Book reports required in schools? Critics find proposal outlandish
Education reform is long overdue in Moore County, as evidenced by data indicating that fewer than half of all students are proficient readers at grade level. Among minority students, reading at grade level is achieved by a tepid 25 percent. Math proficiency tends to follow the same trajectory. Nonetheless, attendees of the April 17, 2023, Board of Education meeting in Robbins derided a proposal to add a basic requirement within county curricula. Board chair Robert Levy and three others voted to make reading great again by passing a new policy that will require students to read four books and submit a handwritten book report during the course of each academic year. A motion carried 4-3. During public comments before the board leading to its consideration of a slate of agenda items former teacher Maggie Smith rose in full throated opposition to the reading/report combination. “You want to create your own standards,” she said. “You will fail a student if they don’t turn in a book report? Seriously? You can do better than this. Who did you talk to about this? Your Republican friends at church? You need to trust your teachers. You made these new rules in isolation.” The speaker’s rant seems to ignore the fact that trusting teachers finds us where we are today, failing our students, and it implies that we simply can’t torture the kids by forcing them to read books. How will they have time to text and post to TikTok? Superintendent of Moore schools Tim Locklair also expressed opposition to book reports during a previous school board work session. He said he fears some students would struggle with handwriting an assignment.
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