ASU literacy education professor Frank Serafini told a room full of educators Thursday at the Heard Museum in Phoenix that the Move On When Reading law will essentially hold back 1,500 third graders from being promoted to the fourth grade.
Serafini, along with Tim Valencia, City of Phoenix youth and education manager, and Daniela Robles, Griffith Elementary School Instructional coach, visited the museum to discuss the law.
Serafini said that the issue is not just that third-grade students are unable to read.
“The issue here is that these students are not able to pass the test,” he said.
Arizona is one of 14 states to institute laws to hold back third-grade students who do not meet state reading requirements.
Move On When Reading, which passed in 2010, will go into effect this year. It mandates that schools must hold back third-graders who score in the lowest category of the reading portion of the AIMS test.
The law will exempt English-language learners and special education students, but makes no exception to students who are doing well in subjects other than reading.
Supporters of the bill argue that teachers of higher grade levels do not know how to teach reading and that this might be the only way to ensure that children receive the help they need. Critics say that children who fail a grade are more likely to drop out of school later.
Serafini said holding children back does not hold a great track record.
“The retention rate is not favorable and the rates of students dropping out are hard to refute,” he said.
The discussion was moderated by Cathryn Creno, education reporter for the Arizona Republic, and was sponsored by Zócalo Public Square, a project of the Center for Social Cohesion at ASU. It is a nonprofit organization of exchange of ideas blending live events and humanities journalism.
Serafini said a student’s ability to read is hard to define.
“Children are being held back because of their score on a test,” he said. “The test is only one measurement.”
Serafini also said when students are taught to a test, a lot of other things fall away.
“The big elephant in the room is that teachers can’t teach how they know best," he said.
Valencia said there needed to be a stress on the importance of education in the early years of a child’s development.
“Ages zero to 4 are instrumental,” he said. “We really need to invest a lot of time in that age group."
Valencia also said education is a community issue and not just about the schools.
“We are failing because we are not working together as a community,” he said. “Communities and businesses are not stepping up like they should."
Robles said literacy is an issue that needs to be addressed before the third grade.
She said there needs to be more prevention and then intervention. Schools in Arizona are committed to student success, she added.
“We already have measures in place that begin in the reading lab,” she said.
The discussion concluded with a question and answer session.
Carmen Tucker, a teacher at Crockett Elementary located in Phoenix, was one of the audience members at the discussion. She said the conversation was engaging but did not address the real issue.
“I thought it was a good conversation and it was very engaging but they didn’t really address the topic or come up with any real solutions,” she said.
Reach the reporter at kgrega@asu.edu or follow her on Twitter @kelciegrega
