I don’t think these people are smart enough to see the outcome of what they are proposing.

In any case, they are a good argument for homeschooling. Any teacher who thinks the way they do views parents as obstacles not as partners.

And the Nuns weren’t scary, the Brothers with the cauliflower ears from Ireland were. That’s who backed them up.

After that, it was the red ribbon society in the records department. And just so you know Rabidfox, those ribbons are still there. Forever…..

After visiting the local high school, and looking at the crap posted on bulletin boards from radical organizations like Greenpeace and others, I decided I would not send my daughter there. Instead I sent my daughter to parochial school (we are not Catholic) for k-8 and home schooled high school using a virtual (Internet) high school.

By the way a virtual high school costs less than $2000 a year, and provides brand new books for each class. Try that in a brick and mortar school. Email feedback was excellent and provided more assistance than she would get in a class room.

Out of that experience, my daughter was accepted at every college she applied too, and was offered several scholarship opportunities as well. One college that we eventually turned down called us, and asked what they could do to get her to come there, instead of the competing college she chose.

Bottom line is choice is the solution, and even today you have more choices than you think you have. Number one choice, keep your kids out of public schools.

These aren’t limited to underpriviledged kids…I can tell within 10 minutes of my first class with students whether or not they have been raised with a sense of their own accountability for their education or not.

We need to get back to standards that expect students to complete the work at a certain level or they don’t move on to the next grade.
-and lastly the respect, responsibility, integrity and commitment of the school administration and community (and some teachers)to invest wisely in the students and teachers.
As far as the NEA is concerned I think their only goal is social engineering our students toward globalism and away from U.S. citizenship.

If anyone is more interested in this go to edwatch.org, go to the search button and put in FED ED. It will access articles that tell how there has been an extensive movement to change our children’s perspective on morals, our country and society. Sobering.

One nun ran 35 kids. No talking, no acting out. No bad grades allowed.

It works.

He made some good points, but in thinking about those I have found some others. This may – in the larger cities – be the way to go.

1 teacher, 1 aid, and maybe 40 students – ALL FROM THE SAME APARTMENT BUILDING – would cut out so many of what are currently problems in the system. No wasted ’services’. No wasted ‘overhead’ or ‘administration’. No bad lunchroom food. ( Get local takeout – it will reflect the local taste and be cheaper besides!) No stupid jock coaches. (If the kids want coaching – let them pick the sport and hire a real coach!) No transportation or… if the schedule was for an eight hour school day … hassles with after school daycare. (Meaning that money could go to the students or even – yes, what a shock – school activities.)

NO, you could not guarentee all’ good’ students – but logic would say that good or bad the students would all be closer together in background and potential. Closer in culture and expectation. The smaller group and the closer parent involvement would allow the ONE teacher – unshackled by a pyramid of desk-jockys – to guide the students in a way the *parents* value. In return, parents who felt their input being heeded would have a motivation to be reinvolved in their childrens school lives.

It would be hard work for the teacher – true. But most people prefer hard work that accomplishes something to easy days of powerless wheel-spinning.

We need not to reform the school system – we need to remake it from the ground up.

Vouchers and freedom might be a good start.

All a school needs to be good is a little sunshine and people with the wit and wisdom to shine the light on real problems.

A student in the hands of a bad teacher is like a dented can in a grocery store — damaged goods. And people in authority need to deal with the problem or be exposed for not doing so.

I am a solid conservative and I was very impressed with the results of this model. The disadvantaged kids were surrounded by kids who were motivated and engaged and were supported by parents who assisted them in ways their own parents could not. Our kids, mostly white and Asian, were exposed to kids they normally would never encounter, engendering an understanding and respect they might not otherwise have had. Keeping the underperforming group small allowed the larger performance-based culture to have strong influence. The community kids’ scores and grades reflected the positive effect of that influence and my daughter also received a quality education (that was superior, in my opinion, to that of the affluent district my children are now in). I have never seen this model in place anywhere else.

Obviously, most urban kids go to schools that reflect their neighborhoods, which is the biggest challenge most teachers face. Vouchers seem to offer the best answer in those situations.