Baltimore: 41% of High School Students in City Schools Earn Below 1.0 GPA
“nearly half of high school students in City Schools earned a grade point average below a D”
Almost half of the students in Baltimore city schools failed to achieve a 1.0-grade point average in the first three quarters of this year.
If a hospital had that kind of success rate, how long would it stay open? At what point does the state of Maryland intervene and fire everyone involved?
Chris Papst reported at FOX 45 in Baltimore:
Baltimore City Schools: 41% of high school students earn below 1.0 GPA
Baltimore City Schools has reached an alarming low in student performance. Project Baltimore has learned, during the first three quarters of this year, nearly half of high school students in City Schools earned a grade point average below a D.
When Jovani Patterson ran for Baltimore City Council President last year, he ran on a platform that included accountability in education.
“They take. They take. They take. Yet, despite the amount of money they get. We don’t see much change. Our schools outspend 97% of other major school districts,” Patterson said during a 2020 campaign ad…
Project Baltimore obtained a chart assembled by Baltimore City Schools. The chart shows the average GPA for every high school grade in the city – freshman through senior. In the first three quarters of this past school year, according to the chart, 41% of all Baltimore City high school students, earned below a 1.0 grade point average. In other words, nearly half of the 20,500 public high school students in Baltimore earned less than a D average.
Is there a better argument for school choice?
children's education dollars shouldn't go to a monopolistic institution regardless of its performance or families' preferences
families should be able to take their children's education dollars elsewhere
fund students, not systems. pic.twitter.com/wpet35AKJj
— Corey A. DeAngelis (@DeAngelisCorey) July 14, 2021
The district blamed the pandemic in a statement to FOX News:
“Consistent with the experience of many school districts across the country, the COVID-19 pandemic created significant disruptions to student learning,” the district said in a statement to Fox News. “As early as the summer of 2020, City Schools identified large numbers of students with decreases in their grade point averages and classroom performance when compared to past performances.”
These students are being cheated, and so are the taxpayers. All I can think of is this scene from the 1989 movie Lean On Me:
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Comments
Close to 100% Rat run city for decades and majority black, so this is clearly the fault of white Republicans.
I’m curious what the % is with a 2.0 or below or how many with a 2.0 or higher can read or do math at grade level.
Any electorate that keeps choosing race hustler Kweisi Mfume (Frizzell Gerald Gray) over Kim Klacik deserves this.
(Oh, did I black-name him? So cancel me, see if I care.)
All public schools have lowered their standards to a large extent. Baltimore is just one of the extreme ends, like NYC. NYC and Baltimore also have the highest per pupil budgets.
I bet it is less than 5%. Of course, the school isn’t gonna fix any problems. They are just gonna start artificially passing more kids.
I worked with a principal who told teachers that all students should get either an A or a B in every class. I chose not to go along with the principal but with the principles I was raised with and taught in my 20th century education classes–I would work with any student (outside of class time if necessary) to bring him/her up to the level that they needed to be or beyond to earn that grade but I served no purpose if all I did was “give” grades. I even made the statement that he had the ability to override my grade if he saw fit but that his name and signature had to be included in the student’s permanent record indicating that MY GRADE was this and HIS GRADE was that.
Gotta keep that school score up. Screw the kids actual education.
My first post in a public school involved a lot of kids moving on when I failed them. I started at a private school where the principal apologizes to me but said he had to get a new chemistry teacher because the wrong kid got a B.
That stuff is rampant everywhere.
Unions just push them through.
Them they push free college on them.
It starts at home. Govt isn’t going to fix it.
“I’m curious what the % is with a 2.0 or below…”
Either Obama.
Paddy,
Indeed. An abject failure by the d/progressive teachers in a d/progressive city, in a largely d/progressive State, their weak r Gov notwithstanding.
Baltimore ranks 11th in terms of large metro education spending. Funding isn’t the issue.
Competence and a commitment to genuine education v time marking and indoctrination on the part of teachers and a lack of standards or accountability on the part of the ed administration, school boards and the parents of these children.
Vote these clowns out of office. Prepare your child for the school day, ensure they show up sober, clean, respectful of authority and their peers, ready to learn.
Do those things, then we can discuss additional resources. Demonstrate that the parents and taxpayers of Baltimore have made every effort within their ability. Then and only then should you ask for help.
Wait until CRT boosts their scores.
America will still be burdened by the lack of skills, but man! Just look at that self-esteem!
I just threw up in my mouth a little bit.
Sorry, but there is no self-esteem when you get something for nothing. Sure, there may be temporary euphoria but reality sets in eventually. In my experience, students know when sunshine is peeing on their leg and claiming it is rain. It may not immediately stink but the stink will come, especially when it’s too late to change it. I never was real big on standardized testing except that it did make some teachers actually teach, especially when their scores were published within the school. There were more problems with this kind of testing, especially in assigning students to classes. The top students (who would pass the tests anyway) were being assigned to the do-nothing teachers in the good graces of those administrators and those actually teaching all the time got the lowest students and problem kids. Works much better when the SCHOOL or DISTRICT is identified for its shortcomings!
The whole system would work better if EVERY teacher is expected to teach EVERY minute of EVERY class without fail! An honest day’s work for an honest day’s pay!!
Curious–does anyone know how many states have updated their core curricula to include CRT into each curricular area?
TY 20k20,, I really appreciate reading about personal experience. Teachers have it rough, absolutely, well those that GAS.
Louisiana has not. You can see our state standards by searching “Louisiana Believes State Standards”. The state doesn’t mandate curricula, though they tie funding to a “tier 1” curriculum. They decide what is tier 1 and often the choices are limited.
You ought to leave a little space for the other contributor, that blacks are lower IQ on the average. The lack of accommodation for black needs, for instance teaching good character as something that works to achieve status, is the major problem. Resentment gets you zero jobs in real life; good character gets you lots. That’s the schools’ chief fault.
Also that frees up time to actually teach those who can actually learn, without destructive acting out, fighting and status-seeking taking over all the attention.
IQ is not the problem. In my youth my IQ was measured at 89 (below average) and I have two engineering degrees and a masters in mathematics. IQ scores are pretty useless.
The real problem in the American black community is cultural. Fatherlessness and substance abuse are common in poor black communities, and those are a double whammy to poor kids. It also does not help that rapists, drug dealers, pimps and murderers are seen as heroes (think BLM). Regardless of race, upwards mobility is at least partially dependent on upwards admiration, and holding a street thug up as a role model is a recipe for disaster.
It also does not help that many black leaders use racism as a tool to keep American blacks enslaved to policies that are destructive and counter-productive. In the book Uncle Tom’s Cabin, the fictional Simon Legree was at least horrified (subconsciously) by his cruelty. I doubt that Maxine Waters and others like her have ever lost a minute of sleep over the death and destruction they have caused.
And a lot of these kids refuse to get educated cause it’s whitey’s system.
IQ and other standardized tests work pretty well on the higher ends. However, there’s nothing inherent in the test that can measure whether someone even cares to do well (or cared enough to do well in the years leading up to the test that would form the basis for test success).
Blacks are lower on the IQ scale due to cultural, not genetic problems. The CRT idiots want to say it’s the white man’s fault or that the questions are culturally biased because they are about farms instead of gold chains and rap lyrics. The truth is getting someone to care about their betterment must be catalyzed by individual cultural reform regardless of race or some other group demographic. This is why education should be colorblind and individualized rather than parlayed by group think.
IQ tests measure Intelligence, which is 100% genetic, not knowledge – which is learned. Its a *very* different test from, say, an SAT that you can study for and for which cultural problems that result in refusal to study/prepare/work can account.
The only people you can blame for your IQ is your parents. And their parents.
Intelligence is inherited, so, yes – it varies by race. Considerably. And culture has nothing to do with it (well, with one exception: the cultural tendency for cousin-marriage in Islamic culture. Inbreeding will definitely result in lower average IQ).
An IQ test measures your reasoning and problem-solving abilities. I.E. – your ability to learn. And no, it is not 100% genetic. Your IQ is fluid over time and is affected by stress, diet, and other factors.
IQ tests were originally designed to tell how well kids were being taught, that is, to gauge the performance of schools, not students. They were not intended to rain pernicious judgment down on the students, as you choose to do. Think about it this way: if you, an American, were given an IQ test in spanish, how well do you think you would do? Learning affects IQ scores.
IQ tests measure native intelligence plus some aspects of learning. They are admittedly not scholastic achievement tests.
IQ tests have a broad range, plus or minus 20 points. That means that a person with a nominal 100 IQ might score anywhere between 80 and 120 points. It also means that, a 15-point difference between two populations is not significant. That is, the scores are THE SAME. This is basic statistics, a topic poorly understood by the writers of “The Bell Curve.” who argued unconvincingly that American blacks are dumber than whites due to a 15-point IQ difference.
Finally, American blacks are not very black. You can see the difference between photographs of contemporary people and both their ancestors and contemporary residents of Africa. This means that the vast majority of American blacks have white ancestors. If your notion of IQ were to hold true, that would mean American blacks have IQs like American whites.
Valerie, can you toss me a cite on a 20 point margin to the scores? That just seems so huge.
That said, I don’t see how people can argue any intelligence measurement doesn’t have a significant input from experience/environment.
Bravo.
I have spent my life in Engineering, hired a lot of Engineers. I learned long ago that motivation trumps everything–including intelligence. Secondly, the idea that you can measure the incredible complexity that is human intelligence with a single number simply boggles the mind.
Finally, I never reveal my IQ–because it is embarrassing that someone with such a high number can do some of the dumb things that I have. Fortunately had a wife that routinely would remind me of such. Miss her every day.
“”I never reveal my IQ–because it is embarrassing that someone with such a high number can do some of the dumb things that I have.””
One thing it is not, is a measure of common sense.
Intelligence quota as in knowledge and developed skills.
What IQ is necessary to pass high school? It isn’t very high.
Anything below 70 is considered whatever the currently politically correct term for “retarded” is. Those kids have a modified set of graduation requirements. Above that kids are expected to be able to read, write, and do math at a 10th grade level. But that’s not a level you’d expect a kid going off to college to be at in 10th grade. Kids’ grades include how much schoolwork they did as well as how well they did it. When a school has that many failing students, it’s often more reflective of how many days the kids show up in school and how much work they do that can be graded. Usually, the first step in “rescuing” a failing school is to crack down on truancy.
I’m with ya. I was able to get out of a school that was similar to the one described, but not quite as bad. It is unbelievably demoralizing for the kids that want to do well.
Say hello to a new member of the Democrat caucus in Congress
You beat me to it.
But you forgot to add: future Secretaries of Defense.
Or a psychopath in the woke army:
Joint Chiefs Chairman Mark Milley Compared Trump to Hitler, MAGA to Nazi ‘Brownshirts’:
https://pjmedia.com/news-and-politics/tyler-o-neil/2021/07/15/joint-chiefs-chairman-compared-trump-to-hitler-maga-to-nazi-brownshirts-n1462038
Ten more years of this, and we’re gonna need a new black national anthem.
My money’s on “Sixteen Tons.”
The question is where are the demarcation points for the GPA? Remember some school districts made “A” extend to 80%, “B” to about 50%, “C” to around 30% … so “D” may be far worse than just flunking.
And a lot of schools keep a 10-point scale but the lowest input grade will be a 50.
I went to a high school where 95 to 100 was an A, 90 to 95 a B, 80 to 90 a C, below 80 was an F … no D’s. They didn’t take shit from students either.
Isn’t a GPA under 1.0 de facto FAILING?
Of course, they won’t fail these students and after leaving school Leftists will make sure they have permanent keepers and social workers to fill out their gummintgimmee forms.
Yes, it is a failing grade (F). But we can’t tell these kids that they are failures because it might irretrievably injure their fragile, snowflake egos. So the media and school system talks euphemisms (eg. “Under 1.0 GPA) to prevent this from happening. Of course, the Baltimore school district will simply wash their hands of these students and issue them all high school diplomas or pass them on to the next grade and avoid the whole issue. Guaranteed.
Public schools need to be outlawed
In other words, nearly half of the 20,500 public high school students in Baltimore earned less than a D average.
You actually mean that nearly half failed their grade level, right? Why talk around the issue 41% of Baltimore high school students FAILED their grade level
The said part is the parents of these failures will claim that they didn’t have any clue as to how their welfare checks, sorry, children, were doing in school and that it is all the Baltimore Public School’s fault that their kid(s) failed.
And remember. This is GPA, which is simply grades, not an actual measure of their ability. Show me the average SAT score and I bet you it will be even worse.
Which is exactly why they want to get rid of standardized tests. Because that’s the ONLY way for students with actual ability to escape these hellholes, by proving on an objective test that they’re far better than their school.
Bet you about 50 percent of them cannot spell SAT.
“Baltimore City Schools: 41% of high school students earn below 1.0 GPA”
That’s ’cause they didn’t axe the right questions.
I’m utterly confounded that so many Americans seemed unable to comprehend that they had a choice of creating an advanced civilization or this devolution into third-world anarchy. I guess King Charles was right when he told Cromwell, in the 1970 movie: “A democracy, Mr. Cromwell, was a Greek drollery based on the foolish notion that there are extraordinary possibilities in very ordinary people.”
Of course, the ignored reality is that royalty doesn’t equate to extraordinary abilities, either. In fact, one of the enduring themes of English history is the absolute stupidity of their rulers.
I watched “The Crown,” a Netflix movie about Queen Elizabeth II. It is a made-for-TV series, but it is grounded on some fact.
The succession was decided well in advance, and her parents controlled her (lack of) education. When her father died young, she succeeded to the throne, and immediately started getting difficult questions about policy. She was so horrified by her own lack of competence that she immediately hired a tutor.
The tutor thought she was dull of wit until he saw her talking with her peers about horses at the racetrack. That was when he realized that her problem was not stupidity, but ignorance imposed upon her by her parents.
If the rest of the series is to be believed, the English monarchy is mostly run by a Deep State that makes the American one look powerless, and that Deep State has worked hard to manage the decline of a great empire.
Liz is the exception, although her greatest accomplishment may turn out to be living long enough to keep her son from assuming the throne.
Narcissists existed back in those days, but they were far and few, save for crazy royals. And unless they were royals, their manifesting their narcissism would get them tortured to death, or starved to death.
We’re headed back to the old days.
where’s the head of the teachers union?
Up her ass.
And that’s after every effort was made to give them better grades.
On the bright side, they all have very high self-esteem and are most likely well versed in the essentials of CRT. And isn’t that all that really matters?
Future fascist street thugs need training. And they’re getting it.
Btw, here’s how the left is going to handle this:
1.0 will be the new “A”, and 4.0 will be the new “D”.
100% of those failing absolutely believe they have a “Right” to a $15 / hour minimum wage.
Oh, and their failure is all whitey’s fault.
Where’s my Reparations?
Most people already knew this fact including the students. If they don’t care – neither do I.
And next election those same failed schools will say we need more money. Liberal do it all the time. Get mail delivered charge more. Can’t make a profit charge more. can’t get kids educated charge more. There is never a fix the problem option.
Many, many years ago, when the Chicago Teachers were striking, a reporter asked a teacher “what subject do you teach,?”
Response: I teaches English.
For some reason, I still remember this.
I’m old enough to remember an article in the Washington Post about the competence of District teachers. The photo at the top had a local civics “educator” standing in front of a blackboard upon which she had written: CIVILE RIGHT.
This was years before Dan Quayle’s potatoe.
It is ironic that the OP mentioned Joe Clark and the movie “Lean on Me.”
Clark was hired by the Baltimore City Public Schools to clean up what was then Clifton Park High School in Baltimore. The school was relatively new, but was plagued with low performance, rampant theft and violence. The School Board thought Clark would clean it up.
He met so much resistance from students, teachers and even the school board that he resigned, leaving the school to its fate. It has never been the shining light of education it was intended to be. The technology that was the centerpiece was stolen. The best teachers that transferred in to the school to teach were attacked physically and threatened. They left as well.
The current state of the school system in Baltimore is the result of decades of policies that focus on everything but education.
Kids don’t stop being in gangs when they walk into a school.
A couple of months ago this same group audited 1 school in baltimore … They highlighted 1 kid … A black kid about to graduate… They discovered he was graduating after having passed just 3 classes in 4 years … With a GPA of just 0.13… He was graduating in the top 1/2 of his class … With a 0.13 GPA
Do not assume that the failing Baltimore schools are all that different from the rest of the public schools in Maryland, including the ones in the “best” districts.
I made the gross error of putting my elementary school kid into Swansfield Elementary in Columbia, Maryland, home of one of the higher-income average populations. I enrolled him in the after-school program because I worked, just as I had done at Sacred Heart Academy in Chicago.
Swansfield was chaos every day. Opening the front door to that school in the afternoon meant getting hit with a wall of sound like a bar with band.
Unlike the parochial school, the staff of the after school program specifically stated that they weren’t there to oversee homework at any time.
The teachers told the kids that it was important to get good grades, so that life would be easier on them in high school “when it counts.” My little rational utility maximizer immediately concluded that homework was not required, so he did not turn it in. I never got a call, or any other notice that his work wasn’t getting turned in.
Then, they decided he needed remedial classes. I told them no, put him in a real math class. I was able to override their judgment, and that’s what finally turned him around — the kid was getting repeats from stuff he’d learned two years before, and he was bored out of his skull.
I put my younger kids in private school in the same area, which worked much better.
Here’s my guess as to what happened here. Corrections welcomed.
Before pandemic, students were given passing grades if they came to class at least half the time and did not assault the teachers. Many of them learned next to nothing, but everybody went through the motions of what is supposed to be “education”.
After pandemic, it was “online”, and many students did not bother to even log in more than a couple of times, probably in many cases not at all. Teachers could not pretend that students who had not even shown up virtually had learned anything, so the teachers were forced to give the students the failing grades those students mostly deserved before the pandemic.
I can’t say for sure, but the kids were probably passed up in grades or to the next class despite failing.
It would really surprise me if the attendance reporting was checked against anything other than the teacher’s honesty.
Who cares if they learn anything? Certainly not the teachers’ union. The union is happy as long as the students are properly indoctrinated so they will graduate to become committed Marxist socialists.
They need to import some black kids to up the overall average
everyone knows white kids are dumb
Every Child Left Behind to meet diversity, inequity, and exclusion goals.
Another headline could be
“For Democrats mission accomplished”
“We’re going to talk to their folks” (from the movie clip) – problem is around 5/6 of these kids have a welfare Mom and no Dad – that’s the proverbial elephant in the room that people don’t want to talk about, but it’s a complete waste of time discussing this issue without pointing to it.