As the assistant principal of a public elementary school, Brian Culot has witnessed firsthand the upheaval the city’s policy against social promotion initially caused – and the benefits that have followed.
“There’s a lot of controversy about the policy, [but] at the end of the day, for the majority of our kids, it’s necessary,” said Culot, who works at PS 110 on the Lower East Side and runs summer school for struggling third- and fifth-graders at PS 111 in Midtown.
“I see a heightened sense of awareness about the importance of education among students, parents and educators,” he added.
Faced with the prospect of repeating their grade should they fail their standardized reading and math tests, third- and fifth-graders at PS 110 led the school to record gains last school year.
The percentage of students reading and doing math at grade level shot up from 60 percent – where it had hovered for five years – to 74 percent.
Like other educators, Culot said the idea of having a child’s promotion hinging on a single test was worrisome.
But he added that the steps the city has taken to introduce rigorous summer and Saturday schools to help struggling students, and offering them a second chance to pass their tests, have proven effective.
“Prior to having these policies in place, I don’t think students understood the consequences,” Culot said.