The Myth Behind Public School Failure

[sailordeac]

Teaching requires both expertise and charisma. No matter how bad the system, or the structure, or the administration, or whatever, you can still do a good job of teaching. Just close the door and help your students, most of the rest is crap anyway.

 

[DeaconCav06]

Oh man, not this again. Paging DeaconCav.

I saw this thread earlier and decided to ignore it.

But here I go:

I read a number of studies in previous years that attributed the poor grades if impoverished children to the lack of parental involvement and attitudes towards education among the poor. HOWEVER, these studies have been largely discredited as they focused on involvement at the schoolhouse level (i.e. PTA meetings and parent teacher interaction) and failed to account for parental engagement inside the home.

While attitude towards the importance of education are not delineated among party lines the OPPORTUNITY for parental involvement is more limited in poorer households as those households are more likely to have a single parent working multiple jobs.

All that being said, my GF's sister just moved to a new town because her bf works in a screen printing shop there, hasn't had her kid in school for the last week despite being off of work for two weeks while transitioning to a new store and moved into a neighborhood with schools that score a 3 out of 10 based on Florida Standards and less than half of kids perform satisfactorily on the 3rd grade math and reading tests.

When we asked if she had checked out the schools in her neighborhood (given that she had the opportunity to move anywhere in the country that target has a store) her response was "They have schools there." Completely anecdotal and not really relevant but I just had to get that off my chest.

 

[WFFaithful]

Teaching requires both expertise and charisma. No matter how bad the system, or the structure, or the administration, or whatever, you can still do a good job of teaching. Just close the door and help your students, most of the rest is crap anyway.

good teaching has a hard time overcoming a crappy home life

 

[bigdoublezero]

I'm trying to imagine what the rollout of the $50 fine plan would look like compared with something like ACA.

Down with big government!

 

[sailordeac]

good teaching has a hard time overcoming a crappy home life

teaching and the schools cannot solve all problems, and when they try to do so, they end up doing their own job poorly

 

[2&2 Slider To Leyritz]

I'm trying to imagine what the rollout of the $50 fine plan would look like compared with something like ACA.

Down with big government!

Last time I checked, counties and states have absolutely no problem levying taxes, adding penalties and interest to those taxes, and attempting to collect those taxes through their own efforts and assistance from other agencies (DMV, Wildlife, etc). But yeah, that is quite similar to the ACA.

 

[bigdoublezero]

So we'd leave this up to counties to implement and enforce?

Your position is that the $50 plan wouldn't increase the size of government at all?

 

[Deacon923]

If any of you are interested in actual facts about this stuff here are some resources to get you started.

http://www.epi.org/publication/us-student-performance-testing/

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Educational_inequality

http://research.sanford.duke.edu/papers/SAN11-01.pdf

Suffice it to say that the blanket assertion "American schools are bad" is not, in fact, true at all. Going further to the conclusion that "American schools are bad because parents at all levels are doing a bad job at parenting" has to rank among the most ignorant pile of monkey poo ever flung at the wall of these boards.

 

[myDeaconmyhand]

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.

So you're basically refuting the OP - that the large amount of lower class children are mainly responsible for bringing down U.S. Testing scores?

 

[WFFaithful]

teaching and the schools cannot solve all problems, and when they try to do so, they end up doing their own job poorly

right. The schools end up being the child's primary source of nutrition, love, discipline, and other basic needs.

 

[2&2 Slider To Leyritz]

So you're basically refuting the OP - that the large amount of lower class children are mainly responsible for bringing down U.S. Testing scores?

I don't give a shit about testing scores, I care about schools producing productive members of society who will help the US succeed in the future global economy. If you think our schools, on the whole, are doing a good job of that, then we're in good shape and can talk about something else. I, however, do not think they are doing a good job of that.

 

[bigdoublezero]

I, however, do not think they are doing a good job of that.

Why?

 

[Strickland33]

I don't give a shit about testing scores, I care about schools producing productive members of society who will help the US succeed in the future global economy. If you think our schools, on the whole, are doing a good job of that, then we're in good shape and can talk about something else. I, however, do not think they are doing a good job of that.

Why do you think that policy makers and politicians rely so much on testing statistics? This can't be a serious post, can it?

 

[2&2 Slider To Leyritz]

Why?

Because between my business and my wife's business, I review probably over a thousand resumes and other communications each year from generally recent high school, college, and professional graduates for positions all across the spectrum of sophistication and subject matters. And maybe two dozen of those (including those who are college or professional graduates) reflect someone who has the basic writing, communication, and other skills expected to be taught at the elementary and high school levels. Call it anecdotal if you want, but I trust my own eyes much more than some arbitrary test scores measuring who knows what.

 

[bigdoublezero]

Maybe only shitty people want to work for you?

 

[2&2 Slider To Leyritz]

Why do you think that policy makers and politicians rely so much on testing statistics? This can't be a serious post, can it?

Because it gives them something to point the finger at instead of actually making decisions that might generate heat on themselves. It is like someone who looks at statistics to talk about how Phillip Rivers is a QB that you want leading an NFL team instead of actually watching him play and accurately concluding that he is a loser no matter what the stats say.

 

[2&2 Slider To Leyritz]

Maybe only shitty people want to work for you?

Quite possible. But when they submit their garbage to me they usually haven't met me yet, so unlikely.

 

[DistrictDeacon]

DC is struggling with how to retain the middle and upper class kids that are fleeing to the suburbs to avoid the crappy middle schools. Many elementary schools have been turned around by the large involvement of (mostly well to do) parents in their child's schools, but there haven't been many success stories in the middle schools yet.

It's certainly a tricky issue, and one that isn't going to be solved by throwing money indiscriminately at the problem OR cutting the funds of the lowest performing schools. Parental involvement is key, but how do you incentivize that in lower class families? Funding charter schools that have strict entrance requirements and make parental involvement mandatory is one way, but that almost signals defeat for the traditional public schools.

Maybe there is no real answer.

 

[Wakeforest22890]

Because between my business and my wife's business, I review probably over a thousand resumes and other communications each year from generally recent high school, college, and professional graduates for positions all across the spectrum of sophistication and subject matters. And maybe two dozen of those (including those who are college or professional graduates) reflect someone who has the basic writing, communication, and other skills expected to be taught at the elementary and high school levels. Call it anecdotal if you want, but I trust my own eyes much more than some arbitrary test scores measuring who knows what.

You review over a thousand resumes each year and maybe only two dozen of them have basic writing skills?

I call complete and utter bullshit on that unless you're running say, a McDonalds franchise.

 

[2&2 Slider To Leyritz]

You review over a thousand resumes each year and maybe only two dozen of them have basic writing skills?

I call complete and utter bullshit on that unless you're running say, a McDonalds franchise.

I implore you to enter the business world and take a look around. It is a fucking joke. Several high school graduates over the past year have written in "text-speak" on a goddamn resume. "I will help u improve performance". Even the majority of law school students' resumes contain multiple obvious typos. One that takes the cake is a girl whose phone number was disconnected when we called her for an interview (her resume was actually halfway decent). We Googled her name to find a number, no dice, so then Googled the number to see if it gave us any clues to get ahold of her. Up popped several Backpage ads for an escort with her first name and pics including thong shots. She was heinous and, no, she didn't get an interview.