Published Sunday, Aug. 24, 2008 in the WTE

It's time for the Laramie County School District 1 school board to shoulder the blame for its students not being ready for college classes.

And it is time to do something about it.

ACT test scores show that just 21 percent of the 2008 Wyoming high-school graduates who took the test are ready to move to college; the other 79 percent are not.

The number was the same in LCSD1. Here, 73 percent of the students showed they are ready for college English, 38 percent for math, 59 percent for social studies and 29 percent for science.

Overall, just 21 percent of the students who took the ACT test here were ready for all four college subjects. That's disheartening - and it shows just how much work there is to be done.

These numbers reflect badly on the both the state's education system as well as on LCSD1. With all the money the Legislature pours into K-12 education in this state, one would think that more than just one in five students would be adequately prepared for college.

LCSD1 officials have claimed for years that they are not responsible for the high numbers of their graduates who have to take remedial classes at Laramie County Community College or at the University of Wyoming. Yet if they are not responsible for preparing young people, then who is?

And, of course, all this plays out in the small number of state residents who have college degrees.

It is time that the LCSD1 Board of Trustees stops making excuses and gets serious about making certain that its graduates are better prepared for college. That includes such things as raising graduation requirements, requiring tougher classes, being more demanding in the classroom and lobbying students to take the harder route to graduation.

It should be a goal of this district that none of the students who graduate from LCSD1 and who want to go to college have to take remedial classes. Doing so doesn't mean that will happen, but without higher goals and fewer excuses, this district will never even get close.

It also is important to point out that the high usage of remedial classes is a waste of taxpayers' dollars. LCCC shouldn't have to spend money to complete a job that should have been done correctly by K-12 teachers.

This community college has better ways to use these funds than to teach students how to read, write or do simple math.

Until someone - like LCSD1 Superintendent Ted Adams and the board - finds the will power to step up and say, "People, something is seriously wrong here. Let's do something about it," nothing will get done.

Our hope is that candidates for school board will challenge the continued poor performance by this school district. There has been more than enough time to solve this problem.

The time for talk is over; the time for action is now.