How tracking impacts students and their future opportunities from a young age

By Mandy Guo Staff Writer AN OPINION

Educational tracking has been implemented across the United States in elementary, middle, and high schools since the 1930s. Tracking is a soft policy—one used in schools but not explicitly enshrined in law—wherein many of America’s schools split students into three educational paths depending on their academic performance: below-level, on-level, and above-level or honors-level. The tracks students are placed on from a young age can determine the rest of their lives, impacting their education, career, and life opportunities down the road. Schools should be detracked when students are still young, before their tracks define a student’s future.

In the 1900s, race-based tracking was a common practice used to maintain racial segregation in schools. In the U.S., the idea of splitting students into different education levels was first introduced in the South during Reconstruction, when academic programs were primarily decided by Northern white philanthropists, Southern lawmakers, and some prominent Black figures. Their influence was crucial to which curriculums and education programs were allowed to thrive, and their donations dictated which schools would remain open.

Today, tracking still largely follows socioeconomic, and thus racial, lines—socioeconomically disadvantaged students tend to be placed into lower tracks, while their wealthier counterparts, who can afford extracurricular tutoring and preparation, are placed into higher tracks and largely continue down that path for the rest of their educational careers.

In fact, the difference between higher-level and lower-level classes has even created a disparity in

By Julia Lian Staff Writer AN OPINION

In 1926, Henry Ford invented the five-day work week that has been used for nearly a century in the U.S. This work week was created after labor activists spent decades protesting the excruciating 14-hour days enforced by many employers. Now, there is growing conversation about a new and improved version: the four-day work week.

While the nation’s economy and society continue growing rapidly, the work week has not budged for over 95 years. 70 percent of U.S. workers believe the five-day work week is outdated and that they could complete their work in less time than provided. As a result, workplaces have begun modifying their schedules—a third of all organizations now offer a compressed four-day work week of a full 40 hours, and 15 percent offer the new four-day, 32-hour work week. The U.S. should implement the new and improved 32-hour work week, as it has shown to have extensive benefits that include increased productivity and returns, higher satisfaction among employees, and a generally better quality of life.

In 2018, Andrew Barnes, the founder of Perpetual Guardian, an estate planning business, organized a four-day week trial at his company and found that the schedule im- the demographic makeup of classrooms. According to data collected in 2014 by the U.S. Department of Education, even though Black and Latinx students made up 37 percent of the American high school demographic, they account for only 27 percent of students enrolled in at least one AP course. This gap is the modern incarnation of tracking’s original purpose: to keep students separated on the basis of race or socioeconomic status.

Tracking’s supposed benefits include being able to group students with others of similar academic levels. Additionally, its proponents argue that it helps account for differing academic needs: some students aren’t stimulated by on-level education and benefit from more rigorous and challenging content, while other students may require a slower pace of learning in order to not fall behind. The divide in academic level supposedly makes it possible for teachers to better cater to students’ needs.

However, although tracking allows for more individualized teaching, it sets students placed into above-level and honors-level tracks from a young age up for success while leaving their peers on lower tracks behind. When students graduate high school, for instance, college admission departments may perceive honor students as a better fit because they can handle more challenging coursework.

The largest problem with tracking is its rigidity. Tracks are decided for students at a young age based on their performances and are almost impossible to adjust afterward for most students.

This is problematic, as students’ academic skills don’t stay the same as they progress through elementary, middle, and high school. “As [students] grow, they change, and as they change, you don’t want them to be stuck somewhere [when] they really should be somewhere else,” Blair Diversity and Inclusion Coordinator Dr. Celita Lewis-Davis explains.

Furthermore, students face not only the rigidity of the tracking system itself, but also a social divide among students when they move tracks. Blair English teacher Adam Clay recounts how foreign he felt when he jumped tracks junior year people have been together forever, right? And I just jumped in like an intruder.” where these students can learn beside one another,” Culver says. “A properly trained and well-qualified educator [can adapt]… to meet the diverse needs of the people in that room.” of high school to join a class of students who had been classmates for years. “I really liked English, and I wanted to get into it. It was a big ordeal to move into [the honors class], and I felt like a total outsider,” he explains. “These

To address these issues, Blair has implemented All-In Honors classes, which combine all students from below-level, on-level, and honors-level classes into one honors class. According to Lewis-Davis, Wheaton, Northwest, and other MCPS schools have implemented similar All-In Honors initiatives. At Blair, this system is currently in place for core classes in ninth and tenth grade, and is a first step at attempting to detrack.

However, as Clay’s experience suggests, detracking in high school can be difficult for students to adapt to, as students tend to cluster with the people they are familiar with through many mutual classes. This, in addition to the pandemic, has dampened student interaction and participation. “I’m definitely seeing [that] classroom discussions are less robust than they were before the pandemic, and [I can’t] pinpoint whether it’s All-In Honors or whether it’s the pandemic… [It’s probably] a combination of both,” Clay says.

Thus, the divides tracking creates would be far easier to fix if detracking efforts began earlier. “The idea is [that] the sooner we start organizing our learning spaces in a way that supports that type of learning, the better acclimated students will be when they enter into those types of experiences later in [their] educational career,” Culver says.

Assistant Principal Rahman Culver believes that detracking can help students of all skillsets learn from each other. “[Detracking] simply says we don’t need to split [students] apart to meet their needs. We can create experiences in the same space