Why shouldn't California students have to pass a reasonable test to get high school diplomas?

Yet on Friday California's superintendent of public instruction moved to cancel the California High School Exit Exam the class of 2004 was supposed to take this summer. The test is set at 10th-grade academic levels, although some feel it's easier.

Jack O'Connell, in a letter to the county and district school superintendents and exit-exam coordinators, urged the state Board of Education at its July meeting to "delay the graduation requirement to pass the [exit exam] until 2006."

If the state board votes as he recommends, Mr. O'Connell said he will "cancel the September and November implementations" of the exam. Mr. O'Connell cited an Assembly report, which read, "many factors suggest that the effectiveness of standards-based instruction will improve for each succeeding class" after the class of 2004. And he wants to keep the January exam to be given to 10th-graders - the class of 2006 - which will give those students "positive momentum."

The actions come amid other developments regarding the test. "The state Assembly recently voted to delay the exam for two years and the Senate is expected to take up the matter later this summer," reported the Modesto Bee yesterday. "And the California Department of Education is facing lawsuits from two interest groups based in Oakland that want to block the test."

Well, it seems almost everything in California ends up in court. That's not reason enough to delay making sure every student who graduates is worthy of a diploma.

And as Lance Izumi of the Pacific Research Institute noted in Tuesday's Register, "It is now estimated that 80 percent of the 2004 class will pass the test." Which shows the test is not impossible. If the test is given, the 20 percent of students who flunk, and their parents, would then have a good reason to ask why the schooling wasn't better.

Postponing the exam "sends the wrong message," former state Secretary of Education Marian Bergeson told us. "We set standards and the students have had the opportunity" to meet them. "It's up to the districts to bring the kids up to the level of the standards."

She conceded that older students, as the Assembly report implied, did not spend their early years under the recent reforms, including increased standards. But the schools have had plenty of time to get those students up to speed, she said. And students also get to take the test several times, beginning in the 10th grade, so the schools can "see where their weaknesses are" and conduct remedial schooling.

"Communities have put a lot of effort into testing to allow the kids to master the academic levels that are now required," she added.

We urge the Legislature to maintain the current exam schedule. And at its July meeting, we urge the state Board of Education to reject Mr. O'Connell's backsliding on the exit exam.

Lowering the bar of achievement will only reduce achievement instead of advancing it.