More school: Obama would curtail summer vacation

Yahoo ^ | 9/27/2009 | Staff

[Red in Blue PA]

WASHINGTON – Students beware: The summer vacation you just enjoyed could be sharply curtailed if President Barack Obama gets his way.

Obama says American kids spend too little time in school, putting them at a disadvantage with other students around the globe.

"Now, I know longer school days and school years are not wildly popular ideas," the president said earlier this year. "Not with Malia and Sasha, not in my family, and probably not in yours. But the challenges of a new century demand more time in the classroom."

The president, who has a sixth-grader and a third-grader, wants schools to add time to classes, to stay open late and to let kids in on weekends so they have a safe place to go.

"Our school calendar is based upon the agrarian economy and not too many of our kids are working the fields today," Education Secretary Arne Duncan said in a recent interview with The Associated Press.

Fifth-grader Nakany Camara is of two minds. She likes the four-week summer program at her school, Brookhaven Elementary School in Rockville, Md. Nakany enjoys seeing her friends there and thinks summer school helped boost her grades from two Cs to the honor roll.

But she doesn't want a longer school day. "I would walk straight out the door," she said.

[RoadKingSE]

"No more trips to Disney in the Summer,
Turns out the Messiah is a bummer,
Mmm, mmm, mmm,
Barack Hussein Obama."

[xkaydet65]

Here on Long Island you won’t see a demand for an extended year. The kids in Garden City, Herricks et al do quite nicely thank you very much.Summer is a time for sports camps, travel, and in some communites, sleep away camps. These districts graduate 90% of their kids. College placements run in the high 80s across the island. And none of this mentions the Catholic schools which have a slightly shorter school day, yet match their public counterparts in achievement. Once again a top down one size fits all federal solution.

[Sparko]

Ray'sBeth wrote: “If there is no support from the home, and the student decides he/she does not want to learn, then the adage “You can lead a horse to water, but can’t make him drink.” applies. I am not a miracle worker.”

~~~~~~~~ ~~~~~~~~~

I was too quick in my initial post, Ray's Beth.

There are many good and unsung teachers in the public schools and those good ones are in it because it is a calling, an avocation; and you are obviously one of them.

I empathize with your predicament and under no circumstances would I consider teaching in a public school, particularly an inner city school.

Lengthening the school day or year will not help your students when you are in contact with them 5 or 6 hours max and you have no control as to what they get exposed to at home or on the street.

Upstairs I was going to make a facetious reference to the quote of Lester Maddox, so will do so now :)

“when (Lester Maddox) asked what could be done to improve the abysmal conditions in Georgia prisons, Maddox replied that what was really needed was a better class of prisoner.”

Obama also said schools could be opened on weekends so they would offer a safe place. What does that tell you about the conditions that these children face at home? Perhaps in Obama’s fantasy world all children would be enrolled in 24 hour school dormitories.

Best wishes for continued success in your chosen field.

[goldi]

A lot of private schools have less than 180 days a year and their kids don’t have a hard time getting into college or doing well on SAT’s, ACT.

[Sacajaweau]

Take away the computers until 3rd grade....

[autumnraine]

“The president, who has a sixth-grader and a third-grader, wants schools to add time to classes, to stay open late and to let kids in on weekends so they have a safe place to go.”

WTF???? So now school systems are supposed to take care of the kids 24/7? Good God, why not just ship them off to government education camps? Wait, I better not utter that idea too loudly, someone may try it.

[TASMANIANRED]

It isn’t summer vacation that is hurting kids..

[CharlesWayneCT]

Yep, the teachers will always argue that they work a full-time job, and that’s why they get a full-time pay.

But as soon as you offer year-round school, the teachers will expect their yearly salary to go up based on their hourly wages.

[alloysteel]

Well, now, why don’t we just run the schoolhouses 24/7/365, bringing in the kids and teaching crew on three shifts every day, on rotating times, selecting days of the week for one class, a different set of days for another class, and still different times for the third shift. Run right through the weekends and holidays, allowing the weekends and holidays to be taken on alternating intervals, and just keep it running every day of the year. Absolutely full utilization of the physical plant, the hours can be made into a routine to suit each of the teacher-student shifts. By careful scheduling as many as seven classes of children may be run through the same facilities on a round-robin basis, day and night.

Just saying. There are a LOT of schemes not yet tried.

[Maine Mariner]

I remember foreign exchange students visiting our high school about 40 years ago. The foreign students from Europe and Chile, had longer school days and took at least 2 or 3 more courses each semester than we did. As I recall, they spoke of 3-4 hours of homework a day.

[autumnraine]

I have a secret for both Obama AND the teacher’s unions. Teachers will not be happy giving up time they get to grade papers and plan study to babysit longer, even for more money.

One of the MAJOR perks of being a teacher is summer break. I doubt many will find the few hundred a month extra enough to make up for it.

[llmc1]

He feels children are “punishments” and probably assumes other parents feel the same way. This is just a way for him to get them out of the house and away from him.

[Yaelle]

Why should the children ever go home? Wouldn’t it be better for indoctrination if the system could get them right at the maternity hospitals?

[Yaelle]

I already named another person’s post as post of the day. Damn. Yours is hot.

[Yaelle]

ROFL!!!!!!! May I help you?

"He got our daddies all laid off
Got no money, got no job
Mmm mmm mmm
Barack Hussein Obama."

[Pearls Before Swine]

If kids hear of this, and it comes to pass, there’s a whole cohort of them who will hate Obama for taking away their summer vacation!

[VRWC For Truth]

Wouldn’t we be using MORE ENERGY if this happens? How does this jive with his GREEN ENERGY plans? He’s an idiot.

[cubreporter]

kids don’t need to be in school longer. No way. All they need to do is go a full school year like we all did with classes in session from 8am till 3pm with an hour break for lunch. They need to be taught reading, writing, math and LANGUAGE ENGLISH language. Period. Also pronunciation. Ever hear some of these kids talk today????????????????? Anyway, cut out all the extra stuff and the kids will learn and do fine. Keeping them in school longer will solve nothing. If they are not learning now they never will.

[cubreporter]

kids don’t need to be in school longer. No way. All they need to do is go a full school year like we all did with classes in session from 8am till 3pm with an hour break for lunch. They need to be taught reading, writing, math and LANGUAGE ENGLISH language. Period. Also pronunciation. Ever hear some of these kids talk today????????????????? Anyway, cut out all the extra stuff and the kids will learn and do fine. Keeping them in school longer will solve nothing. If they are not learning now they never will.

[truthguy]

Many nations in Europe have long summer vacations. It is what takes place in the classroom that determines how good an education a kid will get. If the kid is stuck in an American classroom a few weeks longer each year I doubt it will do them any good.

I was going to say the same thing. You know lots of American Cities had good public schools back in the 1940's, 50's, and even into the 1960's. In those days we had the same amount of summer vacation.

Summer Vacation can be a magical time. I loved Summertime Vacation and I have wonderful memories. I had fun activities and I stayed busy. I had sandlot and little league baseball. I had a community center with arts and crafts. I lived in an area where we could go fishing and I did quite a bit. I read hundreds of books. In the years between 6-16 (until a got a summer job) I learned a lot on my summer vacation. If a child can get a proper summer vacation then it can be valuable and add to a child's education. Since we have such terrible government schools, their solution is to make them go longer. Pathetic.

By the way I'm not aware that the president has the power to increase the school year. If he does, then we are surely in a dictatorship.