in the 2008 louisiana legislative regular session, state representative ricky hardy introduced his house bill number 128 which stated in part:to be eligible to participate in any interscholastic athletic or other extracurricular activity, a public school student in grades six through twelve shall have attained not less than a passing grade in each course of study for the previous grading period and shall maintain and have attained, as of the conclusion of the most recent grading period, a cumulative grade point average for all courses of study for the year of at least 2.0 on a 4.0 scale, or its equivalent. The board shall review its policy on an annual basis and adopt such rules as are necessary to
on 10 april 2008 hb128 was considered by the house committee on education. quite surprisingly central louisiana's own herbert dixon, a longtime rapides parish school board member, spoke against the bill:insure ensure that these minimum standards are maintained or upgraded. ~ hb128 excerpt
representative dixon says that he has "some real problems" with hb128. that the bill is "about standards" and that some 66% of "african-american" students are anticipated to do very poorly by the present standards and that considering this - that most of the students arent going to get to play high school sports anyway.
representative dixon says that many students nowadays come from single parent households and that the coach is looked on as a "father figure." then somehow representative dixon makes the argument that by raising the grade point average standards that this will prohibit these kids coming from a single parent household who need to be around these coaches to inspire them to "reach-for-the-stars."
so in other words representative dixon is saying that if you're an african-american parent dont worry about requiring your child to actually learn anything academic as long as they can be around these "father-figure" coaches who will inspire your kid to "reach-for-the-stars" whatever the heck that means. sounds about right for louisiana style reasoning.
by the way, the house committee on education voted down hb128.
