Louisiana Teachers Protest Student's Promotion

By Jeanne Ponessa

Teachers at a Grambling, La., middle school have taken an unusual step in what they say was an effort to support high academic standards.

Nine of the school's 10 teachers took a day off earlier this month--and some of them picketed in front of the school--to protest the promotion of a 12-year-old student. The teachers said the boy was promoted without fulfilling the school's requirements for progressing to the next grade.

The student had not received a passing grade in a required language-arts course the previous school year, which meant he would either have to repeat the year or complete summer-school classes to be promoted. The student attended summer school in California, which...