Just a brief note on clueless, out-of-touch “education” folks.
Bobbie Raehl, president of the St. Charles school board in St. Charles, Illinois, is genuinely shocked that parents in the district don’t want their kids shipped across town to satisfy leftists’ obsession with skin color diversity. Although the board says the diversity was socioeconomic, people unencumbered by PC-rewired brains know that’s code for race.
Says Raehl:
“What was supposed to be a plus [diversity] has turned into almost an abomination. It was supposed to be a good thing and has really backfired for lack of understanding.”
(Use “deathfromabove@spamhole.com” as e-mail and “heyman” as password to bypass annoying registration.)
As usual, another liberal misses the point entirely. It has nothing to do with so-called diversity being considered “an abomination.” Hardworking, taxpaying parents move to decent neighborhoods with decent schools for their kids, some with great sacrifice, and disconnected, head-in-the-sand liberals like Raehl want to undo all that by shipping high-performing students to low-performing schools to save themselves from the embarrassing reality of low-performing schools…unbelievable.
Experiment with your own kids, Mrs. Raehl.
Addendum: A blogger and/or reader more motivated than I would investigate to find out if Mrs. Raehl has children and whether those children went to public or private schools and whether she was willing to ship them across town for the sake of diversity.
I’m going out to play. Have a restful weekend! 
End forced busing and end the influence of the leftist NEA.
Comment by BIRDZILLA — 12.01.06 @ 10:13 am
“It was supposed to be a good thing and has really backfired for lack of understanding.â€
Ma’am turn the mirror around to pinpoint the lack of understanding. All you need to understand is give the parents what they want, a good education. Nobody asked for a good ‘experience’ at the expense of the 3 Rs.
Comment by Andy — 12.01.06 @ 10:40 am
I read the article, and then I did some research on the racial makeup of the school district. The district is 88% white, 6% Hispanic, 4% Asian, and 2% black. I looked at both of their high schools and one had 87% white, 7% Hispanic, 4% Asian and 2% black and the other had 92% white, 4% Asian, less than 1% black and 3% Hispanic. I looked at the middle schools also, and there are 3, and one has 87% white, 6% Asian, 2% black, and 6% Hispanic, the other has 91% White, 1% Asian, 1% Black and 6% Hispanic and the last one had 87% White, 4% Asian, 1% Black and 8% Hispanic.
I looked at these ethnic percentages and I cant tell if it truly is a racial diversity thing and not based on economics. I can conclude that it is not the black folks that they are trying to diversify because based on the percentages, there does not appear to be enough in the entire district to move around. Now it could be the Asians and the Hispanics that they are trying to diversify with the white folks, but they too are of small percentages. Maybe, just maybe, this could actually be an economic based diversity program.
Comment by Roye Barber — 12.01.06 @ 11:05 am
Post # 3 expresses part of the problem that I have with opposition to “diversifying”. I am not for forced diversity (I don’t want you if you don’t want me). BUT everything is not about race. It amazes me. Those for and against assume that everything is about race, for the good or the bad and it is not.
Also a conservative public school educator, the problems don’t lie primarily with the system. Comes from the home. You can’t make people want to learn and the kids from supportive homes (even in low performing schools) perform well. It is the other 80-90% of families that have the poor performing students and make up a large percentage of the scoring used to determine how schools perform.
Before people make blanket assumptions about low performing schools they should see what we see on a daily basis.
Comment by Heather in MD — 12.01.06 @ 11:23 am
Can you believe they are still trying to do this? LaShawn Barber is talking about it today, they have dredged up a really bad idea in St. Charles, Illinois.
Pingback by RobTalk — 12.01.06 @ 11:24 am
Busing is back.
One of the things I found most disingenuous back when busing became an issue in the late 960s and early 70s was the media’s steadfast ignoring black opposition to busing because it undermined their selling opposition to busing as “white bigotry toward blacks.”
No one wants their kids bused an hour across town so the school system can balance out its stats.
As you say, in most areas housing prices are predicated on school performance and parents suffer all manner of financial pain to afford their kids a shot at better schools - that’s black & white parents and everyone in between.
Most failing schools are failing because of a lack of discipline, something school systems are loathe to address.
You don’t need a 12 pupil to 2 teacher ratio. When I went to St Sylvester’s Catholic School a few decades back, one single, mean old Nun kept 60 kids in check without breaking a sweat. The threat of impending discipline (so long as there is an actual stick behind it) is often as effective as the corporeal punishment itself.
Comment by JMK — 12.01.06 @ 11:53 am
We have a related condition locally. We have a fairly large geographic area that makes up the high school district, within which are a large number of secondary schools that feed students into various high schools within the district. One high school within the area is also within a specific city which has it’s own elementary and junior high which it administers. This city wants to take over the high school to create a unified school district, and secede from the high school district. The HS district objects. I don’t have an opinion as to whether it’s a good idea or not - there are politics involved as usual - but I do know that one of the factors that might terminate the possiblity of the secession is one of racial balance. The interesting factor here is that the entire district would have its racial balance affected, but none of the individual schools would be affected. That is, the city’s HS would still have a majority of whites, and the rest of the district would have a majority of hispanics. Nevertheless, you take the city’s white kids out of the district, and that leaves the HS district with an “unbalanced” racial population. The powers that be seem to consider this important.
The decision will be made by the State, and at this time, nobody knows what’s going to happen, but the racial factor is baloney. Real, but still baloney.
Comment by suek — 12.01.06 @ 12:12 pm
What I found interesting about the Board itself isn’t even “diverse”. At least as far as I could tell, there are two members for whom there is no photo.
Comment by Mike — 12.01.06 @ 12:35 pm
When I was little, what they did was they put a magnet school in the poor area, and the rich folks sent their kids there on purpose. I lived down the street from the projects, but there was a Senator’s daughter in my classes…
Comment by silvermine — 12.01.06 @ 12:58 pm
A blogger and/or reader more motivated than I would investigate to find out if Mrs. Raehl has children and whether those children went to public or private schools and whether she was willing to ship them across town for the sake of diversity.
Ha. This reminds me of the federal judge who singlehandedly mandated that New Castle County (DE) schools begin what then-Associate Supreme Court Justice Wm. Rehnquist called “the most draconian busing plan in the nation.” And guess what this judge promptly did? Put his own kids in private schools.
Comment by Hube — 12.01.06 @ 1:03 pm
Poster #6 said “Most failing schools are failing because of a lack of discipline, something school systems are loathe to address.”
What do you propose they do? When you have children attempting to fight teachers, calling you all sorts of curse words. They can be suspended but their parents don’t care, except for the inconvenience of having to find alternative placement for their child. Then, they come back. No form of discipline matters more than once or for a little while because they know that there is not much that the teacher or schools can do. Again, it amazes me the uninformed opinion that people who know very little about urban schools have developed.
There are some terrible problems with urban school systems but most of the academic problems come from student problems at home. Dealing with those problems cause teachers to have to spend more time trying to control children who have not been taught at home so other students don’t get the attention they deserve. People don’t want the government raising their children, then they don’t hold these parents accountable for how their children are being raised.
Heather
Comment by Heather in MD — 12.01.06 @ 1:31 pm
#4, you are right and I agree. I only went through the racial makeup to see if it really is about racial diversity. I could not find anything supporting a reason why they would have done this based on race. I think the assumption was that this was race motivated.
Comment by Roye L Barber — 12.01.06 @ 2:24 pm
>>They can be suspended but their parents don’t care, except for the inconvenience of having to find alternative placement for their child. Then, they come back.>>
I agree with you 100%. I think this is what largely accounts for private schools doing better than public schools - first, that the parents _care_ enough to put them in private schools, and secondly, that the schools can say “behave or don’t come back”. And of course, because the parents care, they enforce the “behave” or else part. I think we need to make schools a privilege, not a right as it is presently. I remember that in California during the “English only” debate, a teacher at the board meeting held the position that since California law stated that public schools were required to educate all children in their district, and since educating required that children understand what was taught, it was therefore a legal requirement that we present educational material in Spanish, if that was the language the children spoke. Considering that I think all public ed should be a privilege instead of a right, we were not exactly seeing eye to eye!
Comment by suek — 12.01.06 @ 3:41 pm
“What do you propose they do? … They can be suspended but their parents don’t care, except for the inconvenience of having to find alternative placement for their child. Then, they come back.”
It used to be you didn’t get to come back - you went somewhere else that was almost a prison.
We need to either change the rules (and laws if necessary) so that school administrators are allowed to do some triage, and expell the ineducable so the rest can learn, or write off the kids in inner city schools.
Better yet, go to a voucher system, so that schools that chronically fail can *go out of business*. The usual objection is “what about the poor kids whose parents can’t be bothered to send them to a decent school?” Well, they’re screwed no matter what. We can at least prevent them from screwing up any other kids’ educations.
But busing kids from good schools to bad schools is a total waste. It harms those kids and doesn’t help anyone at the bad school.
Comment by Ralph Phelan — 12.01.06 @ 6:12 pm
Education in this country is no longer about the children. It’s time to call a spade a spade. It is the biggest form of government welfare today. It is social engineering for the benefit of the state. And the “state” is going to go international. Tony Blair just decided to allow the International Diploma for some of their students. George Bush has already subscribed as well. The leftist in the UN want to “reconstruct” the minds of our children for the sake of “world peace.” It’s a scam. Education is no longer directed by the desire of the parent but the will of the state. All with the goal of building a worker to for the global economy in the 21st century. How very sad. Socialism here we come.
Education is not longer built around the dreams of the child, but the demands of the state.
Comment by Spunky — 12.01.06 @ 6:18 pm
We need to either change the rules (and laws if necessary) so that school administrators are allowed to do some triage, and expell the ineducable so the rest can learn, or write off the kids in inner city schools.
I’ve been saying this for years, and I wish to God someone in charge would listen. My son attends a Baltimore City public school, and I’m so close to sending him to a private school. MY tax money goes to “educate” kids who couldn’t care less about getting an education, and I’ll end up spending almost $20,000 a year so my son can get the education he needs.
Sickening.
Comment by Carol — 12.01.06 @ 7:10 pm
Any such “International Diploma” will be an express ticket to career oblivion. Aside from obvious language issues –Esperanto? Latin? Most certainly not Arabic or Chinese– the doltish concept reeks of feckless ignorance. On ‘tother hand, such a kiss-of-death credential might engender a market for educational certificates that actually mean something.
Used to be, that institutes of Higher Education (sic) measured quality by the subsequent prominence (never mind “success”) of their top graduates. On that basis, George Mason University will outrank Harvard and Yale, for starters, within a generation. Doesn’t take many crippled minority females to change that lightbulb.
An academic Gresham’s Law inescapably applies… poor students drive off good faculty; poor faculty drives off good students. In the time it takes a dodo to say “diversity”, once-great schools start graduating bus-drivers. Disaffected alumni withhold contributions, and soon enough Alma Mater becomes a parking lot. Given the PCBS at Dartmouth, U-Penn, Michigan, and innumerable West Coast boiler-rooms, that may have been the Death-to-Western Civilization crowd’s goal all along.
Comment by John Blake — 12.01.06 @ 10:11 pm
A dead-on indictment of liberal cluelessness, La Shawn.
I say that with one small caveat. If one chooses to endorse the government school system by allowing your kids to be incarcerated in it, then you pretty much get what you deserve. The lefties who dominate the school systems in this country pretty much don’t care about your children even one tenth as much as they care about carrying on their little experiment in social engineering. It’s a fact of life. We can complain all day but it’s not likely changeable. Leftists and their philosophies thoroughly infest the government school system. We can ship the kids off to them and hope and pray that maybe someday it changes, or we can get the heck out of a horrible system and use alternate methods (homeschool is what my family has chosen).
Comment by J. J. — 12.01.06 @ 11:24 pm
One problem with society today is that so many people are unwilling to look inward when they are faced with failures. I think that is probably the problems w/failing schools as well. They find a way to make themselves sound like a victim rather than taking a look at themselves and taking the criticism as a chance to better themselves.
Comment by RepJ — 12.02.06 @ 12:04 am
one gets a mental image of the clueless bureaucrat holding a perfumed hanky to her nose, staggered by a case of the vapours, complaining to the (taxpayer-paid) footmen attending her about the ingratitude of the impudent ruffians who dared to disagree with a plan put forth by their betters.
next time, of course, she’ll just implement the plan without any discussion from the riffraff.
Comment by ed — 12.02.06 @ 2:57 am
La Shawn Barber follows the bus.
Pingback by Basil's Blog — 12.02.06 @ 8:58 am
“Poster #6 said “Most failing schools are failing because of a lack of discipline, something school systems are loathe to address.â€
What do you propose they do?”
(Heather)
Well, there are any number of things schools COULD do. One would be to set up boot-camp like alternatives for chronic problem students and miscreants.
The law says public schools have to educate everyone. It does not stipulate that all be educated together. Those miscreants who ruin the educational experience for everyone else should be removed and placed in alternative learning environs.
As I said, 1 little, fiesty old Nun didn’t have any problem keepng 60 kids in line when corporeal punishment was allowed.
For those “kids” and the occasional parent who want to physically fight a teacher, well there’s always that thing called “an assault charge.” I guarantee, you stop treating problem people with kid gloves and the problem will self-correct. If you lock up a few, the rest will fall in line.
People do such things only when they beleive they can get away with them. It’s the same with parental violence at children’s sporting events - put a few of these bullying parents away for, say, three to five years and the others so inclined will quickly assess the risk/reward ration very differently.
To date, we, as a society, have had far too much patience for such blatant stupidity. Beleive me, that can be changed very quickly.
Comment by JMK — 12.02.06 @ 11:41 am
Lack of discipline IS THE ISSUE, and until the entire system gets behind the solution, this travesty will continue to spiral downward out of control. The school system, both administration and teachers, need to lay down the law, with the backing of our legal system. No more coddling or making excuses. I came from a negligent and abusive home and still managed to make good grades; at the very least, I didn’t prevent my classmates from learning. This crap has to stop and because it has been allowed to get out of control for so long, getting it under control will require harshness bordering on militancy. Incorrigible kids need to go to boot camp. If they shape up there over the course of the next year, then they can return and join the society of decent people.
Part of the problem is that so many teachers and educational “experts” are themselves clueless moonbats, so they’ve helped to create this situation. Parents may be irresponsible and unwise, but they depend on the schools to babysit their kids; if the schools say “no more; he’s your problem now,” then the parents will shape up. I believe this completely. The last thing a bad parent wants is to be stuck with a kid all day. So the alternative is for them to YIELD to the “new law of the land” and let the child be disciplined, or sent off to boot camp. Period. That’s the way things have to be. Many parents are lazy and unwise, and they listen to the supposed “experts” making excuses for their kids. Who wouldn’t rather believe the excuses than have to look at oneself and make corrections?
I have seen such deterioration in discipline and respect in the school system during my son’s education, and it is really a shame. I loved school. It was my peaceful respite from a bad home life. I’m sad that so many of the children from bad homes, the ones who aren’t causing the problems but are attending the schools where the problem kids go, are not able to see school as a nice place to be.
Comment by batyah — 12.02.06 @ 11:44 am
My children are adults now thank God, but when my oldest started second grade, the brilliant minds on our school board came up with the magnet school idea to justify bringing children from the housing projects into the better neighborhood schools. They applied the label of “arts and music” magnet school to our neighborhood school, and because my son at age 7 had no particular musical or artistic talent, denied him admission to second grade at the very school he attended in kindergarten and first grade, which happened to be directly across the street from our home. He was assigned to a school less than two miles away, but because the law states a student must live at least two miles from school to be allowed to ride the bus, no transportation was provided for him. Instead, children 10 miles away from the housing projects in the inner city were provided bus rides to our previous school. Now, these children didn’t have arts or music talent either, but because they were deemed underprivileged, were given first priority. The arts and music idea had to go by the wayside because most of the teachers’ time was spent on discipline. As a single mother struggling financially I had to pay someone to take my son to the new school two miles down the road when previously he only had to walk across the street with the crossing guard. Now nearly 25 years later this school which for many years was a jewel in the city’s educational crown is consistently on the Academic Failure list and is a cesspool of gang activity. No parent who can afford private school for their children would send them there, although the school sits smack in the middle of an area of lovely and expensive homes. The students come from across town, not from across the street anymore. What would have been wrong with bringing inner city schools up to standard rather than engaging in such a stupid experiment?
Comment by Paula — 12.02.06 @ 12:23 pm
I know this will never happen soon but things in society will not change until people know they have to pay for things, including education. Taxes are taken automatically on a weekly basis from one’s paychecks so we don’t really pay attention to that. We become lulled into complacency when we don’t feel the pain of paying out cash money.
If people could take home ALL their wages and THEN paid out what the country/state/county/city/etc said they owed then mama and daddy might perk up and pay attention.
Taxes would go down and demand for quality would go up. We’ve all seen that customer (usually right in front of us) argue for 15 minutes over a dollar at the register. Imagine writing a check for “tuition” (in the form of taxes) to your local school monthly and finding out that your darling son is causing trouble or that the teacher is incompetent. I bet folks would fix that situation real quick. Consumers in this country get what they want 99% of the time. It’s the payment system that needs fixing.
Comment by Michael — 12.02.06 @ 12:28 pm
I am a public school teacher at a large urban-ring, suburban high school. We are about 20% minority with Asians making up a substantial number of our minority group.
Teachers I know are trying very hard to educate everyone. Our administration is made up of good people who want the best for all kids. Students who come out of the black minority culture are a huge problem. Mostly, they don’t understand that in some instances their actions in the hallways scare kids of all colors, including blacks. Many black kids have made the cultural jump, and are fine students, headed for college.
Problems I see every day: gansta dress, tardiness, unwillingness to do homework or prepare for class in any way; it’s not ALL minority kids. But it’s a large enough number to cause some parents to flee the district.
I believe out administration is engaging in a kind of triage. The problem is that the bottom third comes to overwhelm and scare the top two layers to a point where the bottom kids eventually become a majority.
Neighborhoods decline as people move to the next “safe” district. Until as a society we can deal with very bottom group and keep it from overwhelming us this is going to continue.
We need some kind of giant Marshall Plan, or at least a decision by private charities to move into ghetto neighborhoods in some way to help these trapped people.
It just seems to go on and on.
Comment by KJO — 12.02.06 @ 12:39 pm
First: every child deserves a quality education through high school at public expense. We created public schools for this purpose. But there is no reason not to have the voucher system so that parents who care can ride herd on the quality of education their children receive. An education at public expense and public schools are not synonymous.
Second: every teacher is expected to “individualize instruction” for every kid in the classroom. Bull feathers! It is not possible by time constraints alone. The fact is, many teachers are caught up expending far more time in dealing with individuals who continually present discipline disruptions than they are in individualizing instruction.
Third: the teacher unions fight vouchers because they know that in many cases the public schools will end up full of drop-ins and behavior problems. They are probably right. But at least it would be an “affinity community” (how’s that for PC?) and they could concentrate on getting as much out of the chaos as possible. At least they wouldn’t be letting the other students molder.
Four: diversity is pure bunk. Anyone who needs a case of diversity can go hang out at the 7-11. The only gripe I have that verges on agreement with the “diversity” issue is when public school systems favor a few schools over the others.
Five: busing students past their closest school to satisfy some statistical need has been suspect from the beginning. Can anyone show statistical evidence that busing has improved any individual’s educational performance? Of course, not.
Six: public education is public relations and politics with all the attendant spin and double talk. The presumptions of the classroom are a thing of the past. Now, the classroom is adapted to the “needs of the child.” Fine enough, but what exactly does that mean? The answer: whatever the strongest political force says it means.
Comment by Heliotrope — 12.02.06 @ 2:08 pm
“I’ve been saying this for years, and I wish to God someone in charge would listen.”
Someone is in charge, YOU. It is the natural right of parents to educate their children. That’s why the federal government was silent on education. They believed and the public understood, it wasn’t the government’s job to educate the masses. Take charge and get your children out of their schools.
So when I hear comments like this, “every child deserves a quality education through high school at public expense.” It sounds like finger nails on the chalk board. Why should my neighbor pay to educate my six children? He works hard for his money, what right do I have to demand that he subsidize my children. I have no right.
If I took from my neighbor to help you, we would call it theft. But when the government does it we call it compassion for the common good. Forced benevolence by the state is not compassionate, it is theft just the same.
Until parents gain control of the funding once again we will never fully see the parents “in charge” as Carol would like. Until then homeschool or private school is your only option. You may not feel qualified but at the end of your life, you’ll be able to hold your head up high and say you didn’t steal from your neighbor.
And your children will respect you more for it. They know a scam when they see it. They know it’s not natural to attend a government welfare institution to learn. That’s why they get bored and lack motivation. And that’s why parents aren’t involved either. The state has made it easy for them NOT to be involved.
And that’s just the way they like it. A child separated from his faith and his family, will look to the state to provide his physical and emotional needs.
And don’t tell me public education is necessary because some will neglect their children. Some parents AND teachers are neglected their children now. So public education hasn’t solved anything. They’ve made it worse.
And if it were truly just for the poor and neglected why are the majority of children in American in public school?
Comment by Spunky — 12.02.06 @ 3:24 pm
Bless you, LaShawn, for drawing attention to this clown. Why do these people always project their own prejudices on those who oppose them?
Comment by John — 12.02.06 @ 3:49 pm
That was excellently put Spunky…right on the money.
Everyone complains when they see themselves being forced to pay for other people’s “free stuff,” but rarely fail to rationalize their own largesse.
It’s one of the reasons that most Americans mistake freedom (the self-responsibilty of individual Liberty) for license (”doing whatever one wants, so long as we don’t hurt anyone else”).
Comment by JMK — 12.02.06 @ 4:14 pm
Ooops! I am the culprit: “every child deserves a quality education through high school at public expense. ” (#27 above.)
It never occurred to me that anyone would promote the idea that the public good does not include education or setting minimal standards. But, obviously, the most ardent libertarian would see it that way.
We have developed a series of concepts around the efficacy of having an educated public. Not only do we have public schools, but many of our finest universities are publicly funded.
Taxpayers get hit for a lot of things they don’t like and for things they don’t use. National defense, fire departments, interstate highways, mental institutions, game wardens, etc. are all “frills” to some taxpaying folks.
As it now stands, public schools are largely funded through property and sales taxes on everyone, whether they have children in school or not. Furthermore, all children are accorded the same amount of education spending even if their parents paid no taxes whatsoever.
The alternative of dropping the taxation and turning education over to every parent is to turn the clock back to a period when many found it more economic to send their little children to work in the rope loft than to educate them.
Education was not exactly left out of the Constitution and the Federal Government. The Constitution outlines the obligations of the national government. Education was left to the states and the people of the states. Thus, only the Preamble (promote the general welfare) and the ninth, tenth and fourteenth amendments apply indirectly to public education.
However, Congress has created lots of education related funding programs and every state has chosen to go after the money. The price for the deal is to abide by federal regulations attached to the use of the money. Many conservatives have dreamed of getting rid of Jimmy Carter’s Department of Education, but Congress will never let it happen because it is the source of tons of “pork” and lots of votes for Congressmen.
So, if there is to be a standard of educating the public, the 14th amendment requires that the state provide equal opportunity under its laws. How you would ever get funding out of the picture is beyond my comprehension. Can anyone imagine even one state deciding to close down its system of education and turning it back to the individual parents? In fairness, that is the way it was in the 1800’s in many rural places throughout the country.
My belief in a free education is that every parent should have a set amount of tax money available (through an audited voucher system) to turn over to a public school, or a private school or to use for home schooling.
In fact, I would like to see it possible for a home schooler to be able to bank unused voucher money in a college savings account.
One final note: I came up through an orphanage that was privately funded. My schooling was at the orphanage and I got a terrific education. When I left to go to college, I had a new suit, a fiber board suitcase for my other clothes and fifty dollars. My scholarship and work grant program made college possible when only about 12% of high school graduates across the nation went to college.
I spent a career teaching in public schools at the high school and university levels. I don’t believe in public schools as the only way to get an education, but I sure as heck believe in an educated public. I travel the world and the backward idea of leaving education up to the parents alone is common in the slums and valleys of the poorest nations. We really don’t want to go there.
Comment by Heliotrope — 12.02.06 @ 6:39 pm
You may have missed Spunky’s main point, Heliotrope and that is we PAY for every “free thing” from government - sometimes we pay double what it should cost, sometimes triple, but there’s never been a straight, or “even up” deal from the government.
I can’t argue with Spunky’s other main point that, “They (the students) know it’s not natural to attend a government welfare institution to learn. That’s why they get bored and lack motivation. And that’s why parents aren’t involved either. The state has made it easy for them NOT to be involved.”
Does anyone ever really respect and care for “free stuff?”
Our public schools systems have become run BY, OF and FOR the benefit of the teacher’s Unions.
Actually, our current public school system remains an homage to the 19th Century factory model. A model that America abandoned over a half century ago in every other phase of our lives.
Maybe education should evolve as society does. Today the lectures from the very best instructors in every subject could be set on DVDs and made available for EVERY student to benefit from.
Fewer people work in offices, more telecommute, and/or work from home, so why should today’s students be tethered to a classroom?
Today’s public educational system does little to prepare students for real life and offers far less quality than could be offered.
Comment by JMK — 12.02.06 @ 8:05 pm
Thanks! JMK, for the elucidation.
I don’t disagree that the free stuff is undervalued. Nor do I disagree that there is no such thing as a free lunch.
Your point about lectures on DVD’s reminds me of the middle ’60’s when a number of universities established “video” libraries so that students could catch up on missed lectures or review them in studying for exams. While the process was primitive in comparison with the technology of today, the concept was the same. I am not aware of any major institution that has stuck with the idea or updated it. There is a reason for this.
Learning requires a willing environment. Every true student knows that. This leads to the point that: They (the students) know its not natural to attend a government welfare institution to learn. Thats why they get bored and lack motivation. And thats why parents arent involved either. The state has made it easy for them NOT to be involved.
In my ancient time we said that “you can lead a horse to water, but you can’t make him drink.”
I spent years listening to “experts” talk about “motivating” students. When Walter Cronkite left CBS he founded a company that was going to make learning through television broadcasts the thing of the future. Pfffffttttt! Bill Cosby got a doctorate in education and set out to motivate the masses to learn. Pfffffttttt!
The fact is, if you are not inclined to achieve, you will vegetate until the time is right or never. In my day, a lot of kids disappeared from the school rolls about the age of 15. In the inner city, it is still the same, but now we try to drag them back in.
The problem for the drop out is that there is a lot of competition in the construction industry for the grunt work. Furthermore, the drop out of today has a taste for expensive things and an impatience to acquire them.
The idea that many kids “know its not natural to attend a government welfare institution to learn” fits nicely with the rejection of responsibility, abstinence and morality.
Any kid who hates the government welfare institution is free to attach himself to a quality school. The kindness of strangers knows no bounds when a really determined, but indigent person knocks at the door.
Sorry, but the dog you portray won’t hunt. It doesn’t want to.
As an after thought: I taught a time in Nigeria and the students in the university had fought tooth and nail for their position to attend. Every student was ranked by his achievement number. I was allowed to “pass” only 75% of the class per semester. How about that for motivation?
As for parents who give up on public schools…….. surely they are finding better alternatives or taking on other responsibilities for the child’s education. Tell me they are. (I have dealt with the squads of meat cleaver mommas who come screaming about their rights…… not an easy group to deal with when all they want is the outcome without the input.)
Comment by Heliotrope — 12.02.06 @ 9:08 pm
A part of the problem with education is that we expect so little. The “you can lead a horse to water” view accepts that a certain amount of failure is to be expected and is therefore alright.
That may well be true, but only for a small segment of society - the impulsive and self-destructive.
It could be argued that most children are innately impulsive and therefore somewhat self-destructive as well, but most are able to mature and overcome that.
Parents are important, but so are schools, and there seems to be as much blaming of parents by educators as there is blaming of schools by frustrated parents.
Boot camp alternatives for the most chronic miscreants sems to work. The difference between the schools of today that don’t work very effectively and those of yesterday that did, is discipline.
As i said earlier, The law says public schools have to educate everyone. It does not stipulate that all be educated together. Those miscreants who ruin the educational experience for everyone else should be removed and placed in alternative learning environs.
If 1 little, fiesty old Nun didn’t have any problem keepng 60 kids in line when corporeal punishment was allowed forty years ago, the same would hold true today, given the same parameters.
For those “kids†and the occasional parent who want to physically fight a teacher, well there’s always that thing called “an assault charge.†I guarantee, you stop treating problem people with kid gloves and the problem will self-correct. If you lock up a few, the rest will fall in line.
People do such things only when they beleive they can get away with them. It’s the same with parental violence at children’s sporting events - put a few of these bullying parents away for, say, three to five years and the others so inclined will quickly assess the risk/reward ration very differently.
One of the big problems today is that Teacher’s Unions have opposed such discipline in the schools and then sought remedy for the resulting chaos in “reduced class sizes,” and “more teacher’s aids,” instead of more discipline.
Those Teacher’s Unions know that reduced class sizes and more teacher’s aids doesn’t really address the causes of the problems, but they know it sure does benefit those Unions very much!
Comment by JMK — 12.02.06 @ 9:56 pm
I just completed my student teaching assignment at a low-socioeconomic status school in Central Texas. It was a 3rd grade class. As a “thank you” to my cooperating teacher, I was to do a day of substitute teaching “free” (to where it didn’t count against the teacher’s days off). The class has 18 students - 12 boys and 6 girls. I subbed the Tuesday after Thanksgiving. Two-thirds of the class behaved as little hooligans that day - you can’t touch the students. I had several students out of the classroom at different times of the day - I sent them into the adjoining classroom for a while. One student got to talk to the AP after he spit on the floor in the hallway on the way back from lunch… I felt bad for the 6-7 kids who were behaving. For the kids that misbehaved, most of them have uninvolved parents/guardians (one student is being raised by his grandparents, who don’t speak English and work all the time - they buy him expensive things, but they are never there to provide guidance and discipline).
The biggest problem are those parents/guardians who aren’t involved in the child’s schooling. A lot of kids don’t ever do their homework. You can’t force parents to be involved. Kids are given second and third chances to get passing grades. I was told that if you fail too many students (regardless of whether or not they HAVE failed), you could lose your teaching job. A lot of these kids should also probably be in special education or Section 504 programs (maybe mom drank and/or did drugs during the pregnancy, or the kid didn’t get proper nutrition?), but each school apparently is given a quota they can’t go over, so it is very hard to get kids into these programs.
At this school, discipline is a problem, but it takes a lot to get a student removed from the classroom permanently. I will begin working as a paid sub while looking for a permanent teaching position (with graduating in December, I might not find a full-time classroom position for January). Except for when specifically requested by my cooperating teaching, I will not choose to sub at the school I did my student teaching - I will sign up for only those schools close to where I live where the discipline issues will not be as severe.
As for not having government be in the business of educating everyone’s children, I disagree. If we don’t try to educate every child, we will have a growing permanent underclass, and that will NOT be good for society as a whole. I don’t have kids (yet), but I don’t mind my taxes going to help pay for the educational system.
If you don’t like how the education system in your community is run, do something about it. If you have kids, participate in PTA/PTO. Attend parent/teacher conferences. Find out what the mandated curriculum is, and how your child’s teacher intends to teach it (depending on the mandated curriculum, teachers do have some leeway in how to present it: in Texas, when reading the TEKS (the state mandated curriculum), a “such as” is a suggestion, but an “including” is a requirement. Attend school board meetings. Run for the local school board. Write your elected representatives.
I am a product of public schools. I was educated in San Antonio and El Paso, but also DoDDS schools in Germany. I was lucky to have involved parents, but they couldn’t have afforded to send me to private schools on my dad’s enlisted salary. I was lucky in that I got a quality education - I always wanted to learn. I started school in a middle class neighborhood school in SA. Next, I went to a DoDDS school, which is almost like a private school (you misbehave bad enough and your dad’s commanding officer might be notified…), then it was off to EP, where I was bussed from base housing to the designated school (junior high then high school). These schools did have some problems with gangs outside of class, but classroom discipline was in place. Finally it was back to DoDDS schools for my last to years of high school.
We can’t abandon our public schools to the liberal/progressive crowd. That’s one reason I decided to go into teaching - to try to do what I can as “part of the system” in order to turn the tide back into the right direction. Admittedly, I don’t want to teach in the district I currently live in. I am looking at smaller districts in the Central Texas area. We’ll see if I get a position in the district I’d really like, but only time will tell.
Comment by Miss Ladybug — 12.03.06 @ 4:37 am
There is no doubt in my mind you would have opposed the 1954 Civil Rights Act.
Not sure if you’re responding to me or a commenter. Either way, you’re wrong, as usual. I suppose you meant the Civil Rights Act of 1964, the one that reads, “‘Desegregation’ means the assignment of students to public schools and within such schools without regard to their race, color, religion, or national origin, but “desegregation” shall not mean the assignment of students to public schools in order to overcome racial imbalance.”
I don’t oppose it. I wholeheartedly support it. And there’s no doubt in my mind you’ve never read it. - Admin
Comment by vic — 12.03.06 @ 11:35 am
#35 Ladybug: You have a very clear understanding of public schools today and their many pit-falls.
When I began teaching in public schools in the mid 60’s, students were afraid of having their parents brought in. Furthermore, there was never any threat of involving a lawyer or dragging the Central Administration in. That has totally changed in many public school jurisdictions.
I had a student slug me back in the 70’s and I charged him with assault and battery. He was removed from school for a time and returned on a strict probation. He feared being sent to the reformatory and he toed the line. In the 90’s I had a kid get paged in my classroom and he walked out and entered a girl’s restroom and beat a girl severely. She owed him drug money. He was court ordered back into the school and ordered to behave. Which, of course, he did not.
The public school has become a sociology experiment lab where liberals practice their diversity theories. It is hard to teach a lot in that setting. That is why more and more parents are putting their kids in home schooling or private schools. They are getting their kids out of the asylum and into a setting where the presumptions of learning are first and foremost.
I pity the many dedicated teachers who are still trying to make a difference in the more dysfunctional public schools.
Comment by Heliotrope — 12.03.06 @ 1:36 pm
“As for not having government be in the business of educating everyone’s children, I disagree. If we don’t try to educate every child, we will have a growing permanent underclass…” (Miss Ladybug)
The problem with that statement is that the phrases, “If we don’t try to educate every child,” and “If GOVERNMENT doesn’t try to educate every child,” are NOT interchangable, in fact there’s no connection between the two.
There would be, IF the only way that WE (the people) could educate our children would be via government run education, but it’s clearly NOT the only way.
How much do we as taxpayers currently overpay for public education? Well, in NYC, Catholic Schools (paying mostly lay teachers now) do a far superior job of educating students at less than half what our public schools cost.
So, we’re paying at least double what it should, possibly more, since we don’t have any way to know whether Catholic schools are even as efficient as they could be, for a demonstrably lower quality product.
Besides, there are many other possible models other than a government managed educational bureaucracy. One would be a business sponsored system, where various businesses sponsor schools to gear children to work in specialties needed by those companies.
But government run schools themselves COULD do a much better job, by assigning problem-students to various alternative learning environs and instiling more discipline in the classroom.
The fact that most teachers Unions oppose such things, only demonstrates that education is NOT their first and foremost goal.
Comment by JMK — 12.03.06 @ 2:04 pm
This is why I removed my kids from public school 3 years ago. Now I pay for the privilege of a good education for my children and they learn alongside other kids who’s parents care. It’s not all white and my children are bi-racial. There are black and Hispanic parents who want the best for their kids too. I don’t want my kids in a school where many of the kids and parents just don’t care about education. Now we just need vouchers.
Comment by Kim — 12.03.06 @ 4:59 pm
JMK~
If the government doesn’t have some mechanism for public education, there will be those parents who forego having their children attend school in order to have them earn money to go towards the family finances. Not every person that has children is capable of either a) paying to send their child to private school or b) educating their child at home. The parents that ARE capable of doing one of those two things are the ones that are already involved in making sure their children become educated. The kids that are the problems are the ones whose parents aren’t capable for whatever reason (like the child I mentioned that is being raised by his non-English-speaking grandparents) of doing it on their own. As long as there are children like this, we have to have a public school system.
I know the public school system is not perfect, far from it, but we need to try to fix it, not eliminate it. If you think schools are controled by the teachers’ unions (which are illegal in Texas - teachers are forbidden by state law to strike, but there are ‘professional organizations’, one of which is affliliated with the NEA - I refuse to sign up with that one, but instead have signed up with independent professional organizations. I did that so I can get the professional liability insurance, so if someone decides they want to sue me over the way I have performed my job, I’m at least protected financially), get involved in the ways I mentioned before.
As for Catholic schools performing better (and I say this with parents that are products of Catholic school educations in the 50s and 60s), Catholic schools and other private schools are able to pick and choose their students. If a student does not follow the codes of conduct the school has, that student can be thrown out. Public schools are not so lucky - you work with what shows up in your classroom…
To fix the problem of the kinds of students left in public school classrooms, you have to fix the conditions in the home. What are we going to do? Start deciding who is and is not allowed to become a parent?? I really don’t think this nation wants to go there….
Comment by Miss Ladybug — 12.03.06 @ 5:11 pm
#38 JMK:
Many of the ideas you have expressed have been around for many (100) years. However, the society we live in has turned to the government for more and more service at tax payer expense, not less. Hillary is bound and determined to have nationalized health care under the control of the federal government.
It is unimaginable that with all the forms of welfare that have come into being since the 1960’s that this society would abandon the public schools. After all, they were the first great social program of government.
I favor the voucher system because it gives the parents the freedom of choice. Many parents would like to abandon the public schools, but they can not because of the costs involved.
There are some children who are nearly feral and I suspect that few private schools would take them on. There are rural areas where the sparse population would not attract voucher schools. There mean neighborhoods where voucher students would have a rough time coming and going to a private school. Hence, there will always be public schools for those who are trapped by the neglect of their upbringing, their relative isolation or their absence of motivation and the desire to succeed.
You are entirely correct about the cost of public schools. Washington DC has an enormous per pupil expenditure accompanied by one of the worst records of student achievement in the country.
My first public school teaching assignment (mid-60’s) was in a segregated black high school that had used text books and no supplies. But, we turned out top notch students, nonetheless. We also did not tolerate foolishness in the classroom or in the attendance procedure. The grading scale was A=94-100; B=87-93; C=80-86; D=73-79. A student could not participate in any extra curricular activity with less than an 80 average in any course. No credit could be earned if the student had three or more unexcused absences during the semester. Two unexcused tardies equaled an unexcused absence.
That was then.
I appreciate your tough stance, but in this day of welfare progressivism, you are spitting into the wind. (That is not meant as an insult.)
Comment by Heliotrope — 12.03.06 @ 5:32 pm
“If the government doesn’t have some mechanism for public education, there will be those parents who forego having their children attend school in order to have them earn money to go towards the family finances…” (Ladybug)
The laws against child labor and mandating that children under sixteen must be engaged in fulltime educational activities don’t mandate public schools.
They’re two different issues Ladybug.
Making “education” mandatory and maintaining laws against child labor DO NOT mandate public schools, otherwise parents wouldn’t be free to send their kids to private schools and/or home school their kids.
“I know the public school system is not perfect, far from it, but we need to try to fix it, not eliminate it.” (Ladybug)
Actually, I’ve never espoused “eliminating the public school system.”
In fact, I DID indeed give my own views on what the public schools need to do in order to improve. From one of my earlier posts in this thread; “Well, there are any number of things schools COULD do. One would be to set up boot-camp like alternatives for chronic problem students and miscreants.
“The law says public schools have to educate everyone. It does not stipulate that all be educated together. Those miscreants who ruin the educational experience for everyone else should be removed and placed in alternative learning environs.
“As I said, 1 little, fiesty old Nun didn’t have any problem keepng 60 kids in line when corporeal punishment was allowed.”
There are actually a number of things the public schools could do to improve education.
“To fix the problem of the kinds of students left in public school classrooms, you have to fix the conditions in the home. What are we going to do?” (Ladybug)
Again, there is NO LAW that mandates that all public school students be educated TOGETHER. Problem students CAN and SHOULD be removed from regular classes and placed in alternative learning environs, like boot-camp styled programs.
Heliotrope, same thing….nowhere in this thread did I espouse eliminating public education.
It can easily be “radically reformed” via an infusion of discipline. Parents and students who objected strenuously (physically) would be locked up….you’d only have to lock up a few to eradicate any lingering opposition, of that, I’m certain.
Vouchers are a half measure, in this regard, without that infusion of discipline, the public schools will not improve.
The current system is enormously unfair to people like Kim who are forced to pay for a private school education for their kids, while also paying for underperforming public schools.
Vouchers WOULD give folks like Kim some relief, and that would be good, but it wouldn’t in and of itself improve the public schools, which would have to actually reform in order to improve.
Comment by JMK — 12.03.06 @ 6:51 pm
#42 JMK: At the risk of sounding impertinent, there are two issues you seem not to understand.
1. There is no jurisdiction in the progressive/socialist USA that would or could “lock up” recalcitrant parents or students. It has been 20 years or more since that was conceivable. (We can’t even profile Muslims on air flights!)
2. Vouchers would be a commodity subject to the value fluctuation of supply and demand. At first, they would be an “escape from public schools” ticket. But, if the market works efficiently, the public schools would soon wake up to the necessity of serving the public again, and more people would choose to spend their vouchers with the public schools.
As it is now, the public schools are a virtual monopoly and they have no need to listen to the public; so, they fiddle the education system. When the Bush Administration jammed testing down their throats, they went ballistic. They hate to be measured and compared. If vouchers were available, many parents would seek alternatives on the assumption that things have to be better where a disciplined, structured learning environment is in place.
Over the years, I have mentored over 100 high school students who were not achieving. Most of them finally figured out that the tooth fairy crapped out in the second grade and that success is related to personal commitment.
Some people are predisposed to look at things that are “free” as always available to them when they choose to use them. The problem is that putting off the mastery of reading only makes most of these folks forever backward. Education often requires tough love. Private schools and home schoolers know this. Tough love in a public school is a ticket for getting a teacher or principal fired.
Your prescription for discipline worked forty years ago. Now we are worried about the way terrorists are being treated at Gitmo.
I am afraid that you see a world without the ACLU or the NAACP. The reality is that Jessie Jackson and his rent-a-mob and a bunch of lawyers from Boston would bankrupt your efforts in a New York minute.
Comment by Heliotrope — 12.03.06 @ 8:54 pm
Yes, there are laws against child labor. But who regulates it when kids mow lawns or shovel snow or babysits. I wasn’t one to mow lawns or shovel snow, but I did babysit prior to turning 16. I was ten and a half when my oldest sibling was born. My mom was a stay-at-home mom, but I did quite a bit of babysitting when she was an infant. Consider that some families would have their older children become that babysitter for younger children in lieu of paying for childcare. We also have laws against hiring illegal aliens, and those aren’t enforced like they should be.
I guess it was Spunky who was making comments about forced benevolence re: the government and the educational system.
I, for one, would love to have problem students removed from the general education classroom. However, it is very difficult to do so. That gets back to getting involved by attending PTA/PTO meetings, school board meetings and contacting your elected representatives. When voters make noise, that’s when politicians listen. Separating these students means districts have to pay more money for separate facilities and more teachers, and they don’t want to have to do that, so they try to avoid it as much as possible. Make it difficult for them to avoid it.
Within the district I live in, I’ve been in classrooms at two schools. One was in my neighborhood when I did 35 hours of observation in a 2nd grade class about a year ago. Only one student was a real discipline problem, and he was an ADHD child (yes, I think they use this label too liberally, but I think it was accurately applied in this case). Only one child out of about 20. This semester, I was in a 3rd grade this semester. In contrast, about two-thirds of the class were behavior problems to one extent or another. I’m sure a lot fewer kids at the middle-class school are candidates for removal from the general education classroom than the lower-class school I’ve been in over the last 3 months…
Comment by Miss Ladybug — 12.03.06 @ 10:43 pm
Since I’m done with student teaching, I am home today, and decided to listen to Rush. He got onto the topic of the Supreme Court arguments today on this very topic (but different districts). He said something that reminded me of a thought I had, but took that thought further….
I had seen a report on this bussing story and thought about how having your child’s school across town would make it difficult to get to parent/teacher conferences, especially for low-income parents that might not have transportation.
Rush took it a step further - this is ON PURPOSE to try to keep parents out of the school’s hair, so the school can do what THEY want without any pesky interference from parents…
Food for thought…
Comment by Miss Ladybug — 12.04.06 @ 1:48 pm
I well remember the father of a friend of mine informing me VERY seriously that my parents were elitist snobs because they sent me to Catholic schools. I looked at him in absolute shock at this comment (he was a former school teacher) - how could he even begin to think that of my parents who had worked so hard to provide me with a better education than could be had in the public schools of our neighborhood for which they were also paying via their taxes? His contention was that everyone should go to pubic schools so we would all share a common experience and think alike. It was the most astounding comment I think I’ve ever heard and it fascinates me that now these same liberals are preaching diversity while still wanting us all to think alike - in other words, LIKE THEM!
Comment by Gayle Miller — 12.04.06 @ 2:09 pm
La Shawn Barber scoffs at St. Charles, Illinois school officials who think anti-busing parents see diversity as an “abomination. “Hardworking, taxpaying parents move to decent neighborhoods with decent schools for their kids, some with great sacrifice, and disconnected, head-in-the-sand liberals like (Bobbie) Raehl want to undo all that by shipping high-performing students to low-performing schools to save themselves from the embarrassing reality of low-performing schools…unbelievable.
Pingback by Joanne Jacobs — 12.04.06 @ 3:21 pm
I don’t mind my taxes going to educate the poor, whether it’s through a voucher system or through the public schools. What I do mind, however, is my son and other kids like him being held hostage by a system that caters to the lowest common denominator and turns a blind eye to the behaviour of some of the students…yet my child would be thrown out of school (and soundly thrashed upon arriving home) for displaying the same.
Raise the lowest to meet the highest — don’t drag the highest through the gutter to hang out with the lowest. Cripes — is it really that darn hard for the school system to figure out?
Comment by Carol — 12.04.06 @ 6:58 pm
#48 Carol: AMEN!!!!!
Public school administrators I have worked for and with are quick to saddle the “cooperative” parents with punitive actions for the indiscretions of their children and loathe to take on the hardened jerks who will come through the door yelling “discrimination” and “racism.”
More and more parents are wise to this double standard and are home schooling their kids or breaking their budget to send them to honest private schools.
Comment by Heliotrope — 12.04.06 @ 9:09 pm
The language in these posts are code words for black. All black kids aren’t bad in school. Why doesn’t anyone say anythimg all about all these white kids amped out on meth and coming in and disrupting schools???
Comment by Tiffany in Houston — 12.05.06 @ 11:43 am
I know not all black kids are behavior problems. I went to school with many (it was a small school), and none of them were behavior problems - we didn’t have behavior problems in the DoDDS schools I attended in Germany.
What I have observed is that the behavior problem children are the ones that don’t have good parental guidance at home. The school where I student taught is predominantly black/Hispanic. There wasn’t a single white child in the 3rd grade classroom I was assigned to. Yes, there were black kids that are behavior problems, but there were just as many of the Hispanic kids that were, too. I was in a class with 12-13 boys and 5-6 girls (some turnover in the 3 months I was there). The real problem students were all boys. I think these kids misbehave because they don’t have good role models at home.
I know that whites and meth is a growing problem. When I lived in Arkansas, seemed like authorities where busting meth labs at least once a month, mostly in rural areas (outside of the big towns), which means mostly white. I think the discussion we are having here is focused on a more urban school environment (we are talking about bussing, after all), so the problems will be a bit different than small/rural schools have.
Comment by Miss Ladybug — 12.05.06 @ 1:11 pm
Why doesn’t anyone say anythimg all about all these white kids amped out on meth and coming in and disrupting schools???
I want to make something VERY clear here — I am NOT referring to children of any one race. I’m discussing MY situation, and nobody else’s. Shame on you for assuming that everyone here is so race-motivated. The issues that I (and parents like me) face at my son’s school are socio-economic, and apply across the board. I resent your implication that somehow I would be speaking solely about black children, when I am most definitely NOT. For crying out loud, my SON is half me, half his father. Now go try to figure that one out.
As for meth, it’s not really a problem in the kindergarten set.
Comment by Carol — 12.05.06 @ 6:53 pm
All I have to say is that if the REAL problem is white kids amped out on meth and disrupting schools all over the US, we better start throwing some money at the problem.
Comment by jan — 12.05.06 @ 9:18 pm