Honors, But No Graduation
Joanne Jacobs asks the right questions about the Atlanta Journal Constitution story about an honors student who wasn’t able to graduate with her class.
Brittany Hemphill did not pass the English/language arts portion of the test that Georgia requires for high school graduation. Apparently both the school and the state superintendent signed off on a waiver that would allow her to graduate with her class, but the state school board has not yet approved the waiver request. The board does not meet again until June 9 — almost two weeks after graduation day.
Jacobs notes:
The story is focused on the student’s disappointment. Hoping for a waiver, she’d invited out-of-state family members to the ceremony. The story doesn’t try to explain how someone who lacked the skills to pass an English Language Arts test in five tries nonetheless made the honor roll. Is she a math-science ace but weak in English? Or maybe the high school expects little from students and inflates its grades accordingly.
Ms. Johnson cc me in her reply to Joanne Jacobs.
Dear Ms. Jacobs: Thanks so much for your response to the article about my daughter and for asking a very key question regarding this case. In my response to statements made by other readers in the “Vent” section of the on-line AJC, I did point out that there were key facts surrounding my daughter’s case that were either omitted or incorrectly stated in the AJC article. To answer your question, Brittany’s strong areas all throughout school have always been Math and Science, and as such, there are actually 5 graduation tests, of which she passed the Math, Science and Social Studies tests with no problem on her 1st attempt during her junior year. She has however always had challenges with Language Arts, where she has received remedial services all throughout school, of which Atlanta Public School Officials were aware of and even provided services to her in preparation for each attempt for this specific section of the test. In order to even be eligible to submit the variance to the state board (referred to as waiver in the article), she had to meet a set of very strict guidelines that are mandated by the state, to include passing another very difficult Language Arts test that was also administered during her junior year. As it turns out, she was in fact the only student from her school who met the guidelines to even be considered for the variance submission, of which the superintendent and principal signed off on, however they are also the same ones who revoked her privilege to participate in the ceremony just a few days before they were scheduled. This came after these same individuals had sent official written notification home to us stating that she earned the privilege to participate in the graduation ceremonies with recognition for distinct honors, while they had full knowledge of this one particular test score at the time the notice was sent, however they chose not to disclose to us, all for them to come back just a few days before graduation and say, oh by the way, we have had your scores for the past several weeks, but we chose not to release them until today and as such, we are revoking your privileges to even participate in the ceremony. When I in turn challenged the school district all the way up to the superintendent based on how the case was handled, the fact that the variance had been approved and submitted by them based on her meeting the strict guidelines mandated by the state, my extensive research which revealed that she was actually eligible for graduation even without passing the particular test in question, and that there were apparent mistakes and flaws in their “policies” and enforcement of such, I therefore asked them to grant permission for her to participate in the ceremony accordingly (which in fact was the basis for the “exception” that was requested), and they in turn brushed us off as if we were the inconvenience and the response from several officials was “we made mistakes, but we are not bending from our policy”. Needless to say, this puts it very mildly, and the outcome was the child was left penalized and devastated, and sadly enough, she is not the only student that this has happened to. What this case in fact represents are various noted failures within Atlanta Public Schools and the tragic impact that it has on its students. What’s also of note is even without passing this particular test, my daughter still met the requirements for “graduation” based on the 3 types of graduation credentials as reflected in Atlanta Public School’s policy statement and as mandated by the State and Federal government, however Atlanta Public Schools has chosen to go against their own policy by totally ignoring one of the three credentials, even though most other school districts in the state of Georgia and around the nation recognize it as an earned credential and as such, they still recognize those students as graduates and allow them to participate in the ceremonies accordingly.