Three South Philadelphia High School teachers say they are being pressured to pass all students, even those who can't multiply three-digit numbers or who have 100 or more absences.
The pressure, both implicit and explicit, they say, has come from principal Alice Heller and other administrators in teacher-training sessions, meetings, and an April 27 memo asking them to give students makeup work and credit for fulfilling promises such as showing up on time and wearing a required school uniform.
"It is our strong recommendation that if a student has made and fulfilled their contract, any previously failed report periods will be averaged as 65 for a final grade," the April 27 memo said.
"We have kids passed along in this system that can't do simple arithmetic," one math teacher said. "The attendance is often well below 50 percent, and they're asking me to pass kids I haven't even seen before."
Heller, head of the 1,450-student school at Broad Street and Snyder Avenue, said that there was no pressure to pass students but that she had promised all freshmen none of them would have to repeat ninth grade.
She said that she wanted to give students "multiple pathways to success," and that her plan was to have ninth graders make up any failed courses while continuing on to 10th grade.
"It's a good thing for self-esteem," she said. "And it teaches them responsibility. They have to be consumers of their own education."
It's unclear, however, whether Heller will be able to follow through on her promise. On Wednesday, she was informed that she would be removed at the end of the school year. Also ousted were the principals of University City High and four elementary schools, in keeping with Superintendent Arlene Ackerman's pledge to raise standards.
In an interview last week, Ackerman said that if there was any pressure to pass students along, "they're not getting it from me. I don't believe you move young people on when they don't have the skills."
Doing so, she said, ultimately hurts children.
"Some of this is history," Ackerman said. "Some of the principals probably are feeling pressure that they meet their targets, but there are no targets around passing kids."
The district declined to comment further on the matter or specify why Heller was being removed.
Heller, who said she planned to fight her removal, would not comment on whether she felt pressure from the administration to pass students.
She stressed that teachers could be misreading her insistence that students get lots of chances.
"The message is: We're providing them with every opportunity to be successful," she said.
In the final marking period, which ends this week, students were given a number of "alternative strategies to help them be successful," Heller said.
Students might sign a contract and complete makeup work to ensure they pass. Or they might make up credits with an online program, take summer-school courses, or receive tutoring, the principal said.
In fact, Heller said, she informed the entire ninth-grade class recently that no one would be left back. If a freshman failed all five subjects, for instance, next year he or she would be assigned a 10th-grade homeroom and have all 10th-grade courses but be responsible for making up ninth-grade credits before graduating.
The math teacher, who fears retribution and asked not to be identified, said that although no one explicitly ordered that students must pass, the message was clear from memos and directives to give even the most lax students a way to make the grade.
Eighty percent of the math teacher's students failed.
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