It seems there are laws in Texas about being prepared for college, and those laws could keep lots of students from admission to four-year state universities. A July 11, 2012 article in the Dallas Morning News states that by 2015 state statutes will require students to pass three of the 15 end-of-course exams that debuted in Texas high schools this spring, including Algebra II, English III Reading, and English III W
riting.
The problem is that last year more than 60% of students failed the English III Writing exam even though it had an extremely lenient passing standard, and those standards will be rising over the next few years. During this first year of testing of ninth-graders, only 38% passed the writing test, 50% passed the reading, and 65% passed in algebra (and only a 37% correct rate was required to pass in algebra!). Under the proposed final standards planned for the writing tests only 18% would have passed.
There is one alternative to passing these tests, and that is to achieve a score of 1,500 on the SAT test (out of 2,400). That is equivalent to scoring an average of 500 (out of 800) on the three parts, something not so easy to accomplish.
Robert Scott, the former Texas Education Commissioner, said, “Even if you were to qualify for a full-ride scholarship based on artistic ability, you would be barred from attending a four-year institution unless you passed the exams.” He didn’t mention what would happen to athletes who didn’t pass these standards.
It appears that legislators are trying to raise the expectations on secondary education to help improve the college graduation rates, which could certainly use some help. It will be interesting to see how fast these laws get changed, or the the passing standards get lowered, before 2015.