Public Education
POSTED BY: TheHappyTrader
UPDATED: Tuesday, December 10, 2024 23:18
VIEWED: 7483
PAGE 7 of 7
Quote:
Originally posted by jewelstaitefan:
Some citizens expect their schools to teach their children, the Public Schools fail at this - your claim is that teaching is not the function or responsibility of Public Schools. This argues in favor of School Voucher: give us back our money so we can put it to good use.
Public Schools have no interest in teaching because it's "free", the money is paid to "higher education" so the 13 years of public school is just the time-waster to channel children to college/tech school where graduates cannot even accomplish what 8th graders in other countries (or even our own schools of a century ago) already do.
Problem number one with Public Education: Teachers Unions.
What the shit are you talking about? First off, I never claimed the public school shouldn't teach. Citizen's should expect their schools to teach their children and schools should be able to expect citizens to raise their own gorram children! But, that's in a perfect world where every class room has working equipment, textbooks that aren't ten years old, and eager bright eyed students ready to learn everything we can throw at them. Teacher's should teach. It's hard, there's several things we don't have any control over (like them being yanked out of our class for tutoring in another, or issues with the students personal lives, etc...) but it's part of our job and we do the best we can with what's available.
I knew going into my major that I'd have loans disproportionate to my starting salary with a Bachelor's Degree, but I was, and still am for the moment, an idealist. An idealist, but not a miracle worker. You give us a starting salary that can qualify us for food stamps, tie our hands with red tape, ask us to be social workers and parents to hundreds of students in addition to our normal duties, overfill our classes, cut our planning periods, cut or eliminate our budget so we rely on fund raising and booster organizations... and then complain when we fall behind other countries where teachers get better respect, better pay and don't teach children of all socioeconomic backgrounds in the same place. You know, if we handpicked all the wealthy children and only took them to certain schools, I'll bet those schools would do better overall... Oh wait a minute, we do! It's called private schools. And the occasional magnet school...
Of course our public schools aren't perfect, but it's not for lack of trying. People seem to forget that there are two sides to the teacher student relationship. The student is limited by how much the teacher can teach just as the teacher is limited by how much time and effort the student will put into their own education. I'm not trying to blame the students, but I want to make the point that a teacher can do everything 'right' and still get poor results if the student doesn't put much effort into their own education, perhaps because they're parents have told them all teachers are lazy idiots or maybe they have a bad family situation. If they are being abused, starving, or neglected, learning biology probably isn't high on their list of priorities...
Okay, I feel a bit better now that I've let off some steam, sorry for the rant. I can only assume the post was born of ignorance. I did my student teaching in a title I school (meaning they statically have students of the lowest family incomes) and these teachers were not lazy, were not greedy. Most of them were overworked and underpaid saints! You'd be surprised how many extra hours (unpaid, totally at the teacher's expense) are put into some of these schools. The school itself was like a family in that respect, irritating as hell, but they pulled together to make the most of what we had. I admit, it is possible I was lucky enough to learn at one of the better title I schools. I've heard horror stories before about things like weapons and drugs being brought into the poorer schools.
My biggest problem with the public schools right now is that they are too focused on the "all-mighty standardized
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Not ignorance, Happy - were it so, Rappy would have posted that under his own name.
If you cannot say something without resorting to JSF, Rappy, maybe you shouldn't say it at all.
-F
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Not ignorance, on my part.
My maternal grandmother was a teacher. Her sister was a teacher. My maternal grandfather's 3 sisters-in-law were teachers. My paternal grandmother was a RN and nurse trainer/teacher. Two of her sisters were teachers. My paternal grandfather was a professor, as well as his brother. My paternal aunt was a T/A in Zoology. My Maternal aunt was a teacher, and her daughter was runner-up for the Teacher in Space application process (winner was Christa McAuliffe), and her husband is a teacher. My brother is a teacher. His wife is a teacher. My other brother has all his kids home-schooled.
All went to public schools except my brother's kids.
Since you seem to be confused, I have quoted your post for you to refer to.
Quote:
Originally posted by TheHappyTrader:
I was having a chat with a teacher friend, much older and more experienced than me, who made a very interesting comment concerning what's wrong with our public schools. The Answer...
Nothing.
There is nothing wrong with our public schools, they are doing exactly what they have been designed for, training children to behave themselves, follow directions and become productive members of the work force. The schools are just fine, but they are obsolete. The workforce is in other countries. People expect the schools to prepare students for college but that's just not how they work. Also, it's silly expect every student to prepare for college when most of them will not be attending it.
As a new teacher, I found this perspective very interesting. As a music guy, I'm not as regulated or interfered with as the others, but I'm also not as hired. Still, at least I get to remain an idealist within my subject area, a part-time idealists, but an idealist none the less.
Anyhow, what are some of your thoughts on education, what's wrong, what's right, how can it be improved, etc...
Your statement, attributed to your friend, states schools are designed to teach a bunch of functions which most people recognize as parental concerns. Mention of math, reading, comprehension, writing, history, science, physical fitness, economics are absent from your list, indicating that your school's teachers had abdicated their mission which is what the students were attending for to begin with. Your title was not parent, yet you complain about performing the parental duties while trying to take credit for doing these same tasks, and your friend seems to think that's all he's there for. Your title is teacher, you should teach instead of playing primarily a parent.
You bemoan the lack of respect and deference for teachers, yet once upon a time teachers were respected and valued, and you have failed to realize that the teachers have reaped what they sow, their lack of respect reflects the level of respect they have come to deserve. You as a new teacher are less at fault, but your friend exemplifies the worst attitudes of public school teachers, clearly displaying why teachers are no longer held in higher regard, but the lower regard they have worked towards.
Sorry to burst your bubble. Your post indicated you wanted input/feedback. You didn't say you wanted it sugar-coated or non-critical feedback only.
People are not expecting their children to be prepared to attend a college where graduates cannot be guaranteed to be literate (meaning that college graduates those who cannot even read, let alone perform rudimentary math skills.) Parents are expecting students to be graduating high school as literates, capable of performing tasks that the same level of education achieved decades ago, and even what colleges graduates of the past could perform. Knowing that today's college graduates cannot achieve the skills that high school grad from decades ago could performs shows just how much of a failure public schools and their teachers have become.
Another major problem with Public Schools and their teachers: acceptance of failure.
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I didn't mention math, science, etc... because I thought that was kinda obvious. That was my bad, I was trying to make the point that perhaps schools are doing an okay job at teaching just enough math, English, etc, for a student to function in the workplace but perhaps not so much on the college preperation.
Then I was wondering, if most students will not be attending college, should the schools be concerned with it? Of course, I would perfer all students were prepared for higher education so they would all have that option available to them, but is that an efficient use of resources and the right thing to focus on?
You are right in that I did ask for opinions, and I never specified that I wanted them to be constructive. I suppose teachers suck is as legitimate a comment as any... I'd perfer some kind of suggestions or hypothesis concerning what's wrong and what might make it better. I don't think teachers not caring on account of it being 'free' is remotely accurate, but you're certainly entitled to your opinion.
I'm kinda young and don't remember a time when teachers were well respected. Might be I've not seen enough to see the big picture accurately. We have national standards now that are supposed to focus our lessons towards the skills recognized as beig most universally important. May things lime that will help, or maybe they'll make things worse. Only time will tell I 'spect but I really wish they wouldn't neglect art, music, and other classes just because they aren't on the standardized test. I agree woh you that this toleration of failure is a serious problem, perhaps at the root of all our problems, as a country, outside of education.
I apologize for any spelling or grammer errors, I'm postiong from a mobile device.
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Democrats demand examples of CRT, Common Core, SEL in rejected math books — Florida delivers!
https://www.bizpacreview.com/2022/04/22/democrats-demand-examples-of-c
rt-common-core-sel-in-rejected-math-books-florida-delivers-1228862/
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Quote:
Originally posted by JAYNEZTOWN:
Democrats demand examples of CRT, Common Core, SEL in rejected math books — Florida delivers!
https://www.bizpacreview.com/2022/04/22/democrats-demand-examples-of-c
rt-common-core-sel-in-rejected-math-books-florida-delivers-1228862/
If Bobby stole Kenny's apple and kicked Jose in the nuts, how many racisims has Bobby committed?
None. Bobby is black and is higher on the Oppression Pyramid than white Kenny and Mexican Jose.
Bobby deserves that apple, Kenny's great-great-great grandfather made Bobby's great-great-great grandfather pick apples and Jose probably had it coming to him anyway.
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Me: "Remember Covid?"
Useless Idiots: "What's Covid, durr? Russia, Ukraine, Putin, NATO *drool*. DURRRR!!!!"
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Scholars spend $500K in taxpayer funds to deconstruct whiteness in physics
https://www.thecollegefix.com/scholars-spend-500k-in-taxpayer-funds-to
-deconstruct-whiteness-in-physics/
'this endeavor is actually an important step toward the larger undertaking of freeing students and professors alike from the weighty fetters of whiteness. Funded through a $495,847 National Science Foundation grant, researchers Amy Robertson and W. Tali Hairston aim “to develop a knowledge base that could lead to awareness of how power relations may be embedded in the way physics is taught and learned.”'
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Quote:
Originally posted by JAYNEZTOWN:
Scholars spend $500K in taxpayer funds to deconstruct whiteness in physics
Or how to waste half a million US taxpayer dollars in the blink of an eye.
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Falsus in unum, falsus in omnibus
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Academy High School
Common-Core-Clownworld Perceptions? Maywood California.
$69,000 bail
https://files.catbox.moe/f94lov.mp4
Another older news media clips showed the student throwing a basketball at the teacher
international news
'Rightwingers threaten legal action on Biden’s student loan debt relief'
https://www.theguardian.com/money/2022/sep/16/biden-student-loan-debt-
forgiveness-republicans-legal-action
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Biden’s Got One Last Chance to Cancel Student Debt
https://newrepublic.com/article/189149/biden-cancel-student-debt-educa
tion
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