Teens defend ‘fail factory’ high school in error-filled letters

NY Post ^ | 2/23/14 | Susan Edelman

[21twelve]

“You say that based on what you think, not what you know from personal experience.”

Not that I have personally witnessed it, but my daughter says her 10th grade math teacher hands out the worksheets and then goes back to doing something on her computer. NO instructions given beforehand. They are allowed to work in groups to figure it out, and are allowed to ask her questions. But often they are met with a large sigh and after either telling them to work on it more, or in some cases berating them that “it is pretty much the same as yesterday’s worksheet”. And sometimes she will answer the person’s question.

I mentioned this to the principal, and she said “Yes - she has a different style of teaching. We are well aware of it.”

Other teachers are okay, and a rare few really have gotten my kids really exited and interested about a subject. Even in subjects that my kids didn’t think they would like. “I wanted to do computer science, and I got stuck with a stupid art class” turns into “Hey - look at my painting!!!”

[EinNYC]

That's too bad about that particular teacher. But to make a broad sweeping statement about all teachers based on that one weird teacher is totally unfair. I had a job interview at another school today. I was asked to observe a biology class going on. When some of the kids looked like they were not getting it, I jumped in to explain the topic another way. A couple of girls stayed after the class ended to thank me for making it clear for them. Back at the original school, a couple of students were staying after helping their (very young) biology teacher. Seeing several aquaria in the room, I asked for a microscope, slides and a pipette. I sampled the water in the aquaria with the pipette and prepared slides of the water drops. There were some cool protozoans and rotifers in the water, as I knew there would be. I showed these to the kids, who were fascinated. I also identified the fish in one really big tank as being from 4 different continents and answered some of their questions about why these fish, from wildly different genera, would not breed with one another. The kids stayed after class to tell me how much they appreciated what I showed them.

OK, condemn me for sitting there with an iPad or something.

[21twelve]

“But to make a broad sweeping statement about all teachers based on that one weird teacher is totally unfair.”

Agreed - but it has been more that one bad teacher. But the majority do the best they can. And a few are motivated to go the extra step to pass on THEIR love of the subject to the kids that are willing. Like you and the fish tanks! (Cool!)

[gaijin]

Letter written by the President of the Detroit School Board:

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Good Evening,

If you saw Sunday’s Free Press that shown Robert Bobb the emergency financial manager for Detroit Public Schools, move Mark Twain to Boynton which have three times the number seats then students and was one of the reason’s he gave for closing school to many empty seats.

Based on the Free Press Map where it shows that the most of children who live in 48217 is near Gleason by the former Mark Twain. Why did Bobb think the larger numbers of our children would cross Fort St. to attend the Boynton school site calling it Mark Twain, make’s no sense unless the plan is to destroy the public schools that’s remained in our neighborhood. ….. When Bobb moved Mark Twain to Boynton, 48217 lose about 200 hundred students some of the student attended Mark Twain on Gleason came from out side the city of Detroit.

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He has a learning disability and took 15 years to graduate from college.

That sounds like a joke, right?