Public High School Students In The United States Ought Not Be Required To Pass SEE's To Graduate

Alright, I'll go Standards/AC/NC. Value Debate This debate ultimately comes down to who will create the most benefit for society. This means not looking only to an 'educated citizenry', but to all aspects of life. Neg states that we want people to "maximize themselves", and because of this, we are actually valuing the same thing! She wants people to reach their full potential - which is maximizing their positive social mobility! Thus, in this round we must look to the social mobility created on both sides, and vote for the debater who creates the most positive mobility. C1 @ Brown Card Note that this card is all about standardized tests in general. There is nothing specific to exit exams, and thus this is nonunique. Neg doesn't refute any of my evidence here. This is going to flow through the round and become very important. Any benefit that the Neg hopes to draw is also accessed by the Aff through NCLB's standardized tests. C2 @ O'Connell Card First, we again have nonunique impacts. There is no specific reason to introduce exit exams when we can instead keep our current system. While this evidence talks specifically about the CAHSEE, there is no reason that one cannot gain accountability through non-SEEs without harming students. Furthermore, there is no reason to believe that teachers on their own cannot identify students. SEEs purportedly tell us which students have not achieved basic competency. However, if we're talking about students who cannot muster basic competency, such a lack of ability would be clearly evident in the classroom. If a student cannot apply the quadratic formula or write a coherent essay, their teacher will notice. If we are to negate, we are to believe that teachers and counsellors are so incompetent that they cannot notice when a student is performing poorly. C3 @ O'Connell 2 Card Note how Neg only refers to passage rates. At no point does she say that scores themselves are increasing. This is largely because reported success of SEEs comes not from improved student achievement, but from lowering the passage bar. As Professors Warren and Grodsky write: "This same basic pattern of exit exam policy evolution has played out in a number of states. States begin by setting moderate to high standards and then spend hundreds of thousands of dollars designing exit exams that purport to hold students to these standards. In short order, however, high failure rates and much-publicized legal challenges test the political will of policy makers to hold students to these standards. In the end, politics wins over principle and the exit exam, the passing threshold, or both are altered to increase the share of students who pass the exam." What actually happens is far from what Neg says. States actually end up lowering the bar to the point where passage rates are meaningless. Let's now head back to the Affirmative. Aff C1 A) Socioeconomically disadvantaged It does not matter whether or not it's the test's fault - as long as an SEE penalizes the poor for factors out of their control, it is unfair and ought not be implemented. We don't even need an SEE to pinpoint the poorest school districts or find out where money needs to go. The need is fairly self-evident, and NCLB gives us the little data that we need. Furthermore, she doesn't refute my evidence that says the poor will definitely fail SEEs if they are implemented. B) Gender Lines Con doesn't refute my Viadero or Sacks cards at all here. These cards are going to flow through the round and become powerful voters - girls will unfairly fail SEEs for no reason other than their thinking style! She even concedes that I provide "imperics[sic]"! Con then goes on to state that somehow SEEs will solve for the exact same inequity that they create, which is a completely contradictory claim. C) Dropouts While Con's correlation/causation argument may have applied if I gave you a single statistic, the fact is that as SEEs get harder and harder, more and more people drop out - particularly the poor. Furthermore, students who just miss the pass mark on their first take are less likely to pass on subsequent tries, especially if they are poor. Debra Viadero notes, referencing a Harvard University study: "Students who just missed the passing cutoff in 10th grade are 8 percentage points less likely to graduate on time than demographically similar students who just barely passed. And in New Jersey barely failing the test decreases the likelihood of graduation for students overall and especially so for black, Hispanic, and low-income students." She goes on to explain that the reason is psychological. After being labeled failures once on the test, students perform poorly on subsequent assessments. This all culminates in my second contention. While Neg states that none of these impacts will happen, she fails to attack ANY of the evidence that I use to link to my impacts! The fact that she doesn't attack the actually body of the Sacks, Viadero and Glenn cards means that the Negative is clearly linked to a dramatic negative societal outcome! This is going to be the primary reason to vote Aff in this round - not only is the Negative case nonunique in many respects, but Negating the resolution will put us in a backslide. When we implement SEEs we only hold the poor down and allow the rich to prosper now. As I have clearly shown, the poor will unfairly fail, and lose the opportunities to improve their lot in life. Negating only adds to the problem of poverty and prevents people from freeing themselves from it. Furthermore, because girls will also unfairly fail SEEs, the progress we have made towards gender equality will be for nought. As girls are prevented from taking positions in the job market and breaking gender barriers, society will come again to view them as the inferior gender. Because the Negative fails to show any specific benefits of SEEs and will only damage society, I urge an Affirmative vote. Back to you!