— Will mandatory biology and geometry exams keep high school students from graduating? New tests could prevent thousands from graduating:
The passing rate on Florida’s new biology and geometry exams — now must-pass tests for a high school diploma — would be under 60 percent if a proposed scoring system is adopted.
That would put success on the state’s newest end-of-course exams on par with its algebra 1 exam, which 58 percent of students passed last spring.
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“It will have a cumulative effect and impact on students who are trying to graduate from high school,” she said.
And high schools, she added, will be stretched thin trying to get them all into summer classes or other remedial programs to help them pass re-take exams.
— Thanks to YouTube, St. Petersburg High math teacher has students in 100 countries:
Last year, he landed on an additional way to teach — through YouTube. He has posted more than 300 videos on such topics as factoring, right angle trigonometry, standard deviation and — this one had more than 33,000 views — “z-score Calculations & Percentiles in a Normal Distribution.”
Tarrou, 41, began posting his self-made videos in the fall of 2011, partly to help a student who couldn’t attend class.
Now, people around the world have watched “Tarrou’s Chalk Talk” videos more than half a million times. More than 3,000 people from more than 100 countries have subscribed to his online channel.
— Manatee school district success story: STEM, career programs rank with nation’s best
Gov. Rick Scott has placed great emphasis on the STEM disciplines — science, technology, engineering and math — at all levels of Florida’s education system. The goal is to meet future workforce demands in those growing fields and improve the state’s economy with sustainable and high-wage jobs.
The governor stresses that the K-12 system must meet STEM demands. He should come to Manatee County for a tour of our school district’s esteemed programs in career and technical education. Scott would learn that Manatee is not only a state leader in those programs but a national one as well.
