In late 2022, Culver City High School eliminated all honors English classes for freshman and sophomore students. Other school districts including Santa Monica-Malibu Unified School District, Sequoia Union High School District, and San Diego Unified School District have done the same, causing some parental and media backlash.
However, some college admissions counselors and educators believe that such changes will improve the chances of students who would not necessarily take honors classes and will not affect the students who already do.
The Wall Street Journal’s recent influential article, entitled “Schools Cut Honors Classes to Address Racial Equity. It Isn’t a Quick Fix,” sparked a larger conversation about whether this change really levels the playing field for high school students.
“In fall 2022, Culver City Unified transitioned from a two-tiered system of ‘Honors and Non-Honors’ to ‘College Prep’ classes-for-all in our 9th and 10th grade English courses,” Culver City School District wrote in a public statement about the change. While many parents expressed fear for their children’s honors education being sacrificed, the school views the change as an ‘Honors for All’ approach. The district explained, “We want to emphasize that the College Prep English curriculum is an Honors curriculum, serving all students with the same level of rigor as the Honors curriculum, and one that prepares students to enroll in advanced classes in their final years of high school.”
According to the New York Post, one parent said at a Culver City school board meeting in early 2023, “I have a child in the high school … It is too easy in his classroom. They say, ‘Mom, they say it’s equity, they say that’s the reason and therefore it’s okay.’ I want my child to be challenged.”
The new classes are called “College-Prep” classes, however, parents seem to be concerned that a one-size-fits-all education might take away opportunities at more competitive universities.
“Eliminating ‘honors’ designations for courses doesn’t necessarily reduce the rigor of the course,” David Hawkins, Chief Education and Policy Officer at NACAC, the National Association for College Admission Counseling wrote in an email. “Rather, doing so has the potential to provide equitable access to coursework from which some populations of students have been systematically excluded. In an ideal world, we would want all students to have access to rigorous courses so they can demonstrate their unique approaches and talents within that context.”
Hawkins said discontinuing honors classes at public schools won’t have an impact on college admissions.
“Currently, colleges must account for tens of thousands of differing approaches between high schools both public and private,” Hawkins said in an email. “As such, colleges are accustomed to interpreting students’ applications in the context of their high school’s policies and curricula.”
In September 2023, Sequoia Union High School District released a report summarizing the changes and progress made by de-tracking or eliminating the 9th-grade honors classes. The report revealed data suggesting that this change actually increased the number of “high flyers,” or students who got better grades, and also increased the number of students who later participated in 11th-grade higher-level English courses.
Parents in the California school districts have complained about their kids being deprived of opportunities. “The idea that my son, who excels in math, excels in science, excels in all that he does, even performance, would somehow have to have his equality stolen from him in order to provide for somebody else and call that equality is just unbelievable,” said Lori Burke Ellet, a parent of a San Diego Student at Patrick Henry High School, during an online school meeting in April 2022, according to KPBS. Later in 2022 and 2023, other California school districts followed suit.
Santa Monica High School decided to de-track 9th and 10th grade English classes to help bridge the achievement gap between students of color and white students, according to the Santa Monica Daily Press.
Nathan Fulcher, the English Department Chair and an English teacher at Santa Monica High School, told The Samohi school paper, “Many of us have always felt that our current two-track system is not accurately representing the diversity of our student body. This is a way to try to tap into something that we always claim is our biggest strength here at Samo: the diversity of students. We want to see that reflected in all of our classes.”
CCUSD has no plans to expand this approach beyond the English department, a spokesperson for the district said.
