"the Restoration Of Apartheid Schooling In America"

[resa850]

This is part of the title of a book by Jonathon Kozol. I saw him speak at my school a few weeks ago, and have been meaning to post about it. This man is a very passionate educator!!! His first year of teaching (1964), he was fired for teaching poetry to his 4th grade class. He has spent the last decade or so visiting inner city schools. He has found that not only are children being academically judged on a higher gamnet, but they are beginning to be racially segregated. I haven't read his book, but I plan to.

http://shows.airamericaradio.com/lauraflanders/node/2890

edit: i've had a few glasses of wine, so please excuse my poor grammar and spelling.

Edited March 4, 2006 by resa850

[HPTDoh]

Kozol sounds familiar.. I know I read one of his books last semester.. can't recall which one off the top of my head..

EDIT: just kidding; it was Amazing Grace. A very intense read.. liberal guilt all over it. Seriously its a good book though :)

Edited March 4, 2006 by PikeyTheTurtle

[RAzOR]

This is part of the title of a book by Jonathon Kozol. I saw him speak at my school a few weeks ago, and have been meaning to post about it. This man is a very passionate educator!!! His first year of teaching (1964), he was fired for teaching poetry to his 4th grade class. He has spent the last decade or so visiting inner city schools. He has found that not only are children being academically judged on a higher gamnet, but they are beginning to be racially segregated. I haven't read his book, but I plan to.

http://shows.airamericaradio.com/lauraflanders/node/2890

edit: i've had a few glasses of wine, so please excuse my poor grammar and spelling.

Don't you think they should allow the kids to pick whichever school in the district they would like to attend?

That way schools compete amongst themselves for the better kids and the kids get to pick.

Sounds fair to me.

[resa850]

yeah it doesn't work that way. even so, it would be better to have the parents decide as opposed to the kids. in the district i work in, a parent has the option to move their child to another school if they provide transportation, have daycare near by, and if there is space in the school.

a lot of the kids in this situation don't have that benefit. most of them have parents who are too busy trying to earn money to put bread on the table instead of worrying about their child's education. the single parent family is becoming even more common today which makes it even harder to support a family. ts sad, but true. they aren't bad parents, they just have too much over their shoulders.

[RAzOR]

I think parents are the key to many problems. Teachers can only do so much. Parents need to take a proactive role.

Separately, IMO, forced busing is a horrible idea. It simply averages out all of the schools into an average instead of having one or two stand out and having one or two sink low. At least in the latter case, attention can be focused on the lower achieving schools to bring them up and the students get to stay in their neighborhood.

What do you do for your district?

[resa850]

i'm not sure if i know what you mean by forced busing.

I agree, the teachers can only go so far, but its the same for a parent, they should take a responsibility in thier child's education. then again all children should be receiving an equal education which they aren't. the gov't and school districts are spending too much time and money altering cirriculum to the point where children are over worked and learning isn't fun anymore. teachers don't have the right to make their own additions to curriculum anymore. instead they have to waste their time writing sections and objectives on the board, like the kids even know what its supposed to mean. it takes the passion out of being a teacher, which the kids can sense. its the fault of many.

testing is a joke. why is it so important for a kindergarten child to go through standardized testing? instead of helping the schools with low scores, the schools with high scores are rewarded with more money... seems kinda backwards.

what do i do for my district? I'm a recreation supervisor, but i'll soon be a high school english and math teacher. being an elementary school teacher is probalby the hardest job ever!!!! my dad just retired from the same district, my mom still has a few years left. they way teachers are treated is getting rediculous. why would someone with a four-year degree work like this when they can be treated better with some lame job for the state? because they have passion. and all the "higher ups" are taking that passion away. leaving the crappy teachers who care more about the perks of being a teacher instead of what its really about.

end rant. thanks for sparking that razor

[Gioseppe]

I think parents are the key to many problems. Teachers can only do so much. Parents need to take a proactive role.

+1

my parents were never really on my case about school and i felt that it made me sink lower in grades and test scores.

resa can be my teacher anyday.

"now kids, find the spool time of a gt40r on a b5234 with a heavily ported head, oversized valves, and a custom tubular exhaust manifold." that would be the best day ever.

with forced busing, there's a school in my district called aptos high, pat went there, they intentionally bus kids from watsonville(primarilly hispanic and latino population). i don't think it's neccesarily a good idea to bus, but if you didn't, it would create that racially segregated school, then were back to the 60's with the black/white segregation all over again.

higher scores, higher pay from the state. totally jerk backwards. schools with dropping grades need more money to make the teachers happy, which really reflects on the kids. at my school, we scored well, but just didn't get any money, and teachers were always complaining about paper shortages and other little things. it really got to the point where the teachers almost went on strike to show their unhappyness.

soo over public schools.

[resa850]

so do you know why those kids were bussed?

[RAzOR]

I think teaching is one of the great tragedies in modern day. Teachers play such a vital role in the perpetuation of our way of life and they are largely underpaid, overworked and crapped on by many. To me its one of the most noble endeavors today. If I was gov or pres I'd find a way to:

1. Double the pay of classroom teachers.

2. Force parents to participate/give them easy access to monitor classroom activity and performance.

3. Allow kids to be kicked out of school easily

4. Make teachers stick to core curriculum part of the time and allow them time for their own course-realted topics.

5. Streamline (remove) most administration.

6. Teach fundamentals first.

7. Relegate sex ed to anatamoy and leave the moral coaching to the parents.

8. Protect teachers with decent lawyers who will interface with threatening parents.

I could go on.

[Gioseppe]

so do you know why those kids were bussed?

overpopulation of other schools?

an attempt to racially diversify aptos?

i honestly have no clue.

[merlin390]

I have a very good friend who is teaching her first year of 1st grade. The admin sucks, the parents (about 50% of them just dont care) the moral is horribly low, the hours/pay suck, and just the friggen amount of paperwork she does at night when she gets home is unreal. She hardly has time to spend with her own child, I really understand why they say teaching is the second most stressful job behind being a nurse. I agree double the pay kick out the bad apple and go on.

[Beiner]

1. Double the pay of classroom teachers.

2. Force parents to participate/give them easy access to monitor classroom activity and performance.

3. Allow kids to be kicked out of school easily

4. Make teachers stick to core curriculum part of the time and allow them time for their own course-realted topics.

5. Streamline (remove) most administration.

6. Teach fundamentals first.

7. Relegate sex ed to anatamoy and leave the moral coaching to the parents.

8. Protect teachers with decent lawyers who will interface with threatening parents.

1. My dad has been teaching for 32 years now. When he started in '64 his salary was a little under $4k. I have friends that teach and put up with a lot of crap for what they do. I may very well be a teacher instead of a firefighter if it payed a bit more .

2. When you try to stong-arm the parents, most of them will just whine and give you the "I've got no time or enough money" crap.

3. Kids will behave when there parents make them

4. I think most young teachers think that core curriculum is "boring" so they try to get creative which leads them to not be as effecient. They also feel pressure to perform on certain tests so they teach to tests and not real material.

5. Perhaps, but I'm not sure how much educational "red tape" there is out there.

6. Agree

7. (no position)

8. It's become a very sad culture when that even has to be mentioned but sadly it's probably true. If #2 was implemented the lawyers wouldn't be needed.