Blog 4

This article in the Washington Post is about how schools in Fairfax, Virginia with a lot of low-income students had very low literacy and math levels. The first thing Daniel A. Domenech did when he got to Fairfax was to add three hours to the weekly school schedules. The program he invented for these schools was called the “Excel” program. He left the Fairfax school system 17years later and the schools held up very well. I like that Domenech was able to increase the overall test scores in the schools that were doing poorly. Even though I don’t necessarily agree with the way that they solved the problem, I have to respect them for the attempt, and plus it worked.
Now, Domenech’s successor, Jake D. Dale is facing a problem of a major cut in the Fairfax school system budget. The cut in the budget caused the Excel program to be ended. Now, Jake has created a new program called “Priority Schools.” This program works with all schools, instead of the Excel program that works with only the neediest schools in Fairfax. Priority schools is working along the same lines as the Excel program by adding extra school time, and adding an extra $1million to the school budget. I like this project better then the Excel program because this project works with all schools, and not just the schools that need it the most. I think it’s important to keep the work up in the schools that are doing well with their test scores.