Tracking Down a Culprit!

With a certain amount of hoopla, the Mitchell Institute earlier this summer released a report, Barriers 2, which focused on the discrepancy between college aspirations and actual college attendance. Their conclusion: "tracking" in high schools is the culprit. If tracking is eliminated, then college attendance will rise.

"Tracking", for those unfamiliar with the term, is the labeling and then segregating of students by ability level. So for instance, some students will take "college preparatory" courses, while others will take "general" courses.

You may examine the Barriers 2 report in vain for a logical argument connecting "tracking" and (lack of) college attendance. Rather, it appears that elimination of tracking is something on the order of an article of faith, and one either believes or not.

Others have also failed to see the connection.

We're grateful to Thomas Hanson for bringing this set of issues to our attention once again, and for pointing us to Lynne Miller's earlier Portland Press Herald piece on the same subject.

In the Press Herald piece, Lynne Miller, professor of educational leadership at University of Southern Maine, argues that the Mitchell report's solution of de-tracking is simple -- too simple:

So, what is the problem? Is it under-preparation, lack of college financing, disadvantages of class or the suitability of college for everyone? The answer to all of these questions is "yes."

After sensibly discussing these factors, she goes on to challenge the ideology of the State Department of Education:

I believe that when we give the message that everyone should go to college, we are
misrepresenting college and misguiding students.

Her conclusion:

Student academic success begins in elementary and middle school. We have to continue to focus on high school, but we also have to direct more attention and resources to the earlier grades.

If we fail to do so, we may be looking at a high school graduation rate well below its present 75 percent. Then we will have another problem to solve.

Agree with her or not, there's a discussion occurring here that is very important to the futures of Maine's young people.

The Mitchell report, on examination, looks like a construct racing toward a foregone, previously agreed-upon conclusion. The report's recommendations should have close examination and criticism rather than wholesale and unquestioning adoption.