{"id":991,"date":"2009-04-07T06:40:41","date_gmt":"2009-04-07T10:40:41","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.flascience.org\/wp\/?p=991"},"modified":"2009-05-31T19:47:01","modified_gmt":"2009-05-31T23:47:01","slug":"high-school-science-concerns","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.flascience.org\/?p=991","title":{"rendered":"High School science concerns"},"content":{"rendered":"

Paul Cottle, a professor of physics at Florida State University and a member of the committee that drafted Florida’s new science standards, has been busy writing articles in defense of science education. Here is his latest one: Two bills put high-school physics at risk in Florida<\/a>.<\/p>\n

However, the legislation that would end the 11th-grade science FCAT calls only for an end-of-course exam in biology. Students would be required to pass this biology test to graduate from high school. Physics is on a long list of subjects (both in science and otherwise) that would be addressed in the end-of-course testing program when resources are available \u00e2\u20ac\u201d a bad bet in the present environment.<\/p>\n

…<\/p>\n

During the meetings of the science standards committee, it became clear that subjects that are not on the accountability agenda \u00e2\u20ac\u201d that is, those that are not on the FCAT or required for graduation \u00e2\u20ac\u201d are de-emphasized because of tight budgets.<\/p>\n

…<\/p>\n

Staff at the Florida Department of Education \u00e2\u20ac\u201d the same folks who hosted the science standards process \u00e2\u20ac\u201d tell me that there is not enough money to develop end-of-course tests in all science subjects in the short term. Biology is the highest priority because it is the most popular science course in Florida’s high schools.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Paul Cottle, a professor of physics at Florida State University and a member of the committee that drafted Florida’s new science standards, has been busy writing articles in defense of science education. Here is his latest one: Two bills put … Continue reading →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_is_tweetstorm":false,"jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":false,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","enabled":false}}},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/pcZNLl-fZ","jetpack-related-posts":[{"id":1057,"url":"https:\/\/www.flascience.org\/?p=1057","url_meta":{"origin":991,"position":0},"title":"What the professors said","author":"Brandon Haught","date":"June 2, 2009","format":false,"excerpt":"Following up on yesterday's post about Florida science professors wanting end-of-course tests rather than the 11th grade FCAT, here is the white paper they wrote and here is the list of folks who signed it. Below is the text of their statement: --------------------------- Graduation Requirements and Assessment Policy for High\u2026","rel":"","context":"Similar post","block_context":{"text":"Similar post","link":""},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":1012,"url":"https:\/\/www.flascience.org\/?p=1012","url_meta":{"origin":991,"position":1},"title":"Politics Trump Physics","author":"Jonathan Smith","date":"April 22, 2009","format":false,"excerpt":"Despite the good faith efforts of three representatives to improve the bills on high school science assessment and graduation requirements, today's events in the Florida House of Representatives demonstrated how difficult it can be to get education policy right in a challenging legislative environment.\u00c2\u00a0 Representative Fresen, the sponsor of the\u2026","rel":"","context":"With 3 comments","block_context":{"text":"With 3 comments","link":"https:\/\/www.flascience.org\/?p=1012#comments"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":1015,"url":"https:\/\/www.flascience.org\/?p=1015","url_meta":{"origin":991,"position":2},"title":"Physics made a comeback","author":"Brandon Haught","date":"April 24, 2009","format":false,"excerpt":"This is an update to Jonathan's earlier post tracking bills related to science education. Physics made a comeback on the floor of the Florida House of Representatives late yesterday afternoon.\u00c2\u00a0 Late the previous night, Representative Fresen, sponsor of the House graduation requirements bill (HB 1293), filed an amendment to put\u2026","rel":"","context":"With 1 comment","block_context":{"text":"With 1 comment","link":"https:\/\/www.flascience.org\/?p=1015#comments"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":1148,"url":"https:\/\/www.flascience.org\/?p=1148","url_meta":{"origin":991,"position":3},"title":"Commissioner responds","author":"Brandon Haught","date":"December 20, 2009","format":false,"excerpt":"FSU physics professor Paul Cottle had sounded the alarm in the Tallahassee Democrat concerning Florida's leadership's unimpressive \"plans\" -- or lack thereof -- for improving our \"pretty much last in the nation\" standing in science education. Eric Smith, Florida commissioner of education, responded. I do commend Smith for taking the\u2026","rel":"","context":"With 2 comments","block_context":{"text":"With 2 comments","link":"https:\/\/www.flascience.org\/?p=1148#comments"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":1201,"url":"https:\/\/www.flascience.org\/?p=1201","url_meta":{"origin":991,"position":4},"title":"2010 Science FCAT and beyond","author":"Brandon Haught","date":"June 29, 2010","format":false,"excerpt":"The annual Florida Comprehensive Assessment Test results are finally released. These are exams that students across the state in specific grade levels must take in core subjects. These scores can influence students\u00e2\u20ac\u2122 promotion to the next grade, and dictate what the student can or cannot take the next school year,\u2026","rel":"","context":"With 3 comments","block_context":{"text":"With 3 comments","link":"https:\/\/www.flascience.org\/?p=1201#comments"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":994,"url":"https:\/\/www.flascience.org\/?p=994","url_meta":{"origin":991,"position":5},"title":"Failing Physics","author":"Jonathan Smith","date":"April 10, 2009","format":false,"excerpt":"Paul Cottle, a professor of physics at Florida State University and a member of the committee that drafted Florida\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s new science standards has just offered this update on the situation regarding the \"down grading\" of Physics in the school curriculum. Paul has learned that\u00c2\u00a0only 16% of Florida's high school graduates\u2026","rel":"","context":"Similar post","block_context":{"text":"Similar post","link":""},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]}],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.flascience.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/991"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.flascience.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.flascience.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.flascience.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.flascience.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=991"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.flascience.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/991\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.flascience.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=991"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.flascience.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=991"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.flascience.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=991"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}