MHS accreditation
Marion High School received some good news this past week when it received formal recommendation that its accreditation be renewed.
Team members were thrilled with MHS. They said teachers were using the system as intended. For example, they used test scores to show that students needed to improve their problem-solving skills. Then they used research-based methods to add more problem solving challenges to the curriculum, including physical education, foreign language, and art. Then they used test scores again to show how students had improved.
In the old days (the mid-1990s), some teachers and administrators might have noticed students didn't do so well with word problems. Maybe they would make changes in their own classroom, but it wouldn't be school-wide, and they might not use the most effective way to make improvements.
This doesn't mean the accreditation process is perfect. It's clear that no matter what the state says, accreditation rides on the scores of various state, national, and local assessments. No wonder some principals in Wichita tried to give their students the answers in advance. Even schools that act honestly have, by now, adjusted their curriculums to better prepare students for these assessments.
As one accreditation team member said, our school districts are now in the hands of 16-year-olds, who may not be all that excited about doing their best on these tests. It isn't clear what the district can do about that, other than hope the community helps its young people recognize the value of doing your best, even if it isn't for a grade or nobody sees you.
Nor does it mean MHS is perfect. While the accreditation team was meeting, police officers were transporting a student to a juvenile detention facility on a probable cause charge of possession of marijuana.
The high school can't make these improvements alone. There are many things that affect high school students, including whether or not their mothers drank or smoked while they were pregnant or if their fathers are such poor money managers that they spend summers without running water because the home utilities are shut off. But the school has to deal with challenging students. It is our right to demand the best from the school; it is the school's right to demand the best from us.
But despite these challenges, the high school staff and students deserve our thanks for earning accreditation this time around. We are proud of you.
— MATT NEWHOUSE
