Color-coded student IDs and planners that reveal test results

[Sabriel]

What kind of an insensitive dumb ass would think up a scheme like this? This is right up there with the Georgia school that had different lines at lunch for those on free and reduced lunch.

http://www.ocregister.com/news/students-320604-school-student.html

My favorite line is actually from the follow-up article:

<<An educational psychologist who specializes in student motivation is calling an Orange County high school's system of grouping students by test score "one of the worst ideas ever" to promote learning, while the principal of a neighboring high school with a nearly identical program is defending the practice as extremely effective.>>

[Peregrine]

1. No problem here

We may hurt some feelings or demotivate the unmotivated. Well too F'n bad.

[TalkingDog]

5. You forgot the sarcasm tag

If you leave it off, people might think you are serious.

[SheilaT]

2. My ninth grade social studies teacher,

about half way through the school year, reseated us after every test, with the highest score in the seat farthest from his desk. He'd been telling us all along that he'd be doing it. First time I got the number 2 seat, and after the second test took the number 1 seat and never relinquished it.

Plus, he was a really good teacher.

[proud2BlibKansan]

9. There is absolutely no way I would ever do this

It's positively gross. I'm glad it motivated you but I'm thinking about the kids who were seated in the front who had the low scores. How demeaning.

[liberal N proud]

3. Reminds me of the blue eye / brown eye experiment an Iowa teacher did in the 60's

They use it in corporate diversity education courses.

Once start segregating people, you fence them in and set road blocks to their success.

Those students with different colors because of test scores will be made to think that is all the better they can do and will preform worse because of it.

Another fined example of :wtf:

[Reader Rabbit]

4. That is some seriously F'd up sh*t right there.

I consider myself a hardass when it comes to teaching my students, but this is just obscene.

[Sabriel]

6. Are you talking about the article or the responses?

It seems some people here have no problem with public humiliation in the name of motivation.

[Reader Rabbit]

7. The article itself. Encouraging Social Darwinism. Horrible.

Reminds me of the YA book Whale Talk by Chris Crutcher. The protagonist describes how an elementary school teacher sat his students in order of their grade percentage. The kid who had been brain damaged as a result of child abuse as a toddler was always in the last seat in the back of the room. And that teacher thought that was okay.

And some people on a supposedly progressive message board think that kind of thing is okay, too.

Makes me want to puke.

[CarolusMagnus]

8. This is a terrible system.

I agree with providing incentives to motivate students who quite frankly could not care less about their education. Even if the only reason a student might bother to try to learn something is to get a free ticket to a football game, he or she will have gained more out of it than had he or she not tried at all.

*sidenote: the English language seriously needs a singular third person pronoun to refer to either gender*

However, forcing students to carry color-coded IDs is going too far. While, as the article mentions, a small fraction of the students might feel motivated, the majority of those with the "far below basic" cards will probably feel inferior to their peers and unfairly treated. That the students with white cards must stand in a different lunch line is wholly unnecessary and unsettling. This is forced segregation and is completely unacceptable. Honor societies and other distinguishing merits are completely optional (not to mention the fact that no "dishonor society" exists that all below average students are forced to join) and thus cannot be compared to this color-coding system. Students should be rewarded for their efforts and not publicly criticized when they fail.