Capitol Hill Blue Forums Life and Moral Issues Education US Schools -- a failed system?

I think we're on the same page.

I'm just shooting from the heart here, 2wins...truly.. but I can't imagine ANYONE going into public education these days (my oldest daughter has a couple of friends who are teachers) who didn't start out doing for love and passion.
Our system sucks. Big time. Teachers are having a hell of a time trying to work with the system. It's not fair and it dampens their original enthusiasm.
I agree with you. If I lived in an area like my sister does (shudder) I might have tried to homeschool too. She would have done it anyway but she's got 'agenda' other than education.

ahhh..
thanks 3wins.
we're typing on top of each other

I agree. I think we are on the same page.

i wonder though, seeing that you live in athens where people are more progressive and put a premium on education - university towns are like that - how much of an advantage do you have and how much might that skew a point of view, not necessarily yours though. you know, we read about cases where people will do anything including lie about addresses and so forth to get their children into different schools or districts. and i understand about teachers. ill tell you though, the well to do folks around here, people we know and communicate regularly, and are avid pta-ers, once they find out we homeschool, the shut down. one of them tried to engage me a conversation about it and the whys and while i really was careful about what i said, she socked it to me just the same. since we pulled our youngest daughter out of public school here she won't let her daughter, same age, have any thing to do with ours. well, at any rate ....... run out of things to say, for now.

Wouldn't the ideal world combine home schooling with public schooling? there are benefits of public schooling unavailable to all homeschoolers, yet if parents do not supplement that at home, a complete education just won't happen.

Schools with active parent participation, and I mean participation, not just griping and trying to get something for your little precious, are better schools. Parents have skills and backgrounds teachers simply cannot bring to the party, and they would ideally be a part of the school curriculum as they are capable as well as working with their own children after class.

In fact, people other than parents could make valuable contributions to public education if designed into the system. Part of the problem is thinking that the education apparatus has the only knowledge of how to teach, fear of rogue adults and lack of imagination.

I get a little confused on these issues sometimes, so bear with me:

1) The need to get "the feds" out of the system
- "the feds" aren't heavily involved in grade schools/high schools, or weren't until No Child. The Department of Education itself was only formalized about 25 years ago, and it deals primarily with financial aid, numbers (research on attendance, graduation rates, etc.), and, I think, athletics (Title IX). It's been awhile since I worked in institutional research (beancounting for higher education) but to the best of my recollection the D of E is mostly focused on colleges. So I'm curious - which feds are screwing up education, and how? (NCLB is a given, I think, as teachers and administrators alike seem to hate it.)

2)Public education in this country grew out of a need to provide a basic education for the less-than-elite. It was pretty much where you send your kids if you can't afford private school. PS 37 is unlikely to be Montessori Public for the simple fact that taxpayers hate paying school tax. When was the last time your town passed a levy increase for schools, until the buildings were literally crumbling? Which leads to

3) A need for tradeoffs between local control and local funding, and federal standards/federal funding. We need some way to keep yokels (of whatever income or color of neck) to fund local education adequately whether it bites into funding for the new stadium or not. And those same local yokels need to have a say in how their educational system works.

But federal funding, and standards, might be of use in some places, or Texas, Louisiana, and Mississippi are going to rank 48th, 49th, and 50th forever and urban schools in poverty-stricken area have little hope of improving.

4) A somewhat-interesting note you probably already know - in addition to the lovely hourly bells and rigidity to prepare our students for industrial work, our system is also burdened by its agricultural origins - the 9-month school year is directly related to the need for kids to do farm labor in the summer. That 9-month year may not be doing us any good any more, but people will fight like hell so little Emily and Blake can have the summer off just like Mom and Dad used to.

random comments...

"All" schools in the U.S.of A. should be[at least] as "well-equipped" as are "all" military "boot camps".

[With much different "equipment",of course.]

Sometimes when discussing a subject, it helps to begin with its origins. Compulsary public education in America as we know it today, was modeled after the Prussian system . That system had as its main goals, conformity of mind, obedience to authority, unifying citizens under the state, and training workers for an industrial world. Any frills that have since been attached do not alter its primary mission.

The regimentation of the system and its structural conditioning are still with it, today. A child is taken from his home each day to do a 5 day week of approximately 8 hours a day all the while taking orders from authority figures who are not his family, required to be in specific places at specific times of the day, conditioned to begin class and end class at the ringing of a bell, eat lunch and end lunch to the ringing of a bell, begin 'play' and end 'play' to the ringing of a bell, required to engage in and complete specific tasks within specific timeframes identical to the tasks being done by uncounted other students, using the restrooms at prescribed authorized times (between classes) or, in an emergency, being forced to ask permission to do so, requiring a "pass" to move beyond a subscribed area and being required to show said "pass" to monitors with the authority to detain and demand papers properly signed by the autorities.

We see the graduation stats. They suggest there are better ways. The link provided by 2wins shows one alternative method of teaching that focuses on how we learn in the natural word -- one answer may often lead to multiple new questions taking us off on tangents or even seemingly unrelated directions. Phil points out that someone wishing to homeschool could be well-served by having access to certain more formal classes in subjects that may be of value in assisting a daughter's pursuit of an interest. She could spend most of her day in a homeschooling environment, but also avail herself of a class several times a week much like those found in community college settings. And, why could not such a 'community' of teachers not be a loose confederation of private individuals skilled in specific areas -- preferably through hands-on experience -- making themselves available to those interested in learning from them?

This is, I think, a good read. John Gatto is a veteran of the public school teaching trenches.
SOURCE:
Yours,
Issodhos

Was that "John Gotto" or "John Gotti"?

Gimme a vowel for fiddy, Vanna.