-Submitted by David Drumm (Nal), Guest Blogger
America likes to think of itself as a country where one’s abilities determine one’s fortune. America was founded by those fleeing European countries where upward mobility was restricted by the state.
The opportunity to obtain a good education is essential to a society that values meritocracy.
James Bryant Conant, president of Harvard University from 1933 to 1953, recognized that students should be chosen based on their intellectual abilities rather than their family connections. A meritocracy, based on equal opportunity, is the cornerstone of a free society. Without free public education, there is no mechanism allowing the talented to display their abilities.
Educational opportunity should be the great equalizer in our society, it should not be reserved only for those who can afford the costs of private schools. Yet numerous states are using tax payer funds to subsidize the rich who treat their kids to an education at a private school. These states are cutting funding to public education, and using those same funds to provide vouchers subsides to those who least need them.
Yet the rich are not content with being able to afford the costs of private education, they expect tax payers to subsidize their expenditures. In Colorado, the board of the Douglas County School District voted for a pilot program that provides parents $4,500 for each student. That falls significantly short of the tuition that ranges from $7,000 to $14,000.
In states across the nation, lawmakers slash public school spending while funding voucher programs. In New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie (R) slashed $820 million in school spending last year while financing a school voucher expansion which “would cost about $825 million.” In Pennsylvania, Gov. Tom Corbett (R) proposed nearly a billion dollars in education cuts, while pushing a voucher plan that “is estimated to cost taxpayers $730 million in the first four years.”
When Republicans talk about cutting spending, they are excluding the rich from those cuts.
H/T: The Economist, LA Times, Think Progress.
Elaine, I don’t doubt for a minute that you did everything in your power to make sure every child in your charge received every possible opportunity to learn. And I don’t doubt that your fellow teachers and friends who were teachers did the same. I’m sure that this is a fact.
But it’s also a fact that many teachers didn’t and don’t. It’s a fact that there are lots of kids who aren’t fortunate enough to have teachers like you and go to schools like yours. It’s also a fact that where we see the most problems with kids in schools that don’t meet their needs is after elementary school.
Middle and high schools are where the arbitrary requirements really kick in. It’s where kids first learn to hate school, because as they are becoming individuals, their arbitrary requirements are less and less individualized. Combined with the overt authoritarianism that surrounds them, it’s no wonder that so many kids stop trying or drop out altogether.
Again, criticizing the methods we use to educate (grouping by age, instead of ability or interest, for example; or requiring that kids memorize facts for which they will have absolutely no use when they’re adults) is not to criticize every teacher or every school. It’s to point out that there are things we haven’t tried that we ought to try.
The way we educate our kids is as personal a decision as the way we feed them, discipline them, interact with them. What works for some doesn’t for others. The path that brings satisfaction to some, brings the opposite to others. When it comes to education, more options mean more freedom and more learning.
Les & Mike,
I was an elementary school teacher for more than three decades. During the years that I taught, our school system and our teachers tried a myriad of educational approaches with our students. I taught single-grade classes and multi-age/multi-grade classes. I taught in a traditional classroom and in an open-concept classroom with a team teacher. I did individualized reading instruction, taught reading to small groups of children who were at different ability levels, and did whole-class reading instruction. I used basal readers and trade books. I taught integrated units that connected subjects across the curriculum. I adapted programs for some children, provided individual help when children needed it, developed activitites and projects to stimulate my students interest. My fellow teachers at my school did the same things–as did my friends who taught in other school systems.
I watched the educational pendulum swing back and forth over the years. I saw new ideas come and go–and old ideas return with new names. Many of us teachers learned through experience which educational approaches worked with our students and adapted them for our classrooms. We didn’t throw out the baby with the bath water when certain educational ideas went out of vogue.
Unfortunately, we are now living in an era when the focus of education has become preparing children for standardized tests. Most teachers that I know are not happy with this state of affairs. They are trying to cope with tremendous pressure from the “powers that be” who feel that the only way to prove that children are learning what they need to learn is via paper and pencil standardized tests.
Elaine,
Yes, of course they are. I suppose I could have been clearer when talking about the two different kinds of public schools, but I was trying to make a much larger point (something I apparently failed to do).
rafflaw,
There is no doubt that family dynamics and socioeconomics are the cause of many students’ failures in education. But there are lots and lots of current and former teachers (like myself) and administrators who recognize the failings of our school system. Pretending like the schools don’t fail is like pretending that socioeconomics and family dynamics have absolutely nothing to do with education, and it condemns a lot of middle-class kids with good parents to a mediocre to poor education.
Mike,
I think the first, most important way to change the methodology in our education system is to let kids and parents choose how and where they’ll be educated. As long as we ignore the personal nature of learning, I don’t think much will change.
“It isn’t an indictment of the people who teach, but rather our antiquated and ineffective ideas of what it means to learn.”
Les,
I personally don’t believe in vouchers, charter schools, or any of the market-based solutions to the problem of our failing educational system. I think though, as shown in the quote from you above, that you are on the right track in stating that the methodology of education is the root of the problem.
Our public school systems use a production line model, with the underlying assumption that all children of a certain age category learn at the same rates. This is not true and handicaps the ability of even the best educational professionals to teach effectively. We must change the model into one that takes learning differences, related to maturity. Also poverty affects
the ability of children to learn and methods must be developed to even things out educationally.
All that said, however, the real problem s that our country does not seem to put a high value on education, nor has it ever been willing to devote sufficient resources to it. This is so terribly
shortsighted and irresponsible as to be seen as a lack of care for our country’s future.
In Minnesota there have been a number of cases reported where private schools refused children with disabilities. The best example were twin brothers, both on the honor roll; the private school would admit one but not the other, who had cerebral palsy.
Minnesota also requires the closest public school to provide special education services for students at private schools at no cost to the private school or the student.
When ADA was passed Congress promised to fund 40% of the cost for special education that they were now requiring. They have never supplied even half of that. While reviewing my local school districts budget a few years ago it became apparent that had Congress actually lived up to its word the district would not have been in financial distress & needing to increase the property tax to cover their losses.
Elaine,
Les has his facts wrong. The socioeconomic situation and the family dynamic are the reasons why some students fail.
Les,
Charter schools are public schools.
Elaine,
I taught in a public elementary school where students who were autistic or had Down Syndrome or cerebral palsy were mainstreamed. We did not “farm them out.” The charter school in our community sent their students who needed special help to the “regular” public schools for tutoring.
That’s why I didn’t say public schools “always” farmed out the special ed kids, but “frequently.” I taught at those non-public/non-profit schools which took in the special ed kids the public schools wouldn’t or couldn’t teach. It’s often a matter of resources, which charter schools struggle with as much, if not more than public schools. And needless to say, it differs state to state, and district to district.
You’re painting all public schools with a broad brush stroke. There are many excellent public school systems where students perform at a high level. I taught in such a system–the same system where my daughter attended school from K-12.
I’ve found that education is a subject similar to the military or policing, in that it’s very touchy. Education, like the military and law enforcement, is filled with selfless, devoted people, who frequently and regularly do incredible things. But it’s an undeniable fact that all of those systems fail regularly and often, and it’s usually because of a culture which is resistant to change.
In saying that the system is a failure, I’m not saying that every public school is terrible, or that all kids hate their schools, because that’s obviously not true. I know lots of kids who thrive in their schools, which offer them everything they want. At the same time, there are kids in those schools who are struggling to read with comprehension, but are expected to memorize who their state’s governor was in 1898. There are kids who can’t turn a fraction into a percentage, but much of their time is taken up reading literature they couldn’t care less about or memorizing the periodic table. In those instances, the same schools which are providing so much to the students who thrive within that paradigm, those same schools are failing the kids who don’t. And in the worst schools, many more kids are being let down than are being supported.
If my plumbing works in such a way that I can only get a glass of water after half a gallon has leaked through the pipes, I can’t hold up my glass of water and say that my plumbing isn’t failing.
At the 6:35 mark of the video I posted at 3:38, the reason that so many children are failed by our public school system is explained rather precisely. It isn’t an indictment of the people who teach, but rather our antiquated and ineffective ideas of what it means to learn.
Elaine,
Amen. My 3daughters attended Catholic grade schools and a catholic high school while my son opted for the local high school. His education was every bit as good as my daughters was. You are right about the inclusion kids. The private schools and the charter schools are not equipped to handle their special needs.
Les,
“I know that Charter Schools are limited in certain resources necessary for things like special ed, but, then again, so are public schools, who frequently farm out their special ed students to non-public, non-profit schools.”
I taught in a public elementary school where students who were autistic or had Down Syndrome or cerebral palsy were mainstreamed. We did not “farm them out.” The charter school in our community sent their students who needed special help to the “regular” public schools for tutoring.
*****
“The system, as it is, is a failure.”
You’re painting all public schools with a broad brush stroke. There are many excellent public school systems where students perform at a high level. I taught in such a system–the same system where my daughter attended school from K-12.
Les, yes charter schools DO get to pick and chose who can attend, at least in the places I know of.
Also, while you may support public education and vouchers that does not mean that the people who are behind the idea of vouchers do. And just because you do not understand that the continuing starvation of public education, aided by the additional drain caused by vouchers, will kill public education does not mean that it won’t. Try to explain how taking money away from the already strapped public schools will not further the decline.
Well OS,
The answer to your question is now they have a Mercedes that enforces Fashion….
Style Police on Patrol in Mercedes CLS For Fashion Week
http://blogs.wsj.com/drivers-seat/2011/02/11/fashion-week-style-police-ride-in-mercedes-cls-patrol-car/
Charter schools do not get to pick and choose which students they enroll. I’ve not been able to find examples of this, but if you can, I’d be very interested in it.
I know that Charter Schools are limited in certain resources necessary for things like special ed, but, then again, so are public schools, who frequently farm out their special ed students to non-public, non-profit schools.
Again, the essential thing here is finding a way for students and parents to have the most control over their child’s education. Giving them more choices instead of forcing them to go to under-performing or dangerous schools is one step in reaching that goal.
Elaien,
you are right on. The public schools don’t have the luxury of deciding who comes to their schools. That includes inclusion kids that I am sure most if not all private or charter schools would not even consider.
My THREE favorite quotes! (I struggle with my numbers.)
As a further example that the things we most need to talk about in regards to education are the last things we’re talking about, here’s a fantastic example. My two favorite quotes:
“So the children said, ‘How do we do that?’ and I said, ‘Well, I don’t know, actually.’ And I left.”
–Indian education scientist Sugata Mitra
“If children have interest, then education happens.”
“Any teacher who can be replaced by a machine, should be.”
–Arthur C. Clarke
Elain M.,
I don’t think that rich people should be able to use voucher money, either, but ultimately, the issue is about school choice. Giving parents the choice of which school they’ll send their kids to should be the first goal around which the system is built.
The system, as it is, is a failure. We’ve continued to spend more and more money per pupil every year, but we’re not getting the results one associates with increased investments. Schools are less and less flexible about how they educate, when the opposite is the only approach that really works.
I actually think that vouchers and unions, the two most discussed aspects of public school are the least important. We really need to completely reevaluate how we ensure that kids are learning the things necessary for an independent adulthood. But there are entrenched and vested interests on all sides, less interested in learning theory than in the status quo.
Les,
School vouchers that pay/help pay tuition at private schools drain tax money that should be used for and by public schools. I don’t want my tax dollars diverted to private schools when they are so sorely needed by public schools that must accept all children who live in their districts. Public schools can’t pick and choose which children they educate. Private schools can.
I think it’s quite reasonable to support school choice, while believing strongly in public school. Not all proponents of vouchers oppose public school.
OS,
Agreed.