This is the greatest day of my life!!!
After at least 10 unsuccessful attempts, I've finally gotten a letter published in the New York Times! (It's the second one on the page.) Here's the original article that it's responding to, about the unrepresentative (and worsening) demographics in New York City's specialized high schools.
UPDATE: I've been cited in Gothamist. Not as exciting as the Times, of course, but still cool.
Congrats! It's always exciting to see your name in a major national publication.
ReplyDeleteOf course, if you often write letters on highly controversial national and international issues, it should be obvious why this is the one that was published.
Anyway, I'm not sure whether I agree with your proposal. Don't you think that students who believe they have a chance of making the cut take the test anyway?
Mazel Tov!
ReplyDeleteI like the letter. It's short, intelligent, and to the point. Hopefully they'll listen to you and start administering the test during the school day.
mazal tov BZ!
ReplyDeletewhen we talked about this the other week i mentioned the possibility of using already administered state tests as the becnhmark to qualify students. is the problem with that proposal that there is too little nuance as we get more than 2σ away from the mean?
Elf writes:
ReplyDeleteCongrats! It's always exciting to see your name in a major national publication.
Thanks! This totally beats the Jewish Week.
Of course, if you often write letters on highly controversial national and international issues, it should be obvious why this is the one that was published.
Yes, the key is picking a topic that has wide enough interest that they'll want to run letters about it, but narrow enough that they won't already be flooded with other letters. My past attempts may have swung too far in one direction (responding to Judaism articles) or the other (writing about Republican corruption).
Anyway, I'm not sure whether I agree with your proposal.
It certainly won't do anything to improve the quality of K-8 education (which needs serious help, as other letter writers pointed out), but I don't think it does any harm (other than the cost of administering the test, and the loss of yet another instructional day for 8th graders who are already taking too many standardized tests).
Don't you think that students who believe they have a chance of making the cut take the test anyway?
I think that it's not on everyone's radar to the same degree. If all your friends are taking the test, you're more likely to be aware of it and to sign up for it, which seems to be more the case in Chinese, Korean, and Russian neighborhoods, and less so in African-American neighborhoods.
Knitter of shiny things writes:
ReplyDeleteIt's short ... and to the point.
That's the only kind that the Times will stand for! They enforce a 150-word maximum.
is the problem with that proposal that there is too little nuance as we get more than 2σ away from the mean?
ReplyDeleteYeah, I think so. I estimate there are 100,000 entering high school students each year, and about 2000 in the big three specialized schools, so the test has to pick the top 2%, which isn't what the state tests are set up to do -- those tests are aimed at seeing whether or not students are performing at grade level.
Along similar lines, the PSAT will now be free for all NYC public high school students!
ReplyDelete