In a controversial move, the Florida Department of Education approved a strategy that would judge student achievement partially based on race and ethnicity.

The plan, approved by the state Board of Education on Tuesday night, calls for 90% of Asian students to be at or above grade level in reading by 2018. It expects whites to be at 88%, Hispanics at 81% and blacks at 74%.

In math, the board expects 92% of Asian students to be scoring at or above grade level, whites at 86%, Hispanic students at 80% and black students at 74%.

Several people have spoken out against the plan, citing it as blatantly racist and setting a low standard for certain minorities, particularly blacks and hispanics. However, the board attempted to justify their actions by claiming they were simply setting a realistic goal based on preexisting statistics.

Cheryl Etters, spokeswoman for the Florida Department of Education, said the disparate numbers are not meant to lower expectations but rather set "realistic and attainable" goals, the Sun-Sentinel reports.

"Of course we want every student to be successful," Etters said. "But we do have to take into account their starting point."

What is your opinion on this? Is it racist to set different standards based on ethnic background, or is it realistic to pay attention to those statistics, even if it creates a distinct separation by race?

(source: usatoday)

It is, and won't last too long. Don't we, as the United States, have laws against this sort of thing, anyway?

Racist, all the way. This is just a load of crap. I'd type out more, but I think it's obvious how horribly stereotypical this plan is.

Say goodbye to racial equality Fl, and hello to stereotypically charged school systems.

>>2>>4 We also need to end affirmative action. Is this day and age it's completely out of place.

Just two words for this: THAT'S RACIST.

I used to live in Florida. I'm black and I can read at a 11th grade level even though I'm only in the 8th grade. so...WTF FLORIDA?!?

WHAT! MY FLORIDA I AM NOT HAPPY WITH U! I AM A FLORIDIAN WHO DOESNT APPROVE!

I need to punch the whole florida board of education in the face.

What the fuck? That's so racist. And isn't Florida also one of the states that want to secede from the Union?
The plot thickens.

Real. That's about as shitty as SOPA.

I'm from alabama and even i think that's racist.

I remember recently we had a problem like this in the U.K. were foreigners were having their English tests marked or even changed by the Exam Boards and teachers (illegally, without knowing anything about it), just so they could pass.

>>1
I really want to know YOUR feelings on this. :3

I'll play the devil's advocate here because this case is being closed way before any of the good stuff really surfaces. Whiteknights, keep your pants on.

Is this racist?
Well, yes of course.
Is this wrong?
Most would say yeah.
So no one could benefit from this?
Perhaps some, but it is unfair.
How is it unfair?
This implies students of one group are being given a standard below par; that undermines them and doesn't challenge them.
But would it statistically apply well by removing the social issues?
It could, but we are humans, not numbers and not machines.
Who else is effected by this?
The students of another group are being given a standard above par; they will be expected to perform better than other students and implies doing so possibly without consideration of whether individuals are capable of achieving those grades.
Sounds open and shut. Why aren't you a good advocate?
Now, now. All we've covered is that it wouldn't be fair because it would put "too much pressure" on one group and "not enough pressure on another". Uneven scales don't seem to be fair; but are we already dealing with uneven scales.
Could this be an attempt at re-calibrating the educational system?
Ah, excellent question! Absolutely. Misguided or misunderstood, this is the result of special interest in making things "fair" by being "unfair", neither of which side can agree that both sides are... both "fair" and "unfair", including the quotation marks for the irony of it all.
What the fuck?</b?
Let's take a step back. Circumstances of all kinds influence us in countless ways all the time for all of time. Quirks to study habits to thinking patterns, its all impression for external environments and forces.
So the goal is to find a way to apply a calculated solution to as many people at once, because it would be nice but unfeasible to take each individual and gauge their personality, lifestyle, background, past scores and grades, etc, etc, in an attempt to determine what the expectation of their scholastic effects should be. Hence, stereotypes, profiling, and racism ensues, but not for social reason. For logic, math, statistics, socially oblivious calculations.

/end advocacy

I wanted to see what the general response was before saying my opinion on the matter.

I don't think it is racist at all, in the derogatory sense. People see differing numbers and racial groups in the same sentence and they automatically assume there is some form of discrimination happening - but seriously, do you think such a thing would even be considered by the entire Florida Board of Education if it was targeted towards suppressing a particular ethnicity?

I actually stated my thoughts on this already, so I'll just link it instead of retyping/copypasting it.

To expand on it, if you think about it, what would you consider equality instead, in terms of goals? You could say you want to increase the educational standard for students equally, and that sounds like the most fair, right?

And that's nearly exactly what's being done here, from the looks of it.

I don't know the exact numbers currently, but the goals are based on the current statistics. Blacks and Hispanics are given a lower goal because they start at a lower percentage to begin with. To use a simplified example, let's say you have 10 cubes and 10 spheres. 3 of the cubes are painted red, and 6 of the spheres are painted red. If you want to increase the amount of red shapes by 10% equally, then you would have 4 and 7. Would you say it's unfair that the goal for cubes is lower than spheres?

Let's analyze the other method though, since apparently people seem to think that is unfair. Let's make the goal for everyone 90% literacy or something. But asian and white students are already nearly there - blacks and hispanics are only at 70-80%! Thus the program seeks to focus on increasing their capability much more than it focuses on asians and whites. But, isn't that also "unfair"?

It all depends on the wording. Did they present the strategy with the percentages as their tagline? Their subtitle, their creed, their main focus? Likely not. It's something that was inferred due to an apparently loaded wording. They hit a trigger with people seeking to be offended, and thus they failed in the public eye.

You wanted my personal opinion on this matter, though:
I think the public outcry is retarded.

I posted this here in an unbiased manner to gauge the response, and to see if anyone would read into it enough to try and see it from the other side of the argument. It sure is easy to side with political correctness, isn't it? Up until your post nobody showed any signs of trying, and honestly I didn't expect any more than that. If anything I hope there is a lesson to be learned here, but I'd find it more miraculous if people bothered to read my entire spiel.

>>15
Read it.
You are right. Apply the idea of a handicap like in golf, or maybe an easier metaphor would be video games. You want everyone to have a good time, to have a good experience that yield learning; in the video game, you would like to enjoy a "fair" game. Some players aren't as experienced, so you would give them a handicap that way they can last longer, learn how to play, and not be dead weight/free points/pissed off and never want to play the game again. The handicap is not fair, but neither was the game in the first place since some players are better than others because they had the resources, experience, training, etc to make them better players; the kid from the bad street doesn't have a console much less that game specifically to improve themselves.
There is a right way which can benefit everyone, if done with good intention and foresight, to use "fair/unfair", "racism/social grouping". Giving different groups different goals allows each group to operate at a level that doesn't hinder or overwhelm the others. And there is nothing that says individuals cannot exceed/fail their or other groups' educational expectations.

Well yeah it makes sense from a mathematical or statistical standpoint, but math and society don't always get along. Like divine said >>14, people can't be summed up by numbers.

And couldn't they find some other way of gauging performance other than race? I don't know, but if I were a black person and knew that people have lower expectations of me simply because I'm of a certain race I would definitely feel offended and treated unfairly.

Can't testing separate people into performance groups? Why is race the only factor taken into consideration? What about financial situation or anything else?

I don't live anywhere near the US, so I'm pretty removed from the situation, but even if it's well intentioned, this doesn't seem like the best idea.

>>17 I think that's a good idea, separating students into performance group and such.

Blacks have been trying to gain equality for a long time. I don't think we should be setting lower standards for them. We should be encouraging everyone to do well, not just be fine with mediocore just because certain races tend to get mediocore grades.
When applying for colleges, if someone isnt as qualified as some asian kid but, oh, compared to other black kids they're grades were good, they shouldn't get in instead of the Asian (although it sometimes works out that way)
They should focus more on the student himself rather than what statistics say about his race.
Let's say a white kid struggles to get a 70 in his english classes, so they put him in a special class to help him out. A black kid is also in that situation but they don't put him in the special class because he's expected to do poorly anyway. That just doesn't seem right to me.
Set the same standards for everyone. If more blacks and Hispanics end up in the special classes than whites and asians, then so be it. In the real world they won't (or at least they shouldnt) get special treatment just because of their skin colour. A job done poorly is still a job done poorly no matter who did it. Being black should never be an excuse for being stupid.

I'm pretty much in the same position as >>17, since I'm not American and therefore removed from the situation at hand. But I don't know, guys... there's something about this policy that just screams lazy...

Going from that golf analogy in >>16, handicaps are needed to give those involved a more even playing field, but realistically, golfers aren't given handicaps because everyone else in their race has achieved a certain standard. Wouldn't handicaps be given depending on the past results achieved by the individual?

Like with students, I think it would make more sense if these standards were to be set depending on what individuals have done, rather than statistics taken from groups of people. In that sense, I agree with bang-bang. It would be better if there were tests to separate people into performance groups.

On another note, being half-Asian myself, I wonder about how those who are half-black or half-Asian would be categorised. Wouldn't they be placed in one racial group, although they're a bit of both? I just wonder who's going to be the judge on whether or not they're part of one race and not the other, and what kind of criteria that judgement is based on. If it's purely on the appearance of a student, there's just something undeniably wrong with that.

You're saying it like they expect less individual effort from each racial group. That's not how it works. They're judging how many of them achieve some goal - and for each individual, regardless of race, the goal is the same: some reading standard, or some math standard.

If a white kid makes the grade but a black kid only gets halfway there they don't consider it a victory because they expected the black kid to make a lower grade. The statistic isn't a grade point average, it's a flat survey of how many in the population meet the standard.

They aren't giving special treatment to anyone in particular, and that's the fact of the matter. What people read is "they expect this black student to only make a 74 in math!" when it's really saying "they expect 74% of black students to succeed." Because statistically, the number is less at the moment, so they're seeking to raise it.

When it comes to something like this there's no way to phrase it without offending someone, I guess. It's realism: more minorities do bad at school than white people and apparently asian people do. If you said you wanted to raise them to the standard of whites and asians, that would be giving them extra attention because the gap is much wider.

Basically, the only way to give all groups equal attention is to set a goal proportional to the current standard, which is what has been done. If this were an affirmative action type of strategy, then it would make sense to give the disadvantaged groups greater attention - but it's not. It's a strategy to improve educational standards in general.

>>20 I was about to argue against that, but after I read your response more carefully and thought about it, I guess I have a fairer grasp on the situation here.

When first reading it, it sounds absolutely horrible, but if you look at it more carefully, you can see that instead of broadening the divide between certain racial groups, they're trying to promote an overall academic equality among students. By having a larger number of students in certain groups succeeding in various subjects, they could slowly but surely bridge the gap.

Yeah... sorry if I've misread anything, I understand it a bit better now.

Hey I live in FL!
Hey im about 3/4 black!
But I have good grades,so this doesn't relate to me!
:)

YES! The Hispanics will get to College even easier! Fuck you white people were taking over the world!

>>21 Yeah - I think the article itself is a bit entrapping too, to be fair. I'm not trying to pat myself on the back or anything by saying I managed to read into it - I caught myself thinking it was racist immediately as well until I gave it more thought.

I feel by various means we've been conditioned to associate numbers and races with discrimination without a second thought. I feel like that's dangerous, as a society, if we ever want anything close to complete equality. It's helping to ignore a problem rather than to solve it.

>>23 That's the spirit?

It sucks for the people who actually try to work hard for school, I'm Hispanic and I don't need someone to lower the bar for me, it's quite pathetic really.

You might be interested in reading the discussion in this thread.

The bar was in fact raised, not lowered. But it was raised for everyone. The bar was already low for Hispanics to begin with.

For the most part, I think seeing this as purposely racist is a bad way to go. I agree with the side that isn't screaming "RACIST, RACIST!".
But, while it isn't purposely racist, how will it be viewed by students?

Special Ed has a similar position. For those of you outside of America, this is for students with cognitive/learning disabilities, behavioral problems, ADHD, etc. to help us do better and keep up to the level of other students. And while I do appreciate the help, I do not appreciate the stigma. "What, are you in special ed?" has become an insult because they have help.
The thing in florida, the purpose is to help the suffering ethnicities, but will it only encourage discrimination by peers?

*have help- need help

i meant need help

>>27 After talking to my friend about it, it seems there are two sides of the argument that I hadn't addressed. The point I made was made to criticize those who would call it racist, or jump on the PC bandwagon, because it halts progress due to nitpicking and being unnecessarily offended over something that is ultimately beneficial.

But on the other hand, you're right: they should have just avoided the wording altogether. It was a mistake on their part to even mention race, knowing that there would invariably be people who misinterpret the statistics. It begs the question of who is to blame - the Florida BoE for making that kind of presentation error, or the general public for being thick-headed and prone to progress-halting sensitivity?

It's because of the latter party that we even have these shitty politics in things that face more obstacles than they need to, but it's partially the former's job to work around them for the sake of the progress they so work for. I guess the fault lies with both sides - this entire debacle is just completely silly on all fronts.

Realistic standards my ass. I'm hispanic and have a college reading level and i'm barely in high school.

Everyone forgets about us Native Americans...

>>31 You are gravely misunderstanding what the standard means and you need to ground your thoughts in reality or at least read the ensuing discussion in this thread.

Where the hell did it ever say "all Hispanics can't read"?

I can agree, to a certain degree that it isn't really particularly racist, though as a couple of people have stated, wording could have been better. (And honestly, setting goals and standards, by race, is a LITTLE racist)

I would like to argue the poit a couple of people are making, which is the point of "Judt because the number is lower doesn't mean that they don't expect more from them." That could be a realistic argument, but in my opinion, untrue. The fact of the matter is, at least to me, setting a lower goal does not promote doing better. Even if they expect/want Blacks and Hispanics to do better, setting a goal or standard for them that is lower than that of Whites and Asians isn't going to help that. If the standard is lower, why would thy work harder to get past that? Lets just be honest, most people would be happier to do less work or not work as hard; so if the standard is lower, why would they bother to go above it?(Unless they just want to prove the goal setters/standard makers wrong?) Bt then the issue with that is, some people might not care. Plenty of people are fine with doing the bare minimum, and while that may not be the best policy to live by, it makes since. Not everyone is an over achiever.

Anywho, that's just my thoughts on it.

XD my brother ream that "race-based alchemy" , mot "race-based academic"