In my classroom, we celebrate successes, no matter how miniscule.

“All children can learn at high levels.”

This is the current education mantra. We say we believe it, but do we really? At our core, do we actually have the conviction that 100% of all children can achieve proficiency levels as measured by standardized tests?

Before you write me off as a negative Nelly who doesn’t give students a fair shake, just humor me.

Is this a realistic expectation? Is it even humanly possible?

I have an issue with applying absolute terms to anything that involves human beings. But, this is exactly what education policy makers did with No Child Left Behind when they declared (mandated) 100% of the nation’s students would read on grade level by the 2013-2014 school year. Really? How did that work out? Since when does 100 percent of a population ever do anything? Someone in that administration needs a stats class…stat.

Then there’s Race To The Top (RTTT) and Arne Duncan’s expectation that even our kids with severe learning disabilities be assessed exactly the same way as everyone else. That’s certainly fair, right? The whole idea of Special Education is to provide students with and Individual Education Plan (IEP), so why wouldn’t it be reasonable to test them using a standardized test without any consideration to their learning difficulties? I have watched students with relatively mild learning disabilities struggle with these tests for years, so this ridiculously unrealistic demand makes my brain hurt, my blood boil, and my heartbreak.

Don’t get me wrong, it is absolutely my goal as an educator that the majority of my students will acquire skills and possess more knowledge at the end of a year with me. If they don’t, well, I just suck wind and need to seek employment in a different arena.

I would absolutely love it if I were given a group of students who have not been proficient in reading for years (if ever), and morph them into masters of the written word. I dream about it. Seriously. I have had fantasies about sitting around discussing Kafka’s Metamorphosis with my students (usually in a grassy meadow with a light breeze and the sun shining gently upon us) and then grading the follow-up literary analyses, stamping each one with a big ol’ “A” along with glowing comments about their fresh perspectives and deep insights.

But, alas, I am not Anne Sullivan. And, I certainly cannot sequester my students one at a time to work around the clock with them individually and without any interference from outside influences. As much as I would love to go down in history as a miracle worker, the realist in me knows it’s just not going to happen.

I don’t refuse much, but here is what I do refuse to do: I will not set myself, and more importantly, my students up for failure with ridiculous expectations.   I will not feed into the idea that not hitting a mark on a standardized test marks a kid as a failure.

In my classroom, we celebrate successes, no matter how miniscule. I don’t care if you increased one measly point from one assessment to the next. You’re getting some praise for that. You’d be amazed at how kids who have been made to feel like failures (purposely or not) stand up just a little taller when they get a little kudos from a teacher.

I’ll give you one example. Jorge (name changed to protect the innocent) rocks in math and is even in an Honors class. He is above proficient in that area. However, language barriers throw a monkey wrench in his ability to discern between figurative and literal language, and he struggles on many reading tasks. He is a meticulous and conscientious worker. In fact, his work ethic is a rarity for kids his age and, I would contend, even uncommon among adults. Yet, he looks so frustrated and beaten down on a daily basis, I just want to cry for him. But, he keeps pining away. And, guess what? He scores a 100 percent on a large unit test with three reading passages and some written responses. He is highly uncomfortable with public praise, so I quietly hand him a paper trophy on which I wrote some positive feedback and taped a roll of Smarties candy. At first, he looks at me like I’ve lost my mind. Then, he smiles shyly and tucks the award away in his backpack. And, he smiles a little more now and doesn’t seem as irritated to be in an Intensive Reading class. Mission accomplished.

This makes me wonder why we can’t just measure improvement? Measure it on an individual basis. Because let’s face it, your improvement doesn’t look like mine; we started in different places and have different obstacles in our way.

I do believe that all kids in my room can improve. None of them have reached their full potential quite yet. But, improvement is just the redheaded step-child in education. Yeah, it’s alright. It’s better than nothing, but it’s not quite good enough. And, that is not right for our kids.

Let’s stop applying absolute terms in an uncertain world. Let’s celebrate successes, whether they meet some unrealistic and statistically impossible legislative goal or not. Let’s not give our kids the message that life isn’t all or nothing. They are many paths to success, and scoring proficient on 100% of all the tests you take is not one of them.