The New York State Regents Examinations: A Proposal for the Realist. Occasional Paper Number Six.

This paper shares the author's thoughts on the required New York State Regents examinations: namely, that the exams, now an integral part of social studies courses, are in some ways a real deterrent to relevant learning. Recommendations were made by the House of Delegates of the New York State Council for the Social Studies (the state-wide professional organization of social studies teachers) to "discontinue the Regents examination program in the social studies." In response to a position offered by one favoring retention of the exams, that the teachers real job is to get his students to pass the Regents, and in support of "the teaching as telling" model, the author presents a tongue in cheek proposal in the "rhetorical mode" to make the singular purpose of social studies and education in general the explicit preparation of students to pass the Regents exams. The paper tends to show the need to answer the question "what is the purpose of education?" (SJM)