If you aren't white, it's your fault. No excuses.

In today's Review Journal, we find that the school district again fell short of the expectations set forth by the No Child Left Behind Act. This means that we'll be put on a Federal Watch List, which lines us up for repercussions in the future if we don't improve. The school district says overall performance has improved; the reason we've been placed on a watch list is due to the poor performance of student subgroups.

That warrants saying again. Overall, we've done better, but student subgroups not performing to standard are the reason we've been placed on the federal watch list.

The NCLB Act is a government mandate to record the differences between children of different races and household income levels. Please, somebody tell me they see how utterly wrong that is. But that's not half of what upsets me in this article. Here's what kills me:

"School district officials, who released the results for each school and the district itself on Thursday, blamed the failure in math and English testing not on the performance of most schools, which have improved overall, but on the performance of student subgroups."

That's a straight quote from the article. The school district is blaming the failing scores on the minority/low income/handicapped kids. I think the school district should be appalled that they're being asked to view their students as race and class based statistics. Instead, they're embracing it and using it as a scape goat.

Measuring these differences sounds like some kind of bizarre scientific experiment, reminiscent of Nazis attempting to prove the Jews were subhuman.

So, if the Federal Government and our school district are going to play it that way, I want an explanation. You're telling me minority and low income students aren't performing as well as others. Which ones are messing us up? And why exactly is that? Perhaps poverty is linked to intelligence on a genetic level, and that's why poor people are poor. They just can't help it. They're bred into it and have no chance of escaping it. Or maybe you're going to tell me that one race is inferior to another?

What say you, reader? Anyone agree with measuring academic aptitude based on race or income? I won't rag on you, I'm genuinely interested in hearing a positive aspect of it. Leave your comments.