hunterbishop.com

This article in the Honolulu Star-Bulletin Sunday detailed the growing debacle that is No Child Left Behind in Hawaii. Slightly more than one-third of the state's public schools managed to meet proficiency standards on the state tests mandated by the federal government.  Not one school in Puna met the mark, but the Puna schools aren't the only ones failing to make the grade. Every school but two in the Hilo District, including even the vaunted Waiakea complex -- elementary, intermediate and high schools -- are on this year's "failed" list . Ernest  B. DeSilva Elementary School  and Kaumana Elementary claimed the only passing grades in Hilo . It means that millions more will be spent on mainland consultants who converge on the chronically failing schools with cookie-cutter plans designed to boost students' math and reading scores. A few months ago Gov. Linda Lingle threw up her hands and suggested lowering the state-set standards on the tests in a remarkable departure from her usual commitment-to-excellence approach. Perhaps a better tack would be to end the practice of failing an entire school because one small segment of the student population doesn't do well.  My own experience with Hilo Intermediate School, which has never made the grade, and where a full year of the mainland-expert treatment didn't make the desired difference in the school's performance, is that valuable vocational curricula like shop classes  get eliminated in the emphasis placed on gaining proficiencies in math and reading. It's a short-sighted madness to focus on the core skills in isolation when a wider variety of offerings is needed to meet the wide variety of students' educational needs. A student who struggles through school or drops out without meeting the expected standards of proficiency  has nothing in the end, but a student who learns enough reading and math skills while learning how to build your kitchen cabinets, or fix your car, will have a self-respecting, contributing role in society when he or she is graduated from the public schools. And here's a final thought, maybe the mainland experts should be graded, and paid accordingly, if they swoop in with their fancy plans and fail to get their job done as well.