Sunday, November 20, 2011

Opinion: Schools Need Evaluations

Guest column by Charles Seaton, Jr., a special education teacher at Sherwood Middle School in Memphis, from The Commercial Appeal.

Earlier this month I flew to Washington, D.C., to represent my Sherwood Middle School students at a hearing of a U.S. Senate committee. After years of delay, Congress is considering the reauthorization of the No Child Left Behind (NCLB) law; what the lawmakers decide could change my students' lives for better or worse.

I am a special education teacher in the Orange Mound community. This is a community that is over 88 percent African-American, with a median annual income of $21,802. Almost all of the students at Sherwood -- 97.6 percent -- receive free or reduced-price lunches. My students have a range of disabilities, from attention deficit disorder to autism, as well as many talents. (One student struggles to make friends, but can build amazing things with gears and wires.)

No comments:

Post a Comment