Why 10th Grade Should Be the New Senior Year

• Ed Week

In 1983, "A Nation at Risk" focused political decisionmakers on the necessity of reframing public education into an accountability model designed to provide minimum standards of achievement. By 2001, the No Child Left Behind Act ensured that all states receiving federal funds would meet requirements for standardized testing, teacher qualifications, and funding priorities. Most recently, President Barack Obama signed the Every Student Succeeds Act of 2015 to continue accountability efforts while empowering states with greater flexibility. And while educational improvement has had mixed results, many students have not enjoyed any level of success, or even remained in school. For these overlooked students to succeed, we must now consider reforms to the basic structure of secondary education.

—Getty

There have been many initiatives to improve student success, including providing for highly qualified teachers, improving curriculum development, implementing best instructional practices, relying on data-driven decisions in schools, and many more. But they all have one characteristic in common: They seek to implement reforms that will introduce positive change to the system without fundamentally redesigning it to meet the needs of all students. Higher standards are a double-edged sword, and as academic rigor increases, more and more students will find themselves unable to meet the new, and continually changing, requirements. The obvious, and unavoidable, result under the present system is an unacceptably high number of high school dropouts.

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