Posted on 02/14/2004 7:18:36 AM PST by George Frm Br00klyn Park
WBAL AM-RADIO Baltimore
Ron Smith's "Something to Say" Commentary
School Budgets, Teaching and Teachers
Friday, February 13, 2004
“I could see the fury in their eyes,” said Baltimore Teacher’s Union President Marietta English upon her arrival at the polling place where city school teachers voted “no” to accepting a pay cut to reduce the budget deficit faced by the reeling school system.
It’s clear that teachers feel they shouldn’t have to suffer for the financial ineptitude of their bosses. One can sympathize with their emotions; especially since many of them regularly dip into their own pockets to pay for classroom supplies the school system doesn’t deliver.
But the problem remains, a $58 million cumulative deficit, and something has to be done about it. There doesn’t seem to be a way to avoid hundreds more layoffs and other belt-tightening. It is a crisis, simple as that.
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While on the subject of teaching and teachers, it is good to remember that public school teachers are the real front line in our continuing war against ignorance, illiteracy, social inequality and cultural despair. How are these front line troops being trained? What are they themselves being taught in their college classes?
These are questions that journalist Rita Kramer sought to answer more than a decade ago when she embarked on an extensive tour of the Ed School World, visiting 15 campuses across the country, talking to students, faculty and administrators, attending classes and then visiting the elementary and high schools where the trainees had their first teaching experiences.
What resulted was a most instructive book, "Ed School Follies : The Miseducation of America's Teachers." It’s a must read still for anyone who would like to understand what’s happened to the teaching profession in this country. There are still many skilled and inspiring teachers, make no doubt about that. But the system is stacked against them.
Furthermore, the inane No Child Left Behind Act that the Bush Administration has pushed down the throats of the states is the bastard child of the modern educational theories so devastatingly detailed in Ms. Kramer’s book. It, as you probably know by now, mandates that in a decade, all American school children meet the same educational standards in key subjects at certain ages. That this is an impossible goal doesn’t matter. It makes sure that massive fraud will ensue on the part of educators who will have to lie and cheat in order to satisfy Uncle Sam.
Educational reform is much needed, but the proliferation of mush-minded teaching theories makes it all but impossible. As Ms. Kramer put it so well:
“No amount of restructuring or empowerment, no amount of money spent on salaries or programs, will make much difference until we place knowledge itself at the center of educational enterprise.” Currently, she adds, “Knowledge – real knowledge in the form of facts, not ‘thinking skills’ or feelings of self-worth – is about the least concern of the professional education industry.”
Court mandates enforcing IDEA, a federal law. In this, as in other areas, Congress passed feel good legislation (let's guarantee that the disabled kids get education) and let the courts take the blame when the inevitable enforcement began.
Actually, no, IDEA only dates from 1990 I believe. The court cases go back to PARC v. Pennsylvania and Mills v. D.C. Board of Education in the early 1970s.
The Supreme Court seems to think so. You'll be especially interested in Honig v. Doe.
I think it's become a poorer value, and the purpose of No Child Left Behind is to reverse that trend.
We can argue about how it's being implemented, but I think the intent is worthwhile and necessary.
The first law with the IDEA title was passed in 1975 and was amended in 1990 and 1997. The early 1970s cases were interpreting ESEA, a forerunner of the IDEA that provided for "equal access to education" dating to 1965. In 1970, ESEA was amended to expressly cover the handicapped.
Honig v. Doe dealt with interpretation of a federal statute, not the constitution. Once again, Congress is the ultimate source of the problem.
How else could it really be?
If in doubt, re-read Orwell.
(not YOU, George - I know you know!)
Hello from VA
Well, the NCLB includes all childen--autistic, Mentally retarded, emotionally disturbed, and ESOL (a child in this country for ONE year, must be measured, regardless of their literacy).
I doubt that a child with a 40 is ever going to "get" algebra. Yet, they are included in the measurement.
While it's true that Honig was a case of statutory construction (specifically an interpretation of the EHA), Justice Rehnquist made it clear in his opinion that that statute was enacted by Congress in response to court decisions holding that the Constitution forbade the exclusion of disabled children from the educational process.
In the full text of Honig v. Doe, the reasoning is:
As a condition of federal financial assistance, the Education of the Handicapped Act requires States to ensure a "free appropriate public education" for all disabled children within their jurisdictions. In aid of this goal, the Act establishes a comprehensive system of procedural safeguards designed to ensure parental participation in decisions concerning the education of their disabled children and to provide administrative and judicial review of any decisions with which those parents disagree. Among these safeguards is the so-called "stay-put" provision, which directs that a disabled child "shall remain in [his or her] then current educational placement" pending completion of any review proceedings, unless the parents and state or local educational agencies otherwise agree. 20 U.S.C. 1415(e)(3).It's not an issue of the Constitution -- Congress has enacted federal law which places certain conditions on schools which accept federal aid.
To cut the strings, schools must decline the federal funds. Some schools are deciding that this is the way to go. Utah, for example is considering a bill to opt out of "No Child Left Behind", and forego the federal funding. There comes a point where the damage and expense caused by federal regs can be seen to exceed the value of the federal funding.
And since it's legislation, all congress has to do is repeal it, and the courts have nothing further to say about it.
My kid is gonna hate you. I printed that and will work it into the lesson plan. :)
The biggest problem with educating children is failing to realize how smart they really are. Your example from McGuffey's Readers illustrates that point perfectly. Children will respond in a manner that reflects the person addressing them. If you say, "Yo! Kid! Knock dat sh!t off! I'm watchin' Sex n da City," the kid is likely to respond, "Awww %*$*! you." If you tell the kid, "Please turn that down," the kid will probably say, "Awww! Do I haaaaave to?" To which the wise adult will respond, "Yes, or I will make you learn calligraphy ("once you are capable of sitting again" -- this part is optional)."
I never quite got the "baby talk" thing -- I was never very good at it. So I didn't do it. As a result, my son had a large vocabulary for a three year old ("Mama, I am not 'noxious.") This didn't play well once he got into school. Some of his teachers thought he was making fun of them (he did think one in particular was a little "slow").
I'm fortunate that I have the luxury of homeschooling, and my son still has a killer vocabulary (we work on colloquialisms as well -- I don't want him sounding like Niles Crane).
Several of the teachers my son had problems with had a habit of "talking down" to their students. Perhaps they felt they needed to teach to the lowest common denominator in order to be sure no one felt left out. But I found that, if a child doesn't understand you, you'll see it on his face. Instead of asking, "Do you know what I mean," I usually paraphrase and repeat the sentence until the light goes on. It usually clicks by the third definition.
I know teachers have a busy schedule, largely due to government mandates, and may not have the time to explain a lesson more than once. More's the pity. Children will rise to the level of your expectations with just a bit of help.
That is so sad. It's not called "Special Needs" for nothin'. Disabled children deserve special attention, to the point of one-on-one instruction. That's extremely pricy, but if we got rid of the bureaucracy, I'll bet we could afford it. But you'll never be able to include them in a pass/fail measurement and get an accurate result.
The misguided education authorities didn't want to make slower children "feel bad," so they did away with "Special Ed." So now these poor kids really feel isolated because they're expected to keep up in a class that's moving too fast for their abilities. That just stinks!
Some children are "gifted," some are "average," and some need special attention. You're right -- an autistic child isn't going to get Algebra. Why torment them and their classmates for the sake of a measurement. That's just wrong, but I have no idea how to turn that around and get back to Special Ed and Advanced classes.
Same reason I took my son out of a private school -- over half the boys at the schools were on some form of medication at the insistence of the teachers.
The final straw was a teacher telling me, "He reads too much." He was reading because he was bored! It was the beginning of the end when I asked her, "How is this a problem?"
If you'll dig a little deeper, you'll see it wasn't all legislation. From your full text link:
Although these educational failings resulted in part from funding constraints, Congress recognized that the problem reflected more than a lack of financial resources at the state and local levels. Two federal-court decisions, which the Senate Report characterized as "landmark," see id., at 6, demonstrated that many disabled children were excluded pursuant to state statutes or local rules and policies, typically without any consultation with, or even notice to, their parents. See Mills v. Board of Education of District of Columbia, 348 F. Supp. 866 (DC 1972); Pennsylvania Assn. for Retarded Children v. Pennsylvania, 334 F. Supp. 1257 (ED Pa. 1971), and 343 F. Supp. 279 (1972) (PARC). Indeed, by the time of the EHA's enactment, parents had brought legal challenges to similar exclusionary practices in 27 other states. See S. Rep., at 6.
If you'll read Mills and PARC, you'll see that those decisions relied on the equal protection and due process clauses of the Constitution. Both Reinquist and Congress thought those two cases were very important. Even if the statute is repealed, the equal protection and due process clauses will remain, and I'd predict a slew of new court cases on those bases.
Actually though, I didn't think you'd be interested in Honig so much for the rationale, but because you'd mentioned the problem of behavior-disordered students disrupting classes for the others.
I think actually it was parents who didn't want their children feeling shuffled away, hidden, and isolated, and so asked for them to be mainstreamed.
I'll agree that special ed students shouldn't go into the assessment for NCLB.
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