DOE’s War on Excellence

Boy, does Mayor de Blasio’s Department of Education hate educational excellence. The latest: a drive to ban honor rolls. As The Post’s Selim Algar reports, a new DOE guidance warns that “recognizing student excellence via honor rolls and class rank can be detrimental to learners who find it more difficult to reach academic success.” Even grades can negatively influence “future student performance.”

Instead, DOE’s geniuses want to emphasize “contributions to the school or wider community, and demonstrations of social justice and integrity.” Staff should “eliminate practices that penalize students who have been marginalized based on their race, culture, language and/or ability.” Ability?

Insane. A poor grade doesn’t “penalize” students. It alerts them, their parents and school staff that they haven’t learned the material they need to. Absent any warning, they’re all too likely to fall further behind.

Good grades rightly encourage students to take pride in their achievements. And why work hard if it doesn’t matter how you do?

Of course, the real goal is simply to help adults who run the schools hide their failures in getting kids to learn. That’s why the teachers unions oppose standardized tests.

De Blasio’s entire crusade for school “equity” boils down to a war on excellence that includes the drive to cancel Gifted & Talented classes, admissions screening for middle schools and even the testing that ensures the city’s elite high schools remain top-notch.

It’s fine to recognize “contributions to the school or wider community” — but not at the expense of all other standards.

The next mayor will need to clean house, insist DOE focus on kids rather than adults and roll back the egregious de Blasio dilution of standards. (Happily, he’ll owe the teachers union nothing, since it endorsed his foe, city Comptroller Scott Stringer.)

Otherwise, parents of all races who care about their children’s future will flee the DOE system even faster than the exodus now underway.