Students don't like it, but high school district says de-tracking freshman classes is working

The comment by Bolles in this article is perplexing. 9th grade Social Studies was not recently de-tracked: it had for years been one level of World Studies and Life Skills, and now is one level Ethnic Studies and Life Skills (to comply with state mandate to include Ethnic Studies). There are NOT multiple levels of this, in the past or present. What is she talking about? AP World History is relatively new, replacing AP Euro. M-A has a history of high pass rates for APs (particularly AP Euro back in the day) and success there cannot be attributed to the freshman class (which has never had levels of difficulty.) Nor was the SES of the AP exam takers broken down to examine how students from marginalized backgrounds compared. The term "high fliers" is so obnoxious!

I'm puzzled.

First, we are told "Socioeconomically disadvantaged students also improved significantly in some of the streamlined classes."

But then we are told "The study ignored other factors, such as socioeconomic status,..."

and finally, admitting that the report lacks validity: "...that with academic rigor, the study could have taken many months to complete."

Why would they spend time and effort on such a meaningless report? Smacks of a PR effort to appease concerned community members.

Detracking Track

SUHSD, after a few weeks of study, has declared their de-tracking of English a success. Perhaps they are taking a page from the SFUSD experiment with de-tracking math. There is an achievement gap, and having failed to raise up the low-achievers, its simpler to cut down the "tall poppies", close the gap, cover up the data... voila... gap narrowed, problem solved!

I write to recommend SUHSD (and PAUSD can learn from them) we go further to close achievment gaps and de-track... track and field. In an effort to foster equity, and improve outcomes for all levels on the playing field, without "slowing down" the swifter athletes. The goal is to boost stopwatch split-times and opportunities for less-athletic students under the theory that all students running together (perhaps using a harness) will improve equity, cooperation, and participation, thus improving student outcomes.

Along these lines, another vast achievement gap, for which again the only possible explanation is in-equity, is glaringly obvious in varsity sports. The district will need to merge the varsity and JV teams together, and indeed merge teams across gender (which is only a social construct as we now know), combinging "men's" varsity soccer with "women's" varsity soccer, and actually merging in the JV and club sport athletes as well.

I look forward to a report from SUHSD "Streamlining Athletic Offerings and Creating More Diverse Field/Court Environments to Increase Student Access and Success" which surely demainds the full 6 weeks of consideration afforded the parallel academic study put forward.

The institutionalized perspective that only a specific type of people are meant to play varsity footbll must be deconstructed.

How is it that admin thinks grades are improving by cooperating? That needs more definition. Is it because the more academic students are teaching the materia to their classmates l in a way the teacher could not? Or is it because of group projects where students can ride along with others? I am struggling to understand how this is working in a way that having honors classes did not. I have seen too many students just copy off of others to buy that something magical is happening other than blunting the curriculum or grading more generously. Is this really for students best interest, or just to increase the number of students SUHSD can say have high GPAs?

Local school districts blind determination to replicate policies that have already failed in other districts remains baffling. Detracking math proved a failed Frankenstein nightmare in SFUSD, damaging the students it was purported to help. But lo and behold, a six week analysis in SUHSD claims a new outcome, unique to the world, with detracking metastasizing to English and science. Jesus wept.

See "California’s Math Misadventure Is About to Go National"
Web Link

I have no bone in this debate: if evidence shows that de-tracking improves learning for students who are not already high achievers, and maintains excellence for those who are, it would seem to be a good thing, a kind of "rising tide lifts all boats" phenomenon.

However, I wonder about the significance of the statistics used in this study: a sentence like "The number of students who took IB English in their junior year increased from 167 for the class of 2017 to 228 for the class of 2024," immediately makes me want to know what the school population was during those years, and how it fluctuated, especially given the disruption of the COVID-19 pandemic. If the school population was generally flat during those years, then this would seem to indicate a significant increase, but if the school population rose, then the percentages could still be the same. It is also not clear from the study if the increase of students in higher-level classes is specifically due to the de-tracking, or was caused or influenced by other factors.

@Jeremy
According to the story, the school district admitted the study lacked "academic rigor" (i.e. scientific validity), claiming that would have taken too long.

In general, one should disregard any metrics of "success" that are entirely within an institutions control. Placements and grades are just what an institution decides to give. They don't hurt or help anyone. It's the sincerity and depth of the learning (or lack thereof) that does that.