Springfield Central
High School
1840 Roosevelt Ave.
Springfield, MA 01109

April 10, 2000

We, the undersigned teachers in the mathematics department at
Springfield Central High School, resent being scapegoated by bureaucrats in
the Department of Education and on the Board of Education. Segments of
the press and the business community have joined them in this tactic with
an apparent agenda of doing great harm to the public schools in the
Commonwealth of Massachusetts. They have been putting forward such schemes
as making the MCAS a graduation requirement and proposals for
teacher-testing, most recently and specifically the testing of mathematics
teachers in high schools such as our own, where MCAS "failure" rates are
high. These are clear attempts to make the students and teachers in the
public schools appear to be failing, thus paving the way for privatization,
for-profit charter schools, vouchers and the like.

We are dedicated professionals, hardworking and skilled mathematics
educators, nearly all with advanced degrees and scores of years of
collective mathematics teaching experience. We have completed extensive
professional development programs in many areas of mathematics, computers
and such technologies as graphing calculators, as well as in pedagogy.
Many of us have facilitated these workshops ourselves.

We teach in one of the state's poorest communities. Many of our
students face innumerable social and economic pressures both in their
neighborhoods and in the schools--obstacles not encountered by most young
people in the more affluent suburban communities. Getting a good
education, getting to school on a daily basis, making time to study, and
even surviving are not the same here as in these wealthier communities. We
have always accepted the challenge to teach in this city's schools. We try
to be there on a daily basis for our students, providing quality
mathematics instruction as well as the necessary support to motivate our
students to overcome these obstacles as best they can.

In spite of these conditions and difficulties, 75% of Central's
graduates go on to 2- and 4-year colleges each year. Yet only 25% of last
year's 10th graders would have been allowed to graduate based on their
mathematics scores on this MCAS exam. Our students do much better on the
proven, validated and nationally normed Iowa's and on the SAT's. Now the
Commonwealth wants to deny diplomas to 75% of future potential graduates of
our school.

To add insult to injury, the Governor and the Board of Education
want to test the math teachers in schools with a higher than 30% "failure"
rate on the MCAS. Naturally, we find this idea to be quite offensive and
preposterous in light of the previous information on our already proven
qualifications and on the job we are dedicated to do. Perhaps they are
trying to drive us out of Springfield to another community or to another
state where our services most likely would be in demand and perhaps better
appreciated. (There is a national shortage of trained, certified and
experienced math teachers such as ourselves). We are tired of being bashed
and bullied. Let us do our job, and test the DOE (Department of Education)
bureaucrats, not the math teachers.

Sincerely,


Richard Annino 
Walter N. Brown 
James Carithers 
David Carlos
Myron Follett 
Francis P. Funai 
Gladys T. Gagnon 
Lori Giacomoni
Katrina Krach 
Denese Lakoma 
Lenny Lapon 
Nancy Mathras
James J. Phaneuf 
Tim Renn 
Leroy Scott., Jr.
Janet Settembro
N. Everett Washington 
Jean Watson 
Carolyn Wikar