High School Students with Low Expectations

Today attendance was terrible. I fail many students because they never attend class or they miss so many of them. I marvel at the time I spend marking students absent – I think to myself, “I got my Masters degree to mark all of these students absent everyday!” I call homes and sometimes get a student to come back to class – but most of the time the calls bring no results. And all of these phone calls take time away from my students who do come and want to be involved. A large number of the kids I teach don’t seem to care about their grades – they have such low expectations for themselves. This New York Times article about the 4 year HS graduation rate gives a shocking report on how poorly so many kids are doing. http://www.nytimes.com/2006/02/10/nyregion/10graduation.html?ex=1297227600&en=ed78a0920e8a88d7&ei=5090&partner=rssuserland&emc=rss.
It seems to me that many of the kids come to high school ill prepared. In fact many of my students do not write near grade level. I was helping one of my students write something for an art piece he was submitting for a contest and his writing needed a lot of work. I spoke to him about it and mentioned that I myself always struggled with writing. He confessed to having the same struggles but he told me he was relieved because he got an 85 on the English regents. I was really shocked! But he goes to class and is passing his classes. He will graduate on time. His story is perhaps more about low tesing standards. It’s the other kids that just seem determined to fail. They don’t seem to have any vision for their futures. I truelly believe that our schools are set up for failure because they are not designed to meet the needs of at least half of the students. How can the needs of those students be met? That's another question