Posted on 05/21/2012 5:27:03 AM PDT by Guido2012
If you want to know what really goes on in our public schools, go to a teacher-of-the-year banquet. Here you will see why schools aren't about academics anymore. Educators will never admit it openly, but an event like this reveals so much that outsiders never get to see.
This is why an increasingly large part of each student’s day is being consumed by politically correct indoctrination, and not true academics. If schools were indeed devoted to rigorous academic training preparing students for careers, instead of providing a fantasy mini-society where they can engage in all sorts of juvenile behavior without consequences, there wouldn’t be time for kids to be brainwashed with feel-good programs, multiculturalism, sexual orientation training, or pseudoscience classes. Schools need to be devoted to academics, period. Employers will tell you that most of the current crop of high school graduates do not even have the minimum skills necessary to enter the work force, which is why many employers have taken it upon themselves to train them on their own. As further proof of the dwindling role of academics, just observe how often your child’s school has “field trips” loosely disguised as learning opportunities. Yes, I realize that they can learn about marine life at Sea World, but ask any teacher or student making that field trip if that’s the portion of the trip that they were honestly anticipating. An honest teacher or student will tell you that they’re happy that it’s a day off school. Now you know why we graduate students who feel good about themselves, but finish next to last on standardized tests among industrialized nations.
My three children received excellent academic educations in public school.
We live in Texas. Much less of the union crap than in other states.
Please remember that every situation is unique. There are good schools and bad schools, good teachers and bad teachers. It’s wrong to throw them all in the same pot.
Does our public education system need improvement? Of course. Always.
But our society needs it more. As a parent who watched first-hand while our children were there, public schools carry a terrible burden trying to teach kids who can’t learn and don’t really want to because they carry the hubris of our world.
And their parents don’t care.
Drink some more of that Kool-Aide YOU SAP!
Hell, I still remember foaming at the TV when Clintons “Education” administrator/czar said that self-actualization of the teachers trumped educating the kids.
You been out to sea too long, bubba. While you were away, I was rearing a family and daily involved with their schools. You stick to boat business, I’ll speak of what I know.
Hope you get some help with the anger issues.
Vouchers.
Therein lies a powerful argument against public schools. Very few people will EVER care about the quality of a product that they do directly pay for. Because their parents do not care, the children do not either. As you point out, this is a huge burden on the few parents who do. (see Milton Friedman's four way to spend money)
Parents must pay directly for their children's education - public funding must end. Single payer doesn't work.
The problem here isn’t learning vs feel-good, it’s handing out awards instead of recognizing ability in most of the teachers while getting rid of those who don’t have it. Thanks Guido2012.
My children were in the public system in Texas as well — one of the exemplary districts. I spent summers filling in the gaps of their education — things like knowing states and capitals, as they were never made to memorize them. Both of my kids were bored to tears — but I know that many parents were perfectly happy in the system.
Beyond the absence of challenging curricula, I was also irritated by the lack of accountability for student behavior, lack of accountability for rotten teacher behavior, and over-emotional schtick in the classroom. I was taken aback to hear my child’s teacher tell the class how much she ‘loves’ them. No, you don’t. You care for your class, but when they walk out of there at the end of the year, they don’t hear from you again. That’s not love. It’s a lie to say that, and it’s ridiculous. In addition, kids were not allowed to say — no, I don’t want to play with you on the playground. Sorry, teachers, but there is still freedom of association in this country, and if my child does not want to play with the class paste-eater, that’s the way it is.
Yes, there are problems outside the schools — lots of parents demanding things that have zip to do with academia. Parents are expecting schools to raise their children rather than educate them. There are children who have zero support at home to help with homework and they drag the class down, because heaven forbid schools should ‘level’ students according to ability. Someone’s feelings might get hurt. And then there are the kids who barely speak English — how do you teach a child who has no idea what is being said?
In short: if your children received an excellent academic education in Texas public schools — I think that’s wonderful. But I also imagine that your definition of excellent and mine are wholly different. We pulled our kids from the public system; my 10 year old has almost completed pre-Algebra with 96%, and my 14 year old is wrapping up Algebra 2 (he is scoring in the upper 90%’s as well). It’s looking like he’ll be finished with high school at 16. If we were still in the system, they wouldn’t be excelling as they are — they’d have been held back and forced to a mold, and force-fed state emotional/societal crap like what to do if you get in a car with a drunk driver (this was a program my daughter was made to attend in 2nd grade), counseling propaganda about ‘bullying’ (while the school completely ignores actual bullying when presented evidence). Much happier out of that ‘exemplary’ system. Not sure what it was supposed to have been an example of — but to me, it was an example of all that’s wrong with American schools.
I’m with you. There are a lot of terrible schools out there, places that no decent parent would send a child if they understood what was happening, but there are also a lot of great schools. My kids have gone to excellent public schools (and several are still in those good schools), where the focus is on academics, and the quality of the academics is exemplary. Those schools exist, and even in average schools, there are GT classes that provide a real academic education. Thanks for standing up for the truth.
I think of these discussions much like discussion of how safe it is to walk the streets in town. I agree with those in Baltimore, DC, the Bronx, Chicago, Detroit, and East LA who say the streets are dangerous, and I agree with those in smaller towns who say the streets are safe. The mistake is in generalizing from the streets/schools in my neighborhood, yours, or an anti-school/anti-ubran poster’s neighborhood to all the streets/schools. We are all at least mostly right for the streets/schools where we live.
If you really want an eye opener send your kid to school with a digital recorder for a week.
“My three children received excellent academic educations in public school.”
I would be very surprised if it’s as good as you think. And I can almost guarantee you they are subjected to near non-stop subtle, and not so, far left, PC, multicultural, ideological indoctrination throughout the school day. Maybe that mirrors your own beliefs but if it doesn’t you need to be concerned.
I taught in a FL middle school for one year as part of a “change in career” program they had set up to lure teachers in from other careers. It was far worse than I had ever expected. Students at education departments around the country routinely score at the bottom on college level standardized tests and it shows in school break rooms. For the most part the teachers teaching your kids became teachers because it was the only college course of study they could complete. It’s no surprise they endorse all the garbage of the left, they’re not smart enough to see through it. My personal belief is sending a child to public school amounts to child abuse. You are, of course, entitled to your opinion.
http://www.salisburypost.com/News/051912-North-teacher-on-video-qcd
Read this then click on the video link at the bottom of the article.
The incompetency and ignorance of this teacher is unbelievable.
Vouchers,tax credits,charter schools,distance learning. All simply rearrange the deck chairs on the sinking ship of federally controlled government education.
Homeschool using a 'carefully ' chosen curriculum would seem to be the best option. Next best , a private school that takes no federal funding, if you can find one.
I see the St. Louis Public schools, a model for urban districts, run like a jobs program. Let’s face it, black kids go in eager to learn at 6 years old and face teachers who believe they cannot learn, cannot keep up and need special consideration. This lowered expectation is what they live up to until at 15 they decide they can learn more from the street or from their own baby, and they drop out. Since our child labor laws will not allow them to work with their hands they turn to the work available in their community. Know what that’s likely to be?
Your schools may be good where you live but the ones here stink. Even the gifted program here is just average. I had to pull my kids out of public school. My son was falling behind even with 4-5 hour of help after school. My daughter was in the gifted program and was bored to death because she was forced to read books she had read 2 years earlier. The teacher was just plain mean to her. The other students didn’t like her because she was so far ahead of them.
I figured if I had to work with them for 4-5 hours on my own time we might as well teach them on our own. It burns me up that 75% of my property taxes go to these crappy schools and I can do nothing about it.
My son is now ahead of public school and catching his older sister. My daughter is struggling now because she was not challenged in public school and finds it harder to focus now. She is still ahead of public school by far but it takes more effort to learn then just to sit in a gifted class where you are not challenged. Even so she will get through calculus and organic chemistry by the time she graduates. Not sure what my son will get to yet he has not expressed his interest yet.
My kids would have been left behind and not achieved what they could have in our local public schools because they no longer care what they teach only how the kids feel. If you have good schools count yourself lucky. Our local schools are said to be good that is until you look at what they are teaching.
“My children were in the public system in Texas as well — one of the exemplary districts. I spent summers filling in the gaps of their education — things like knowing states and capitals, as they were never made to memorize them. Both of my kids were bored to tears — but I know that many parents were perfectly happy in the system.”
Doesn’t sound very exemplary to me. I teach history and that’s one of the things that I teach... I draw a blank map and I get the kids to label each state with the name and the shorthand (WY, ND, etc).
We go over all the M’s and all the I’s.
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