Student Progress Report - Central Union High School District: Fill & Download for Free

All right, so your daughter is in my class, okay? High school English. Let’s say she’s a sophomore.You expect me to prepare your child to be ready for either college or a career when she gets out of high school, right? That’s my job. I’m supposed to teach her how to read and write to prepare her for that.How will any of us know that I’m doing that? Or that she’s performing at a level of proficiency that shows she’s ready for that?That’s what standards do.Standards don’t tell me as a teacher that I have to teach Huck Finn or Animal Farm. They simply lay out standardized skills and content and explain what proficiency in those skills and content look like.As a teacher, I had tons of freedom to decide what texts, what units, what projects, what lessons, what instructional strategies I wanted to use to get your daughter to those levels.Let’s say a standard says this: “Students can analyze how complex characters (e.g., those with multiple or conflicting motivations) develop over the course of a text, interact with other characters, and advance the plot or develop the theme.”[1]I could do this with a lot of literature. I might choose to have the students read Shakespeare’s Othello. Whooo boy are there some complex characters with multiple and conflicting motivations, and some incredibly dynamic interactions with other characters to advance the plot! Themes of revenge, of broken marital trust, all sorts of awesome stuff. Dirty jokes abound that would get me fired if the students actually understood them, but hey, classic text, right?Your daughter could show me her ability to analyze all of that in lots of different ways. She could draft a poster. Write a paper. Illustrate a graphic novel or make her own film adaptation. Those are just a few ideas. I have lots of freedom to give her assignments. I could give her lots of freedom to choose those assignments.The standards tell me (and her) what skills she needs to have and at what level she needs to show me she can meet those standards.Now, let’s say you get a new job towards the end of your daughter’s sophomore year. Your company is downsizing and transferring you from Wisconsin to North Carolina. It’s a bummer for her, leaving all her friends and all. But, you have to go.What happens to her education when she gets to North Carolina, and all of the sudden, the standards are all really different?She gets to school and finds out that in Wisconsin, she had to do geometry and algebra by the end of her sophomore year, but in North Carolina, she’s already supposed to have had trigonometry her sophomore year and her junior year, she’s supposed to do geometry, which she just took. She hasn’t taken trig yet. Does she get stuck with a bunch of sophomores in her new school when she’s a junior? Does she repeat geometry?What if North Carolina’s standards figure she’s supposed to have mastered a whole bunch of skills and concepts that Wisconsin doesn’t even have in their standards at all?And what if Wisconsin’s standards are aligned with local businesses and colleges, but North Carolina’s haven’t been revamped in twenty years and don’t address things like basic computer literacy?That’s a problem, right?That’s precisely where the Common Core Initiative came into play in the early 2000’s.A little history lesson is in order.In 2001, Congress re-authorized and amended the Elementary and Secondary Education Act of 1965, or ESEA. You’ll better know that re-authorization as No Child Left Behind. (NCLB was replaced in 2016 with another re-authorization of the ESEA called the Every Student Succeeds Act.)One of the key focuses of NCLB was that it massively expanded the amount of data gathered by schools, through testing and through other means. This was compiled by the federal government and state governments, and was supposed to help teachers identify areas of proficiency and weakness for students. It tied funding to standardized testing, and required schools to make an adequate yearly progress (AYP) goal. Failure to meet the AYP meant massive loss of funds.But it also left all that testing development up to the states, and left it to the states to set their AYP goals.And it said nothing about standards. States could (and did) have wildly varying standards. Maryland required teaching trigonometry. Neighboring Virginia didn’t.A number of organizations were formed to help make sense of this sudden treasure trove of data. One of these was the Grow Network, founded by Rhodes Scholars David Coleman and Jason Zimba.One of the key problems they ran into was how to compare various states when the standards were completely different. Another key problem was that all of this data was still essentially useless in helping schools figure out how to get students successful for college and career readiness in the 21st century.The last major push to create standards had taken place in the late 60’s. They’d been amended piecemeal since, with one major reform push in the 80’s and 90’s, but other than adding some degree of technology skills, the patchwork set of standards from state to state were woefully out of date with modern career and college expectations and wildly different from state to state.And those standards were often so expansive that no teacher could possibly address all of them in a single year. So, teachers often had to pick and choose which ones to address, and had to focus on hitting as many as possible at relatively shallow levels of proficiency, rather than requiring deeper mastery of fewer essential standards.The standards also tended to be rather vague. The Wisconsin Model Academic Standards were still in use when I was in undergrad. We spent several weeks of one of my courses during my Methods of Teaching semester (five classes taken simultaneously that had an intensive focus on how teach secondary ELA,) on just how to break down the standards and turn them into usable guidance.Coleman and Zimba aimed to fix all that.Their goal? Work with business and college leaders, educators, administrators, everyone who had a stake in public education, and develop a set of modernized standards that could be adopted everywhere. Not from a federal top-down mandate, but a grassroots state-led coalition.They started the Common Core State Standards Initiative in 2008, laying out an ambitious plan in an essay to the Carnegie Corporation for clearer, fewer, higher standards.They wanted to focus on real-world applications of literature, math, and science, and bake those right into the standards. What would the students have to do in college and careers? That was what should be in the standards. Practical work.Coleman and Zimba found that lots of people were interested in this idea. The Council of Chief State School Officers immediately signed on to be a part of it. The National Governors Association signed on in a wide rare moment of bipartisan support for the initiative, loving the state-led approach. Coleman flew to Seattle to pitch the idea to Bill and Melinda Gates for financing. Bill was immediately supportive of the idea, and proceeded to pour a great deal of funding into the initiative. Policy institutes ranging from the progressive Center for American Progress to the conservative United States Chamber of Commerce jumped in.Jeb Bush made it a central push of his education plan in Florida. Mike Huckabee was an early supporter and championed the standards as a way to improve education nationwide.Even the American Federation of Teachers, the nation’s largest teachers’ union, jumped on board and hailed the effort as “essential building blocks for a better education system.”Honestly, this looked like one of the first times when everyone was on board. Teachers. States. Businesses. Colleges. Everyone.Seriously, when was the last time the American Federation of Teachers and Mike Huckabee were on the same side of anything? That’s how much everyone involved thought this was a great idea.The people working on the initiative were hopeful that they could maybe get a dozen to fifteen states to sign on initially, if they were really lucky. They expected more like ten.More than thirty-five signed on almost immediately.Arne Duncan, the Secretary of Education for the Obama Administration at the time, saw this as a golden opportunity to improve the failings of No Child Left Behind while working on a replacement law, and got Congress to authorize a big pot of money and No Child Left Behind waivers for states willing to adopt any set of new, updated standards that even resembled the new proposed Common Core. All but two of the remaining holdouts (Rick Perry in Texas, and Sarah Palin in Alaska) jumped on board to get the federal dollars and NCLB waivers.So, from 2008–2011, the Initiative worked to create draft standards, starting with mathematics and English/Language Arts. This was not done in secret or behind closed doors, but the nation kind of had some other things dominating the news cycles at the time.And in the meanwhile, the Tea Party, deeply mistrustful of all things federal, came to the national forefront.So, when states started enacting the new standards in 2011 and lots of federal dollars went to it, Tea Party Republicans lost their minds about it.Insane conspiracy theories spread like wildfire about these new standards, which from the Tea Party’s perspective seemed to apparently just arise from nowhere. They must be a secret George Soros project to indoctrinate children with liberal, progressive values! Any wacky or ill-conceived assignment became examples of “Common Core Curriculum.” (Again, remember - the standards don’t require of me as a teacher anything about curriculum such as lesson planning or assignments or projects.) Irate parents started yelling at school boards about the elimination of teaching cursive handwriting, even though no state required it in their standards prior to Common Core adoption.This literally became the issue that in 2012 unseated one of the most conservative Representatives in the House at the time, Eric Cantor of Virginia, who supported the standards.And that’s where we are today.I headed up CCSS implementation in several districts from 2012–2014. We spent a lot of time with our local CESA district (a regional school support organization in Wisconsin,) working on constructing curricula around the new standards.The first good thing about them is that there are simply fewer standards, and just make more sense than the old standards. They’re more workable and clear.For example, here’s the old Wisconsin Model Academic Standards from the pre-CCSS days. They only advance in requirements every four years of education; 4th grade, 8th grade, and 12th grade. Here’s B12.2, on writing standards for high school seniors:B.12.2 Plan, revise, edit, and publish clear and effective writingWrite essays demonstrating the capacity to communicate knowledge, opinions, and insights to an intended audience through a clear thesis and effective organization of supporting ideasDevelop a composition through a series of drafts, using a revision strategy based on purpose and audience, personal style, self-awareness of strengths and weaknesses as a writer, and feedback from peers and teachersGiven a writing assignment to be completed in a limited amount of time, produce a well developed, well organized, clearly written response in effective language and a voice appropriate for audience and purposeNow, here’s a roughly equivalent standard from the Grade 12 ELA CCSS:CCSS.ELA-LITERACY.W.11-12.5Develop and strengthen writing as needed by planning, revising, editing, rewriting, or trying a new approach, focusing on addressing what is most significant for a specific purpose and audience. (Editing for conventions should demonstrate command of Language standards 1-3 up to and including grades 11-12 here.)The new standards for ELA (English/Language Arts) are bundled differently, but cover essentially all of the same ground. For example, the WMAS standard requires timed writing. The CCSS also require timed writing, but in a different standard section.The CCSS advance every year until high school, and then 9–10 and 11–12 are joined, unlike the WMAS, which advanced every four years (in conjunction with the grades when students were required to take the standardized tests.) The CCSS build skills more progressively and provide a clearer, more incremental road map for students and teachers to follow as a result.The language is clear enough that with minor modification, I was able to make them into learning targets specifically for my students and their parents to have for each unit, so they could see precisely what we were supposed to be learning and at what level they were expected to do it.Our department replaced a few older texts with newer ones and shifted a few around. Romeo and Juliet got moved to freshmen from sophomore English. Huck Finn got ditched mostly because students just hated reading it. We replaced it with a unit of literature circles where students got to read a novel of their choice from among five selections, such as The Bluest Eye and A Lesson Before Dying.We added a sweet biotech research unit to the sophomore curriculum. The students got to debate the Bill of Rights in their junior year.All of that met the new Core Standards. None of that content was mandated by them.One difference in the new standards was a push for more “informational literacy,” not just non-fiction, but texts like scientific or technical writing: the kinds of things students might see in a college or workplace setting. This was designed to be spread out over the entire core disciplinary areas; ELA would be integrated into science, mathematics, social studies. Students would finally see how content areas and disciplines overlapped, particularly literacy and writing.This was a big part of my job when I taught, heading up cross-disciplinary literacy integration around the district. I worked with elementary and secondary educators to incorporate reading and writing skills as part of their science, mathematics, social studies, history, even art and music coursework. Students got used to seeing standardized writing rubrics across all their classes.This was not originally welcomed with open arms by my colleagues, who were afraid it would add to their already overflowing plates. But, with a little help, it didn’t take long before most of my colleagues saw the value in it and I tried to make it as little extra effort as possible to augment their existing work without just creating more of it. Most of that work centered around providing standardized writing rubrics, having the other educators reinforce what we were already teaching in the ELA classroom, and making sure the students used the same reading strategies everywhere.This has already led to improved results across the board. When students are able to apply the same reading, research, and writing skills from ELA in the STEM classrooms and social sciences, their ability to digest and retain that information is greater. They have a greater understanding how to pick apart a technical manual or draft an effective lab report that others can understand. When their ability to communicate effectively improves, so does their ability to more rapidly pick up other skills and content knowledge. It’s a positive snowball effect that promotes good, lifelong learners.That’s one of those new concepts that came with Common Core. Educational researchers had been telling us this for a long time. The new standards made it part of the classroom.The Standards are just a good way for all of the various states to be on the same page for all of our students, and to have 21st century standards that will prepare our students better for life outside of elementary and secondary education.They are not scary. They are not ideological liberal commie cooties or mandatory indoctrination. They are not a federal takeover of education. They do not kill Mark Twain. They do not require funky math.They’re just better versions of what we already had.Thanks for the A2A, Brian McDermott.Mostly Standard Addendum and Disclaimer: read this before you comment.I welcome rational, reasoned debate on the merits with reliable, credible sources.But coming on here and calling me names, pissing and moaning about how biased I am, et cetera and so forth, will result in a swift one-way frogmarch out the airlock. Doing the same to others will result in the same treatment.Essentially, act like an adult and don’t be a dick about it.Getting cute with me about my commenting rules and how my answer doesn’t follow my rules and blah, blah, whine, blah is getting old. I’m ornery enough today to not put up with it. Stay on topic or you’ll get to watch the debate from the outside.If you want to argue and you’re not sure how to not be a dick about it, just post a picture of a cute baby animal instead, all right? Your displeasure and disagreement will be duly noted. Pinkie swear.I’m done with warnings. If you have to consider whether or not you’re over the line, the answer is most likely yes. I’ll just delete your comment and probably block you, and frankly, I won’t lose a minute of sleep over it.Debate responsibly.Footnotes[1] English Language Arts Standards " Reading: Literature " Grade 9-10

Hi Hinrich ... you sure ask some tough, questions! Good questions, but tough. I am still struggling with the first draft of a short essay regarding your question about philosophy. As for this question, I can't give a good data-driven answer yet, but I felt compelled to write because I was asking myself the very same question tonight while riding home from a drink and chat with some Japanese friends.On that train ride home, I just finished re-reading the last chapter of Eric Hoffer’s The True Believer, and he specifically names the Japanese collective mind as a classic and successful example of the results of a mass movement. He explains that the Meiji era ‘men of action’ wisely knew that the westernization (industrialization) of Japan could not be brought about my the mere introduction of foreign culture and technology, but rather a collective ‘religion-izing’ of nationalism would have to be bred and sustained. The closest Japanese word for this is ‘Nihonjinron’.To some extent, there does seem to be a resurgence of Nihonjinron. I will give a few examples, but you can find much more on debito.org1 - The public news has always been fairly tightly controlled by the Japanese press club, but I’ve noticed an increase of embarrassingly jingoistic news articles extolling the virtues of Japan(ese). The most glaring example that comes to mind is a recent article from the sports page of the English version of the Yomiuri Shinbum, which is not even considered the most right-wing of national newspapers. I remember the article announcing a Japanese as having won a bronze medal, as well as a few quotes from the athlete and some background information … but try as I might, I could find no mention of who actually won the event, or even what was the particular event. The only thing the press deemed important was that the article be about a Japanese who was successful in some international context.2 - A few years ago, just after a Japanese scientist won a Nobel prize, I remember an NHK television news reporter covering one of the nation’s new ‘super’ high-schools for those with a high science/mathematical potential. The reporter asked a young co-ed what was her ambition, and with no hesitation, she said ‘To win a Nobel Prize’. The reporter gleamed with pride, and either he, or a newspaper article that came out at about the same time, said that a Japanese winning the Nobel Prize was proof that Japanese could compete and win against the world’s best. As an educator, I was stunned … not by the young girl, but by the news media’s response. Of course the Nobel Laureate took pains to write a rebuttal saying that science is not about competing to win a prize. The prize is simply one unintended result of a researcher following their own passion, and that passion having helped to make the world a better place. All humans have a competitive propensity (resources, mates, status) and one expression of this competitive drive is seen in our tendency to rank things, institutions, and people … and we often end up placing undo importance of name brand over actual quality. But the hierarchical rigidity of institutions in Japan make this culture particularly susceptible to that mistake.3 - The few television stations in Japan have always provided a steady stream of ‘edu-tainment’ extolling the virtues of Japanese exceptionalism, be it food, anime, robots, history, etc. but it seems to be increasing to the point that even some of my Japanese friends and acquaintances have taken notice of it, and are embarrassed by the blatant propagandazing of Nihonjinron.4 - Public school textbooks are screened and sanctioned by the centralized Ministry of Education. For about 4 or 5 years, I was one of only a handful of native speakers of English involved in the screening and editing process. Many recent textbooks (and corresponding pedagogy) which are supposedly for teaching English, involves content increasingly shifting from cross-cultural contexts to explaining uniquely Japanese culture and traditions to foreigners in English. This might have a two-fold purpose … the marketing of Japan for tourist money, and partially as a strategic counter to China’s Confucius Institutes. Due in part to these Chinese politically funded institutes, Japan is quickly losing the propaganda war in the hearts and minds of large overseas markets, as Japan has no equivalent institutes.5 - The Supreme court has at least twice ruled against public high school administrations for using unreasonable coercion (pay-cuts, dismissal, or suspension) in forcing teachers to stand at school ceremonies during the display of the flag and singing of the national anthem. Just a month or two ago, the most recent ruling of the supreme court was against the Tokyo City School District. Representative of the The Tokyo City school district said it was ‘regrettable’ that they lost their case, but will continue to punish teachers for not following orders. In all likelihood, the City Education officials will indeed ignore the ruling against themselves, because the ruling, like many laws, contain no penalties for refusing to follow the rulings. In effect, this makes such court decisions look like a bit of a Kabuki Show.6 - As in my own case, foreigners are sometimes hired to fill tenure track, full time positions at Universities, with the same obligations as Japanese full-time faculty members — but often with little-to-no intention of giving such foreign faculty the same rights. I’ve seen for myself that neither Japanese labor law, nor labor unions are sufficient to protect the human rights of foreign employees. Partially because of demographics (too few students, too many schools), some strategies schools use to weather the economic storm include replacing full time foreign staff with 'professional foreigners' outsourced from conversation schools, or replacing tenured positions with limited term contracts so that the foreigner can not gain any social currency or a position of authority in the school. To be fair, it is also difficult for Japanese to gain full time tenure.7 - Connected with the decline in population and the aging of society, yesterday’s news announced that in Tokyo alone, there are more than 4 working positions available to each applicant. With the decline in tax revenue from a falling population, the national health-care system and the national retirement pension plan will be at risk. With the flood of immigrants that Europe is now dealing with, you would expect the ruling elite to put 1 and 1 together for the future of Japan. But talk of easing extremely strict immigration law is not even on the table for discussion. I think I remember reading that Japan accepted only .2% of the world’s immigrants last year, but the government is planning even stricter immigration law enforcement.8 - Following a recent ‘recommendation’ from the Ministry of Education, 26 national universities have announced that they will eliminate all departments of liberal arts, humanities, and social sciences … and instead, become technical institutes focussing on applied research and engineering. The short term benefit will be a more immediately practical work force, but the long term cost will be the loss of the next generation of those capable of articulating any critique of the ruling elite and existing system.9 - As of next year, the age at which Japanese will be eligible to vote will most likely be lowered to 18. BUT, students at all high schools and most college campuses will not be allowed to engage in political activities on campus. Combined with pt. 8, (the gutting of the liberal arts), pt. 4, (Japanese oriented English texts), and the fact that youth in any country tend to be less conservative than the older, ruling class, makes me suspect the political leadership of Japan wants to keep the youth as a politically naive and pliable work force. In the near future, I see a strong possibility that in exchange for the right to vote — the youth will also be obliged to serve in a re-militarized Japan, using Korea or Israel as role models. As you may know from the last day or so of political news from Japan, it appears that despite majority opposition, the ruling LDP will ram through changes in the constitution that will allow for a more pro-active, standing army.My guess is that all of the points are a reaction to Chinese expansionism (we Americans used to call it ‘Manifest Destiny’) and Japan’s waning influence in world affairs. In that respect, a resurgence of Nihonjinron may be a necessity of realpolitik.That being said, as I am not part of an American ex-pat community, almost all of my friends are Japanese. I went drinking with two Japanese friends tonight. One of them just returned from a government sponsored stint as a Japanese language teacher in Thailand, and presented me with a book about his experiences which he recently had published. We became friends through a city government-sponsored NPO helping foreigners integrate into Japanese society. The other is a long time friend and fellow community activist, having joined me in activities helping the homeless in Tokyo, mental health out-care patients and severely physically handicapped in Hino City, working with teachers and students in rural Cambodia, and so on. At the Tex-Mex pub where we chatted, one of the guys who worked there was a fellow American who was both fluent AND literate in Japanese (I'm jealous), and as this is the season of community festivals, he had to duck out for a short while and join the other locals to chant and carry the local shrine in the yearly community parade. I talked with some young Japanese guys sitting at the table next to us … fondling their light-sabers. They meet at the pub every Friday to be taught 'the ways of the Jedi’ (actually Japanese sword fencing) by another local American who is a Star Wars fan.From my experience, every Japanese individual is unique in their temperament and skills set, just like every American, Chinese, or German. So I can not say anything that will describe all Japanese without a gross and inaccurate stereotype. But I DO see at least two ‘Japans' in response to your question.At the institutional level, Japan is a rigidly hierarchical society (tatei shakai) that seems to be grounded in the Meiji-era reforms of neo-Confucianism. It is hard for both foreigners and Japanese. Last year, the single greatest cause of mortality among Japanese men between the ages of 20 and 44 was suicide. This is most likely caused by work related stress. As of this year, all companies of 500 or more personnel are required, by law, to provide access to mental health care resources on at least a yearly basis. But like many such laws (corporate friendly at the individual’s cost), the 'mental health care' need not be administered by a mental health care specialist. Institutional Japan Inc. seems to be giving its best shot into once more forging the masses into a state dependent human resource. The tools can be as subtle as the mass media info-tainment extolling Japanese exceptionalism (think America's version as The Discovery Channel's 'Military Hour') to the very blunt insitutionally sanctioned bullying that goes on in the corridors of business 5 Things To Know About Toshiba’s Accounting Scandal and politics Japan Military Bills Provoke Scuffling in Parliament.But at the community level (although rural communities are a glaring exception), there is a lot of cross-cultural exchange, in Japanese and in other languages. Ironically, the same government that is gearing up to face the potential threat of military action with China, is also wooing and depending on Chinese tourists to keep the flagging Japanese economy afloat. Earlier today, I went to Shibuya (only about 30 minutes from my apartment) to watch the latest Bill Murray comedy, Saint Vincent, highly recommend it … and I was amazed at the huge presence of tourists compared to even a year ago. I have mixed feelings about this because the marketing of Japan Inc. has seemed to consign the ongoing nuclear disaster at Fukushima to a mere footnote. Flooding as recently as a week ago has scattered some collected radioactive waste, and the Fukushima power plant had to prematurely flush some ’treated’ water into the sea.The ruling elite seem to be cranking up the collective self required to survive and thrive as a nation. As Eric Hoffer pointed out in ’The True Believer’, this requires the individual to give up their autonomy for the greater good. But even the average citizen seems to be wary. The question is 'for how long' and 'to what degree' the average self-interested citizen can look behind the curtains lowered by a persistent and determined Japan Inc. Large public protests against recent government sponsored bills are made up of a broad cross section of the population — students, housewives, retirees, etc. Though you will not see the equivalent of a Jon Stewart or Stephen Colbert in Japan, educators (as opposed to school officials), community activists, artists, and intellectuals are putting up a good fight for the dignity and sanctity of the individual. Which side will win out in the near future is up for grabs. A lot of the fate of Japan is not in Japan’s hands, but in America’s and China’s.The collective mass-mind seems to be a tool by power elites in any country. Remember how former U.S. President Reagan speech about 'American Exceptionalism' all but ended Jimmy Carter's chance for re-election? I believe that culture, or civilization, is paper thin - not unlike as William Golding wrote in ‘Lord of the Flies’ — or when the power goes down and the lights are out, to paraphrase Harvard psychologist Steven Pinker, all hell breaks loose. As primatologist Frans de Waal says, we are the bi-polar ape … capable of far more kindness, and far more violence than any chimpanzee. I agree with the evolutionary anthropologist Robin Dunbar, that once communities exceed more than a couple of hundred people, we have also exceeded our mental capacity to meaningfully interact with everyone. We then break into warring (or collaborating) factions, or we create competitive hierarchies (how many followers have I gained with this article) in which those who scramble to the top tend to capitalize and dehumanize those at the bottom.My suspicion is that effective 'bands of brothers' or 'Round-Tables of Camelot', tend to be parochial social phenomenon within larger hierarchies. The sheer scale of numbers insures that collaborative circles of equals will always remain dependent on relatively stable, but often de-humanizing hierarchies. Even if the idea of a nation-state as the fundamental unit of identity has outlived its usefulness, the pessimist in me sees only another religious or political mass movement rising to take its place.The optimist in me hopes that there will be more individuals who are autonomous, yet socially mature, and they will see the community as the fundamental unit of identity. My hope is that the spirit engendered by working together in small, critical-thinking, compassionate, collaborative communities will continue to grow. This is my ideal of ‘progress’, but maybe little more than hope as a thing with feathers.edit: Friday, Sept. 25After sitting on this for a few days, I thought I’d pry open a couple of weak points in my own answer. C'mon Quora community, looking for some critical feedback!1 - Even small communities or circles can be rigidly hierarchical, and full of petty politics, bullying, and corruption. So ‘small' does not necessarily mean ‘good’. I have found roughly half of the volunteer groups I’ve been involved with in Japan to be dysfunctional by my standards, and some I left more quickly than others. On the other hand, the more or less grass-roots, voluntary, event-driven collectives … such as the volunteers that spontaneously gathered to help the more than 30,000 evacuees of the recent flooding of Joso City, Ibaraki … or local (some of which are regularly scheduled) events and activities to empower the handicapped or disenfranchised such as the homeless … can be much closer to the ideals I mentioned at the end of my first post.2 - I’m pretty much of a transplanted local country bumpkin, as well as politically left of center, so I am largely ignorant of the possible positive impacts of the multinational corporations. Reading transcriptions of China’s Premiere Ji Xinping’s speech in the U.S., I realized that large multinational corporations that I tend to distrust, (Volskwagen, are you listening?) are a double edged sword with a positive edge. For example, even though Japan and China are ramping up their military machines, much of Japan’s ‘Abenomics’ is depending on tourist spending, the bulk of which is from China. And I assume that there are some Chinese business interests dependent on a fiscally stable Japan. If we can take Premiere Ji Xinping for his word, the U.S., China, and the rest of the world have too much to lose by military conflict, and much to gain by mutual business interests.That being said, I don’t think this model is infinitely sustainable because the Malthusian Principle of populations outstripping resources still seems to be valid. The earth has a limited base of natural resources from which all economies are ultimately derived, so I don’t think we can completely escape the danger of zero-sum end games.So if we have a future, in addition to boots on the ground - community level collaboration, it’s also a high stakes race between emerging technology and its unintended environmental consequences — Jade Rabbits verses the quickly melting Galapagos tortoise of the polar icecap … or another Fukushima. Still hoping … damn it, Volkswagen .. still hoping.

NEET is UnconstitutionalActually let me correct you regarding the question, not only according to TN even according to the recalled judgement of the Supreme Court in 2013, NEET is unconstitutional and is against state autonomy.But the majority judgment by Chief Justice Kabir and Justice (now retired) Vikramjit Sen had differed, holding that NEET would deprive the States, State-run universities and medical colleges, including those enjoying the constitutional protection, of their right to admit students to MBBS, BDS and postgraduate courses as per their own procedures, beliefs and dispensations. “In our view, the role attributed to, and the powers conferred on, the MCI and the DCI under … the Indian Medical Council Act, 1956, and the Dentists Act, 1948, do not contemplate anything different, and are restricted to laying down standards which are uniformly applicable to all medical colleges and institutions … to ensure the excellence of medical education …” the majority judgment had held. [1]TN has the highest number of state run government medical colleges in India. It was the dream of the successive state governments irrespective of the political party, to have one government medical college in each district of TN and they are marching towards their goal by getting the nod for 6 more government medical colleges to be built in 2020. [2] All this was only possible through the tax contributed by the people of TN and electing progressive governments who built colleges instead of spiritual places.Now the central government wants to control the admission process for the state run government medical colleges is unfair to the state and its people. This infrastructure in TN did not come about in a day, and for the center to control the admission process once we have the infrastructure ready to facilitate the people of the state and not contributing towards the infrastructure is injustice to the people of TN.NEET is Social InjusticeThe reservation system is not followed in NEET and it is alleged that 10,000 OBC seats of UG, PG and other medical courses have been denied in the past 3 years under AIQ. TN has one of the highest reservations in the country at 69% and this needs to be followed in state surrendered seats to AIQ as well which has not been followed in the past 3 years.Alleging that out of 8,800 seats surrendered by States, not a single seat was given to OBCs, the AIADMK in its petition said all the seats were transferred to the general category which was unjustified and unconstitutional.The petitioner further alleged that the OBCs were robbed off 10,000 seats in the last three years at least and many more during the preceding years."The Union of India cannot be permitted to turn a blind eye when a significant number of meritorious OBC students are denied seats in the State captured seats in All India Quota," the AIADMK contended. [3]There was a 90% fall after NEET was introduced in TN in 2017–18 wherein the Tamil-medium students who secured a medical seat fell from 438 students in 2016–17 to just 40 students in 2017–18 which is gross injustice to the students from the government schools of TN who readily serve people in the rural and tribal areas of the state.While 456 Tamil-medium students got admission in 2015-2016, the number stood at 438 in 2016-2017, the year NEET was introduced in the country. The Centre had, however, exempted Tamil Nadu students from the exam in the first year due to opposition from the former chief minister late J Jayalalithaa.In the first year of NEET in Tamil Nadu in 2017-18, the number of students who got admission to government medical colleges fell to just 40, almost a 90 per cent fall from 438 the previous year, details obtained through the RTI query showed. It improved to 88 in 2018-19. [4]NEET is Anti-poorIn the year 2019, only 1.6% of the students who didn't attend coaching classes for NEET secured a medical seat in government medical colleges in TN. This shows that the other 98.4% of the students spent lakhs together to attend coaching classes for NEET. Now only the rich and the city bred students have access to NEET coaching centers. The poor villagers and tribal people who live in the hills neither have the money nor the access to coaching centers to crack NEET.Also, 66.2% who cleared NEET in 2019 took more than one attempt to clear NEET. Now you should know that only students who are supported economically by their parents can afford to drop an year or two to prepare for NEET and students from poor economic conditions have to give up their dream of becoming doctors owing to their family's socio-economic conditions.The data submitted by Additional Advocate General P.H. Arvindh Pandian showed that a total of 3,081 candidates got admitted in MBBS course in 23 government medical colleges in the State this year.Of them, only 48 candidates had not attended any coaching centre while the rest had taken coaching from various centres. [5]NEET is Not a Measure of Merit or QualityI do not understand this argument from people who support NEET arguing that it is a measure of merit and quality. NEET is just an entrance exam which can be cracked only through paying lakhs to the coaching mafia.The quality of a medical professional is gauged by the performance of the individual in the 5 years of the MBBS course and once the medical professional starts to practice. Just because you cleared NEET doesn't mean that you're a qualified medical professional, you still have 5 years of the course ahead. So, those students who come through class 12 board exam marks have previously cleared the 5 years course and have become qualified medical professionals in TN and are practicing not only in TN but all over the world.NEET is a test of unequals with undue advantages. If you can afford to drop an year or two you're going to clear NEET ultimately by paying a hefty fee for all the dropped years to the coaching mafias. I don't see the point of merit or quality here.“The first-timers have to prepare for Plus Two examinations as well as for NEET simultaneously, whereas students who had already completed their Plus Two could fairly devote their time for preparing exclusively for NEET. The unequals have been treated equally in NEET and the results would speak for themselves. This fact should also be taken note of by the Central government.” [6]Global Study on Standardized TestsAlso, here is a global study which suggests that standardized tests are not a measure of merit or quality.There’s also an ongoing discussion in countries such as the US on whether standardised tests like the SAT should be used at all in deciding college admissions. Research indicates that school grades are a much better predictor of the personality, which in turn determines a student’s actual success. After all, what a standardised test ends up measuring is how socially advantaged a student is – given that access to coaching classes, preparation guides and the like have a massive influence on test scores. [7][8]There is substantial scholarship in the West (Sacks, Freedle, Wells, Camara & Schmidt) that argues that common admission tests cannot measure abilities that are essential for learning such as imagination, curiosity and motivation. [9]Quality of TN Healthcare SystemTN Healthcare System is a world class quality healthcare system and had world class medical professionals even before NEET. TN is known for medical tourism and Chennai is the medical hub of India.Over the years, Chennai has evolved into a medical hub. “Now Chennai has become the mecca of healthcare. We get patients from the middle eastern and SAARC countries. We keep evolving,” said Amar Agarwal, chairman of Agarwal Eye Hospitals. [10]If you would like a measure of the quality of the TN healthcare here it is for your observation.The proof of how well the system works is in the outcome it generates. If the purpose of medical education is producing doctors who provide healthcare for the society, then by all accounts, Tamil Nadu has a good system. After all, the state has India’s best healthcare system that’s been held up as a model for other developing countries by the Lancet report on Good Health at low cost: Lessons for the future of health systems strengthening. [11][12]Here are the healthcare indicators of TN compared to other states.If you consider the number of doctors per 1000 patients then Tamil Nadu tops the list with 4 doctors per thousand patients which is as high as European countries like Norway and Sweden. [13]Only Kerala and Tamil Nadu have achieved the SDG30 target for NMR 12 per 1000 live births; Punjab is close.The below chart is for the mortality rate under 5 years per 1000 births and you again see here that Kerala leads with 11 and the second best is Tamil Nadu with 19. [14]NEET Exams are Unfair and Not TransparentThere have been issues of NEET question paper getting leaked, proxy students writing NEET and issues with translation into regional languages of the question paper.The Crime Branch CID of the Tamil Nadu police have blown the lid off a huge scam in which Plus Two students who appeared for National Eligibility cum Entrance Test (NEET) in the State engaged proxy candidates to simultaneously write the exam for them with the same credentials in other centres and managed to get admission to medical colleges. [15]NEET is not student-friendly, merit-promoting.The NEET paper was leaked twice in the last four years; therefore, there is not much confidence in NEET’s fairness and transparency. Finally, there is the issue of wrong translation. In the 2018 NEET, as many as 49 questions had errors in Tamil translation leading to a Madras High Court order to award four marks for each of the 49 wrongly translated questions, or 196 marks to all 1.07 lakh candidates of Tamil Nadu. The Supreme Court overruled this order as the High Court had arbitrarily ordered giving grace marks to everyone without examining whether the student even attempted such a question. [16]NEET is a Manusmriti Test of ExclusionThere was once a time in pre-independent India when there was a rule that only those who knew Sanskrit were eligible to study medicine to become medical professionals in India. NEET is an extension of that rule there by making sure that only a certain section of the society has access to medical education in India. This not only deprives medical education to certain sections of the society such as the socially and economically backward classes, it also deprives the acess to medical care to those particular sections of the society.Actor Suriya was right in calling NEET as a Manuneethi (Manusmriti) Test.“The government, which is supposed to create an equal playground for everyone, is creating an education policy that is creating inequality among the students. Those who have no understanding of the ground reality of the students from poor and downtrodden families are making education policies. The court, which delivers judgments through video-conferencing due to the fear of coronavirus, orders the students to take exam fearlessly. The deaths of students just becomes a subject of discussions on the news channels for a day. And some ‘Chanakyas’ even engage in heated debates about spelling mistakes in the suicide notes of the students. ‘Manuneethi’ tests like NEET not just deprive our students of opportunities but also takes their lives,” the actor added. [17]Finally Suicide of S. Anitha and 12 other studentsShanmugam Anitha (5 March 2000 – 1 September 2017), was a student from Tamil Nadu, India. She scored 1176/1200 in the 12th standard exams in the Tamil Nadu State Board. This would have secured her a medical seat, if only the State Board marks had been considered for admission. In NEET-UG 2017, Anitha secured 12.33 percentile while scored 86/720 marks.Anitha was the daughter of a daily wage labourer and her mother had died when she was young. She was brought up by her grandmother and lived in a house without even a toilet. She studied in a Tamil Medium school and was amongst the toppers in her district and she was the only student in Ariyalur district to score 100% marks in Physics and Mathematics in the 12th standard examination. Anitha always wanted to become a doctor. She saw that it was not possible for poor rural students to afford expensive coaching needed to prepare for NEET exams and only if medical admission selections were done based on the 12th standard marks alone would rural students be able to get seats. Anitha was unable to meet the cutoff and secure a seat through NEET. Anitha was offered an aeronautical engineering course seat at the Madras Institute of Technology but as she only wanted to be a doctor she did not take up the offer. She would have been the first from her community in her village to become a doctor. [18]It pains me to see students like Anitha and 12 more children from TN who all could have become world class medical professionals have been killed by NEET. We are killing the aspirations of thousands of students like Anitha who come from a rural, socially and economically backward section of the society through a darconian enterance exam like NEET.Footnotes[1] Supreme Court withdraws 2013 order on medical entrance test[2] Tamil Nadu may get six new medical colleges by 2020 | Chennai News - Times of India[3] AIADMK Moves Madras HC Seeking 50% Reservation for OBCs in Medical Courses Surrendered by TN Towards All-India Quota[4] NEET: 90% fall in Tamil-medium students in govt medical colleges - The Federal[5] Data on medical admissions proves NEET is anti-poor, say judges[6] Data on medical admissions proves NEET is anti-poor, say judges[7] Why Tamil Nadu Hates NEET[8] https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/answer-sheet/wp/2013/10/09/the-bottom-line-on-sat-scores-in-one-chart/[9] NEET is not student-friendly, merit-promoting[10] Tracing the transformation of Madras into a medical hub[11] Why Tamil Nadu Hates NEET[12] Good Health at Low Cost 25 years on: lessons for the future of health systems strengthening[13] 6 states have more doctors than WHO’s 1:1,000 guideline | India News - Times of India[14] How fares India in healthcare? A sub-national analysis | ORF[15] Tamil Nadu police blow lid off a huge scam in NEET[16] NEET is not student-friendly, merit-promoting[17] Suriya on NEET: It brings so much pain when students are forced to write an exam[18] Suicide of S. Anitha - Wikipedia