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From Ritual to Romance's avatar

As a retired high school teacher, this really resonates. When I started teaching in the '90s, marks and accomplishments still meant something. There were still somewhat objective standards. Gradually over the years, self esteem started to take precedence over standards. One principal actually said to one of my colleagues, "Your job is not to prepare these students for university, it's to prevent them from quitting school." This was in Canada in the mid 2000s. By the time I retired a couple of years ago, I felt that objective standards were almost completely gone. I was ordered to use specific phrases on students who were having behaviour problems and not to discipline them. I was ordered to pass students who did almost no work. I was forced to justify teaching the curriculum at an academic level to students who absolutely refused to attend class or submit assignments (I was told by an administrator, "People are saying that there is simply no way to pass your class"). Meanwhile, gifted and hardworking students in that very same class were pulling marks of 90 or even 100. Students who were struggling were given one-on-one attention until their essays improved (this was a public, not a private school). I told all of the students in the class that I would spend every lunch hour helping them with their writing if they wanted it. Only a few students took me up on it. They all got at least 90% in the course. My "reward" for all of this hard work? The course was cancelled for the following year because so many students dropped it because it was clear that they actually had to do work in order to pass. Unfortunately, that is simply not cool in today's educational climate.

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Donna Partow's avatar

This was wonderful. Brilliantly written and so insightful.

I'm a conservative but look forward to reading more of your perspective. All of my Substack subscriptions are with left-leaning journalists, because I recognize the danger of only listening to people who agree with me about everything. I think that's a big part of what's wrong with this country. We're all stuck in our own echo chambers.

Wishing you great success with this new endeavor.

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