San Francisco to pass failing students for ‘equality’

San Francisco will begin passing students with failing grades to promote “equality,” The Voice of San Francisco has reported.

Superintendent of Schools Maria Su intends to announce a “Grading for Equity” plan where students who score as low as 41 on an exam will receive a C, and a score of 21 will receive a passing D. Currently, students must score at least a 61 to earn a D grade. Homework and weekly exams will no longer be counted towards students’ final semester grades. Schools will only count a final exam, which can be taken multiple times. Tardiness will not affect grades.

The new system will become available to over 10,000 students across 14 schools in the fall. Teachers are not required to implement the Grading for Equity system, but may if they wish. The new program would have gone unnoticed without the hawkish eye of a certain school board member. Superintendent Su did not seek approval from the San Francisco Board of Education for the drastic changes and tried to sneak it in by burying it in the school board’s 25-page agenda. Parents were not consulted.

Time for homeschool?

The Voice of San Francisco reports that parents are already mulling whether to return to public schools this fall. Those who don’t might apply to private schools or join the increasingly popular homeschooling trend.

Homeschooling remains the fastest-growing form of education in the United States. In 2023, at least 3.7 million children received a home education, a major increase from 1.5 million in 2019.  

An analysis from the Washington Post looked at 60% of the school-aged population in 7,000 school districts across 32 states and Washington, D.C., and found that homeschooling defies political, geographical, and economic borders. 

For example, while Republican Florida has the largest homeschool population with 154,000 homeschooled children, Democratic New York is showing the fastest growth with nearly 52,000 children homeschooled, more than double the number in 2017. New York City boroughs Manhattan, Brooklyn, and the Bronx saw the highest growth rates, with the homeschool population in some districts surging over 300% in the last six years.

Home education is gaining popularity even in areas with high academic achievement. In 2022, over 60,000 children were homeschooled in districts that ranked in the country’s top fifth for scholastic aptitude.

Homeschoolers see improved academic performance

Studies show homeschoolers outperform their state-educated counterparts in nearly all areas. Standardized tests reveal that homeschoolers, on average, score over 30 percentage points higher than public schoolers in core studies such as reading, language, and math. SAT results show that homeschooled children score higher than state-educated children by as many as 70 points in critical reading and 48 points in writing. They are also more likely to achieve higher GPAs in college.

Minority children who homeschool also show higher results than their counterparts in government schools. Black homeschooled students, for example, have been shown to outscore black public-schooled students by 23–42 percentage points. According to government figures, 41% of homeschoolers are Black, Asian, Hispanic, and other minorities.

Most homeschoolers also report being excited about life and satisfied with their work, compared to a minority of public schoolers.

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