PhDeac
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Poorer than nothing or the criminal justice system?
Anatomy of the Collapse of a Failed City
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Poorer than nothing or the criminal justice system?
We all love the concept of charity in the moment: sure, when faced with the decision for the community to "parent" an under-parented child (as Ph argues in about every other post) or to do nothing, the obvious answer is to provide for that child as much as we can. Basic humanity requires that. The problem is when parents see the government acting in loco, there are some (and every year, more) parents that will look to the school to provide more and more resources (witness: school lunch program). In the great majority of cases, the government ration (either in lunch or in attention to the student's homework) will be deficient when compared to what a parent would provide.
Do people believe it is the school's job to take up the parent's slack? Are there any expectations on the parents to provide for or attend to their children, or are we now just going to set policy by lowest common denominator ("Well, some parents won't involve themselves in school choice, so nobody can have it.")?
Do people believe it is the school's job to take up the parent's slack? Are there any expectations on the parents to provide for or attend to their children, or are we now just going to set policy by lowest common denominator ("Well, some parents won't involve themselves in school choice, so nobody can have it.")?
Happy birthday, War on Poverty! From George Will:
Twenty-nine percent of Americans — about 47 percent of blacks and 48 percent of Hispanics — live in households receiving means-tested benefits. And “the proportion of men 20 and older who are employed has dramatically and almost steadily dropped since the start of the War on Poverty, falling from 80.6 percent in January 1964 to 67.6 percent 50 years later.” Because work — independence, self-reliance — is essential to the culture of freedom, ominous developments have coincided with Great Society policies:
For every adult man ages 20 to 64 who is between jobs and looking for work, more than three are neither working nor seeking work, a trend that began with the Great Society. And what Eberstadt calls “the earthquake that shook family structure in the era of expansive anti-poverty policies” has seen out-of-wedlock births increase from 7.7 percent in 1965 to more than 40 percent in 2012, including 72 percent of black babies.
http://www.washingtonpost.com/opini...f70a8c-dc5c-11e3-b745-87d39690c5c0_story.html
Twenty-nine percent of Americans — about 47 percent of blacks and 48 percent of Hispanics — live in households receiving means-tested benefits. And “the proportion of men 20 and older who are employed has dramatically and almost steadily dropped since the start of the War on Poverty, falling from 80.6 percent in January 1964 to 67.6 percent 50 years later.” Because work — independence, self-reliance — is essential to the culture of freedom, ominous developments have coincided with Great Society policies:
For every adult man ages 20 to 64 who is between jobs and looking for work, more than three are neither working nor seeking work, a trend that began with the Great Society. And what Eberstadt calls “the earthquake that shook family structure in the era of expansive anti-poverty policies” has seen out-of-wedlock births increase from 7.7 percent in 1965 to more than 40 percent in 2012, including 72 percent of black babies.
http://www.washingtonpost.com/opini...f70a8c-dc5c-11e3-b745-87d39690c5c0_story.html
dmcheatw
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where are you getting there's a war on poverty or has been one in this country? From Woodrow Wilson? That was a really long time ago, not sure any major public figure has even superficially explicitly recommitted to the idea of a war on poverty. I contrast this with nixon and his very real renewal of the war on drugs which was expanded (at the federal level) under bush II as recently as 2005.
You have some points, but if you look at school lunches that you reference, to me it makes sense to provide kids with food while at school because it gives disadvantaged kids a better chance at having a balanced diet and directly affects learning. hard to learn if your stomach is growling and your blood lacks the nutrients to develop the correct neurological pathways in response to intellectual stimulation.
where do i draw the line? IDK, but the idea of schools providing clothes, nurses, heat/AC, transportation and even a makeshift bed (nap time) or dorm all make a certain degree of sense, just like it makes sense for schools to have computers and electricity and books and teachers. I've never really figure it in this way before myself, but a lot underlies the luxury of sitting down in a safe place and having the opportunity to learn from experts in their fields.
You have some points, but if you look at school lunches that you reference, to me it makes sense to provide kids with food while at school because it gives disadvantaged kids a better chance at having a balanced diet and directly affects learning. hard to learn if your stomach is growling and your blood lacks the nutrients to develop the correct neurological pathways in response to intellectual stimulation.
where do i draw the line? IDK, but the idea of schools providing clothes, nurses, heat/AC, transportation and even a makeshift bed (nap time) or dorm all make a certain degree of sense, just like it makes sense for schools to have computers and electricity and books and teachers. I've never really figure it in this way before myself, but a lot underlies the luxury of sitting down in a safe place and having the opportunity to learn from experts in their fields.
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bigdoublezero
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If only we had found a way to stop those mayors, maybe we wouldn't be in this mess.
bigdoublezero
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WFFaithful
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The conclusions that you jump to are mind boggling.
FIFY.
tjcmd
Retired
Wow. The welfare state marches on.
Deacon923
Scooter Banks
Hello, post hoc ergo propter hoc. We haven't seen you in a while, welcome back to the Tunnels.
2&2 Slider To Leyritz
Well-known member
I think indirectly that may help. I've been reading a lot lately on neuroscience as it relates to the development of language and communication skills in kids. I apologize if those of you with more educational expertise than I already know this, but there is a concept called brain plasticity, which refers to how the neuropathways in the brain develop with respect to certain brain functions during different periods of life. What research has shown is that, in general, kids of higher socioeconomic status develop higher EEG activity in the communicative parts of their brain at an earlier age (like between 1 and 18 months old), simply because of the amount and variety of language that they hear from their parents and/or other caregivers from the outset. While that may not seem like much, that develops that part of the brain more robustly at a relatively critical developmental stage for the child. The kids with that higher functioning part of the brain develop a better early ability to focus on one activity and tune out distractions (not like an ADD level difference, but just the ability to focus despite external commotion). That component of development has a direct link to long-term educational success. So what some researchers have focused on are "attention focus drills" of kids once they hit preschool or kindergarden to see if those neuropathways can be successfully opened at a later age even if it wasn't done early on. Basically teaching kids to focus on the task at hand while other kids in the room are purposefully creating distractions. They've had a pretty good amount of success. So while the small class size would help, an express core component of early eduction solely addressing the ability to pay attention and focus would likely be very beneficial as well.
Deacon923
Scooter Banks
Good post 2&2. That is one part of a larger issue, which is that there needs to be a recognition that being poor has real physical and psychological impacts on kids, and those impacts are going to carry into school. The overwhelming problem with American schools is not that the "public schools are broken" or the teacher's unions suck, it's that we're trying to educate more poor kids, and those kids are poorer, than our peer nations in Western Europe and Asia. Until we honestly recognize and address the poverty issues head on, we're not going to solve the educational problems.
Until we honestly recognize and address the structural problems with families of origin head on, we're not going to solve the educational problems.
WFFaithful
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I was referring to your conclusion that the reason people are against school choice is that some parents won't involve themselves.
Please provide statistics that parents are getting lazier because schools provide services.
I'm quoting Ph's position.
PhDeac
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Making it harder for parents to feed and clothe their children isn't going to help educational problems.
Not sure what position you think you're quoting.
Deacon923
Scooter Banks
Poverty issues and family structures are really two sides of the same coin. Look at the data on marriage rates and poverty. Poverty puts stress on relationships, and the war on drugs primarily impacts poor young men and makes them unemployable and unmarriageable. Take action to relieve poorer families of some of the stressors of poverty, and you'll get better family structures and better educational performance.
You're against school choice. Why?