Mid-year class leveling is bad school policy, and high schools should make every effort to avoid it. But apparently it is a routine practice in Klein ISD, and it doesn’t take an expert to understand how harmful it is to a student’s education.
(Note: What follows may interest only readers within Klein ISD.)
Regular readers may remember my oldest son is a freshman at Klein Oak High School. He’s a good student and also is a member of the band. When students went back to school last week to start the second semester, many were handed new schedules — with changes. In Austen’s case, he is taking year-long classes, as opposed to semester-long classes, so there should not have been any changes. And that’s generally how most school districts approach it — any class leveling would have occurred at the beginning of the school year.
But that’s not the case in Klein ISD, where mid-year class leveling appears to be the norm, perhaps even the rule.
It’s not hard to figure out that disrupting schedules is very hard on students, especially freshmen who are adjusting to the whole high school thing to begin with. Just as children benefit from a stable family life, students benefit from a stable school routine — knowing who their teachers are and what is expected. But halfway through the game, Klein Oak changes the rules.
Three of Austen’s classes changed: geography, math, and English. The geography class he was moved to last week is actually two units behind the class he was in last semester (and taught by a coach — another uh-oh)! And the math class he was moved to is unruly, which is making it difficult for him to concentrate as he is supposed to be learning new concepts.
So I went through all the appropriate channels (counselor, assistant principal, principal — although the principal didn’t have the courtesy to even acknowledge my correspondence) to get his schedule remedied, and was told it would not be fixed. Period. Classes needed to be leveled and that was that. Never mind that Austen’s friends (who didn’t have Austen’s counselor and AP) had their classes changed back after parental intervention.
I was assured (in very perky terms) that this was really a win/win situation because the new geography teacher (did I mention he’s a coach?) is a very experienced teacher, but he only had 25 students in his class (hmmmm, why?). And, I was told, the new class isn’t really that far behind. When I commented that repeating work and tests is not what I would call an optimal use of Austen’s school time, I was assured that since he was repeating work, he should make terrific grades.
Really. That’s what I was told.
I don’t think it was appreciated when I mentioned that our legal system has double jeopardy protection, but it would seem Klein ISD students do not.
Here are the reasons I was given for the “necessary” mid-year leveling:
1. KO is a growing high school and as new students have enrolled, class levels have gone out of balance.
My question is, why weren’t new students put in classes where there was room as they enrolled? Why does my child (who has been there all year) get his schedule thrown into turmoil to make up for KOHS’s poor class scheduling?
2. Coaches who teach often have to be accommodated depending on what season their sport is.
That has got to be one of the stupidest excuses I have ever heard. Students’ schedules must be disrupted to make the teachers’/coaches’/counselors’ lives easier and more balanced? What a crock! What a bass-ackward way of running a school district! Coaches who teach should have to accommodate the school’s (as in students’) needs, not the other way around! And it’s a great example of why coaches often make terrible teachers. Their interest is in coaching, not teaching, but teaching is what pays the bills.
A couple of questions that were not answered is why some of Austen’s fellow students’ schedules are being changed this week, even as his counselor and AP refuse my request to fix his; and why the geography teacher he previously had has new students in her class — the class that Austen was taken out of because she had too many students and it needed to be leveled.
Klein Oak HS needs to stop preaching “academic excellence for students” and start preaching “academic mediocrity, for the convenience of teachers.” Because that’s apparently what it’s all about — the convenience of teachers, teachers unions, and administrators, not the education of students.
And Austen is soooo looking forward to second semester next year when he’ll be thrown into schedule hell again, because the assistant principal assured me this happens every year. It’s routine. And not just at Klein Oak, but in all of Klein ISD high schools. Hey, Klein Oak: Way to take a good student who enjoys school, and make him not want to go to school! Go Oak!
(I haven’t even gotten to the huge bond proposal Klein ISD is going to present to voters soon. It’s got some big problems, but we’ll get to that later.)
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