Human Events reports:
The Berkeley (CA) Board of Education will consider whether or not to cancel before and after school Science Labs for Advanced Placement Science classes at Berkeley High School because the classes are attended largely by white students. The proposal is aimed at addressing “Berkeley’s dismal racial achievement gap.”
Berkeley’s AP Science courses are an outstanding success. In a time when we are constantly reminded of the need for American students to get better at Physics, Biology, and Chemistry, 82% of Berkeley’s AP chemistry students passed the national exam. The national passing rate is 55.2%.
The AP classes are open to all students, but because “minority” students don’t “show up” to these lab classes in the same percentage as the percentage of “minority” students attending Berkeley High overall, the classes must be cancelled to close the “dismal racial achievement gap.”
If classes are open to all students, why should those students who choose the harder classes be punished in the name of those students who did not choose to work as hard?
Berkeley High School has a first rate reputation for providing equal opportunity to all students. Unequal outcomes in student achievement are the result of the effort each student puts into taking advantage of those opportunities. Narrowing the “achievement gap” by eliminating the achievers doesn’t help either the achievers or the rest of the students.
This is absurd. The students already have equality of opportunity. Just because some students don’t take advantage of that opportunity doesn’t mean that the opportunity should be denied to those students who do want to take advantage of it.
This is the kind of nonsense that happens when an organization tries to make everyone “equal.” Trying to make everyone “equal” always end up dragging everyone down to the lowest common denominator. When everyone is “equal,” no one is allowed to be smarter than the dumbest person.
The truth is that each person is a unique individual. When presented with a chance to take Advanced Placement classes, some students will take advantage of that opportunity, and others will not. The fact that some students choose to not take the AP classes is not a legitimate justification for cancelling them.
Let’s take a look at that third paragraph again:
The AP classes are open to all students, but because “minority” students don’t “show up” to these lab classes in the same percentage as the percentage of “minority” students attending Berkeley High overall, the classes must be cancelled to close the “dismal racial achievement gap.”
My gosh – that’s just about the dumbest thing I’ve ever heard.
Let’s look at it a third time:
The AP classes are open to all students, but because “minority” students don’t “show up” to these lab classes in the same percentage as the percentage of “minority” students attending Berkeley High overall, the classes must be cancelled to close the “dismal racial achievement gap.”
The fact that there are people in the world who think that this is a good idea is sad.
The fact that people who subscribe to this ideology are in control of the public school system is terrifying.
