Joseph Showell, Grand Prairie High School Principal Takes Heat for Singling out Black Students to Improve their TAKS Scores

Principal Joseph Showell told the students

that their performance on TAKS affects

the school's rating. COURTNEY PERRY/DMN

So, a principal takes the time to show his students that he cares about their test scores enough to talk to them as a group and suddenly he's doing something wrong. I guess Grand Prairie High School principal Joseph Showell took a calculated risk, but sometimes that's what is needed to help our students realize their fullest potentials. He called 60 black students into a meeting and challenged them to do better on their TAKS tests. Let me also interject that Principal Showell is also black. So, the race card couldn't be pulled in this case. He felt that he could motivate them to do better, but wait, where are the parents' role in helping their children? Some of the kids appreciated what he did, but of course, there are always dissenters who see the glass half-empty and not half-full.

Principal Joseph Showell told the students that their performance on TAKS affects the school's rating. All of them were on the bubble. They had either narrowly failed or barely passed the exam last year.

Showell theorized that he could motivate the students to do better this year by explaining that their performance on the Texas Assessment of Knowledge and Skills is important to the school's overall academic rating and reputation.

Such is the high-pressure world of TAKS testing, which plays out in March and April. Bad scores in a single subject by just one student subgroup – blacks, Hispanics, whites and the economically disadvantaged – can torpedo a school's academic ranking or sink a principal's career.

Some students appreciated his candor. Others were offended and felt singled out for criticism because they are black. "I said [to the principal], 'How can you call us stupid and not expect us to get mad," said Ashanti Rose, one of the black students called to the meeting last month.

At Grand Prairie High School, the black student subgroup had dragged the school's rating down in 2006 and 2007. Showell, who is black, decided in 2008 that it was time for a straight talk with the black students. He says he never called them stupid or demeaned them. Source: Dallas Morning News

This is the first time, from what I have read, that someone took the time to explain the situation to these kids and I applaud Mr. Showell for doing so. In 2008, black student scores improved and the school moved from academically unacceptable to acceptable. We need more principals like Joseph Showell to help our kids and more parents need to take the time to help their kids.