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The Myth Behind Public School Failure

Milhouse said:
what's your solution
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Oh I think we need massive public school education reform, and need to spend a lot more money on education for sure. However, along with that, we need to confront the reality that some people just suck as parents, and not manufacture reasons to excuse it away in an effort to be politically correct by blaming The Man or The System.
 
2&2 Slider To Leyritz said:
Oh I think we need massive public school education reform, and need to spend a lot more money on education for sure. However, along with that, we need to confront the reality that some people just suck as parents, and not manufacture reasons to excuse it away in an effort to be politically correct by blaming The Man or The System.
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Haven't people sucked as parents since the invention of parents? I don't understand this point.
 
2&2 Slider To Leyritz said:
Oh I think we need massive public school education reform, and need to spend a lot more money on education for sure. However, along with that, we need to confront the reality that some people just suck as parents, and not manufacture reasons to excuse it away in an effort to be politically correct by blaming The Man or The System.
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So your solution is to spend more money while blaming the parents?


Innovative.
 
DistrictDeacon said:
So your solution is to spend more money while blaming the parents?


Innovative.
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Basically, yes. Spend significantly more money on schools, but also directly tie the parents to the kids' behavior to help try to make sure the money isn't wasted. Your kid skips school? $50 admin fee added to your property taxes, state income taxes, or deducted from your state benefits for wasted resources. X number of disciplinary action taken? $50. Your kid is bullying other kids? $100. Your kid drops out? $1,000 charge to the parents. I think you'd find parents would take a lot more responsibility pretty quickly.
 
2&2 Slider To Leyritz said:
Oh I think we need massive public school education reform, and need to spend a lot more money on education for sure. However, along with that, we need to confront the reality that some people just suck as parents, and not manufacture reasons to excuse it away in an effort to be politically correct by blaming The Man or The System.
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You hypothesis and your solution seem they are not congruent.
 
2&2 Slider To Leyritz said:
Basically, yes. Spend significantly more money on schools, but also directly tie the parents to the kids' behavior to help try to make sure the money isn't wasted. Your kid skips school? $50 admin fee added to your property taxes, state income taxes, or deducted from your state benefits for wasted resources. X number of disciplinary action taken? $50. Your kid is bullying other kids? $100. Your kid drops out? $1,000 charge to the parents. I think you'd find parents would take a lot more responsibility pretty quickly.
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and when they can't pay, then what? debtor's prison?
 
2&2 Slider To Leyritz said:
Who can't pay in that scenario? People paying taxes can pay. And if they aren't paying taxes, then it gets deducted from their benefits.
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jags_medium.gif
 
So when you're a bad parent and you're rich, meh? When you're a bad parent and you're poor, no food stamps? Seems fair.
 
The "stick" idea won't work, because the targets are people who don't have anything to lose. Any benefits you grab to pay for these penalties will likely be limited to food stamps and rent help, i.e. the very things keeping their kids fed and housed so they have a remote chance of succeeding in school.

A better approach is to use the "carrot" of conditional cash transfers (CCTs). These programs have been proven to work well in impoverished third world environments and a pilot program in NYC saw some success. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Conditional_cash_transfer Basically, you give money to the parents for keeping their kids vaccinated, getting regular checkups, and for school attendance. It's not a panacea but if appropriately targeted at very poor communities, could make an impact in breaking the poverty cycle.
 
bigdoublezero said:
So when you're a bad parent and you're rich, meh? When you're a bad parent and you're poor, no food stamps? Seems fair.
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Not really. I make a decent amount of money compared to most people, but I would still be pissed as hell at my kid if he incurred a $50 tax increase on my behalf for skipping school.
 
I think 2&2's point is rich people are just naturally good parents.

If education is a way out for all children, why should it matter if they have good parents or not? We need to be working towards making school less dependent on having good parents rather than more dependent.
 
2&2 Slider To Leyritz said:
Not really. I make a decent amount of money compared to most people, but I would still be pissed as hell at my kid if he incurred a $50 tax increase on my behalf for skipping school.
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Imagine how the 8-year-old feels when she can't get a square meal. Pissed as hell?
 
Deacon923 said:
The "stick" idea won't work, because the targets are people who don't have anything to lose. Any benefits you grab to pay for these penalties will likely be limited to food stamps and rent help, i.e. the very things keeping their kids fed and housed so they have a remote chance of succeeding in school.

A better approach is to use the "carrot" of conditional cash transfers (CCTs). These programs have been proven to work well in impoverished third world environments and a pilot program in NYC saw some success. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Conditional_cash_transfer Basically, you give money to the parents for keeping their kids vaccinated, getting regular checkups, and for school attendance. It's not a panacea but if appropriately targeted at very poor communities, could make an impact in breaking the poverty cycle.
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So we're paying people to do the the things they are supposed to do anyway as a basic element of being a human? Holy shit.



That said, you (as usual) are focusing your argument on the very, very bottom of society so that we can't call anyone a bad parent. That is the stagnant lowest common denominator think that prevents us as a society from doing anything with positive results. My "target" is not people who have nothing to lose. The very bottom of society is not killing our school system. It is the vast majority in the middle. You want to exempt out the truly impoverished, fine go ahead. But tell me why my solution wouldn't work for the vast majority.
 
You think the reason our schools aren't performing well enough is because middle-class kids skip class too much?
 
PhDeac said:
I think 2&2's point is rich people are just naturally good parents.

If education is a way out for all children, why should it matter if they have good parents or not? We need to be working towards making school less dependent on having good parents rather than more dependent.
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No, I'm saying almost everyone across the board is a bad parent when it comes to education. But, of course, nobody wants to hear that.
 
bigdoublezero said:
You think the reason our schools aren't performing well enough is because middle-class kids skip class too much?
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I think the reason our schools aren't performing well is because upper, middle, and lower class kids don't give a shit, and their parents don't do enough to make them give a shit.
 
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