Very interesting article. My state gets an F:
“The War on Kids” documentary about the public school system. http://www.fulldocumentary.net/society/default.asp?action=listing&id=2375
I just watched waiting for superman. I think it was a little harsh on teachers and not the perfect documentary but it raises good points. Our public school system is failing lots and lots of kids and despite throwing lots of money at the problem we are not getting results. Focusing solely on test scores and teaching to a test is not the way to address this problem. I don’t think charters are either but we can look at what the successful charters or countries and schools are doing and try to emulate that. I also think encouraging parents to be involved will help. We also need to not allow the rampant helicoptering to occur and to not let parents not see what their kids are not doing and blaming teachers when they are not to blame. There needs to be accountability again. I definitely think it shouldn’t be impossible to fire a teacher if they are bad but sometimes it really is out of a decent teachers control and there are other factors that contribute. We do need to have a system where merit is recognized and bad teachers can get fired. We should not be scoring so low compared to other industrialized nations. We shouldn’t have schools where lots of kids drop out and the ones that don’t have college as an option. We shouldn’t have kids graduating high school functionally illiterate. I do like the point they made about in the movie about tracking in high schools. I think all kids should be thought of as capable of higher level work. It is extremely important for our nation to come together on this issue and come up with actual solutions that address the problems not knee jerk fixes like throwing money at it and forcing test scores. All kids have potential and can achieve excellence ad we need a plan to address this. A real plan.
It is sad about the failing grades. But school districts and schools within districts differ dramatically within every state. I have a friend who teaches in California and her school is amazing.
And to be honest, many grades and school scores online don’t mean that much to me. My school district gets a good grade. But I know the curriculum, and I know how little a child learns, and I know what is considered a passing grade. Sadly it is not very much at all! However another school district in Ohio gets a lower grade and one of their schools that I know is pretty spectacular. If it wasn’t 90miles away I would send my son to that school.
Our local school district is rated one of the best in the state. Well, they give the kids the questions to the tests so that they remain one of the best on test scores. It’s depressing.
I wouldn’t want to be a teacher in this climate where children do not have to take responsibility for their actions and parents will usually defend their children when their children are rotten little buggers. However, there are some very rotten teachers out there as well.
The thing that is going to make this all blow up is homeschooling. Eventually there will be enough homeschooling & private education families that are getting hammered with property taxes they will eventually demand a change to the whole system. The public system is going to have a hard time justifying it’s existence when the cost is as much as a year at college and they can’t turn out literate adults after 13 years.
Yea they definitely have found cheating going on with test scores. My dd goes to a charter public schools that get the best scores in the state. With her school it is not cheating and it isn’t teaching to the test. When I was touring schools I was at first focusing on scores because it was one thing I could measure by. Once I went in the schools and asked detail questions I found that there were surprises in the quality of the schools that had nothing to do with scores. For instance one school didn’t score well but the principal said they don’t care about scores at all and it wasn’t a focus for them. That school actually had 3 schools within a schools within in it and one of those schools was a school for low functioning autistic kids who needs lots of structure. This school had a reason why the scores were lower.They had a lot more special needs kids then most elementary schools.
My dd’s school has high standards for both academics and for the children and they hold the kids accountable. They have very high expectations of the kids. They also have a lot of parental participation. In her school they do not allow helicoptering to occur. The kids are held accountable for their actions. They don’t have to kiss parents butts. They also use methods that are proven when choosing curriculum. One thing I like that they do is the kids need to correct their mistakes and really think about them. Instead of the creative spelling and writing a lot of schools do her school teaches kids the correct grammar and letter formation right at the start. They go above and beyond the state standards and teach all the students in her school not just the advanced ones at a higher level with carefully selected curriculum that builds upon itself. Kids at her schools win academic competitions and they end up in AP classes. There is nothing about the kids in her school to make them advanced. They are randomly selected from all backgrounds and income levels. Charters are not the answer but if you look at a highly successful school like hers and try some of what they do in neighborhood schools there would be better results. There is no one way that will solve this but there are innovative solutions out there.
I also think early learning is very important. Look at what parents on here accomplish. Studies do show how for economically disadvantage kids preschool does pay off. I think they should have early learning as a big part of them. I know how they say socialization is what is really important so most preschools don’t really challenge kid academically. I think we need to start challenging that. Everyone thinks it means sticking small kids in desks and not allowing them to play. That isn’t what early learning looks like. We can set a foundation in preschool kids by believing they are capable and teaching them and allowing them to learn at their level whatever that is. We can give them lots of input in short increments in ways that is fun for them and fits a preschoolers attention span. If a kid starts kindergarten without certain knowledge then they already are at a disadvantage will look like they are behind and have a lot to overcome. If you throw in a few bad teachers a stressful home situation and negative peer influence these kids will just not be able to overcome that bad start.