Seeking solutions at Kashmere
Regarding “Failing Kashmere gets state appointee” (Page A1, Saturday), it is easy to criticize the teachers and administrators at Kashmere High School for their dismal record, but the fact is that the responsibility goes well beyond the staff at the high school. By the time the students get to high school they are already locked into a system that produces failure year after year. That system includes parents, neighbors, community organizations and the elementary and middle schools that feed into Kashmere.
If students are instilled with a desire to learn and taught basics of learning at an early age, they won’t be failures in high school. A systemic failure such as Kashmere should be explored from each member of the feeder schools that make up the extended Kashmere campus.
I don’t accept that changing principals at Kasmere is the answer; that starts at home and first grade and continues through the end of middle school. Let’s form a task force to truly analyze the entire Kashmere family and make corrections early and often.
Our kids deserve no less than our best when it comes to their education. How can we ever hope to find a cure for cancer when we don’t seem to be able to find a cure for a poorly performing high school?
Hopefully the new superintendent of HISD can see beyond the failures at the finish line (high school performance) and look to the starting line (elementary school results). Bill Turney, Houston