‘100% or what?’

My response to the award I was given is not to stoop to the same level as the Board and Dr. Borja but to remain professional and focused on the issues. I also never said the Commissioner was misleading because it was the Board chairman who said, “80 percent of the teachers had passed PRAXIS,” which is not true and I merely clarified his statement. Furthermore, it should known the term “PRAXIS” cannot be found in the NCLB Act. PRAXIS has become the “standardized” state exam and, since the CNMI never had a state standardized exam, we were caught with our pants down. I have written about this before and brought this to the Board’s attention before NCLB became law before I was even appointed to the Board but they didn’t listen then so I’m not surprised by the response of some officials now.

I have said all along that teachers need to take PRAXIS, but at the same time the objective is to have 100 percent of them pass it. Based on the statistical facts that haven’t changed, we are looking at a minimum of 20 percent of the teacher workforce being substitutes. If we are required to have 100 percent, my concern is why are we following a plan that only provides for 80 percent. We are going from bad to worse with teachers on a two-year contract and now almost a fourth of the workforce will be substitutes. Tenure has the potential to resolve many of our teacher workforce problems with PRAXIS and beyond PRAXIS because all new teachers will pass PRAXIS anyway.

As for me taking the test, it is my plan to take the test in the mainland this summer—but this is not about me. What we need is a solution to the obvious 20 percent in substitutes or more that will occupy our system, which could be a very legitimate reason for our school system not meeting the 100 percent requirement under NCLB. If portfolios of teachers that have already passed state certification test are not acceptable I would like Dr. Borja to explain why none of Guam’s teachers had to take PRAXIS, explain why teachers in Tennessee and other states didn’t have to take PRAXIS. Dr. Borja is only referring to BOE policy for PRAXIS—not the Feds’. I am trying to augment the Board’s policy to assure we have 100 percent. Dr. Borja is doing his job in following BOE policy but it is that faltering policy that I’m trying to address and I won’t call him any names like he did me for doing my job.

Contrary to Dr. Borja’s statement of my non-participation in meetings, I raised all these concerns in my statement and letter to the Board in the last meeting but it was the Board and Dr. Borja that refused to discuss this matter. I still don’t have an answer to “guaranteeing” the 100 percent, which is what this is all about or am I the only one that can see the problem—that we still will not have the 100 percent at the beginning of the next school year.

Ambrose M. Bennett
Kagman High School