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>...society needs to focus on the school system before kids reach college. I don't think schools are the problem, I think it's people. Parents today are either

>...society needs to focus on the school system before kids reach college. I don't think schools are the problem, I think it's people. Parents today are either overworked, poor, stressed, unhappy or depressed, single, sick, or a combination of the these and then some. I talked with a guy just this past week who works at a school for Native American kids. The primary job of these teachers is to make the kids feel safe. Their primary job. Not to teach useful skills, but safety. This is an a major metropolitan area, not on a reservation. During one class, a teacher asked if anyone had died from or suffered gun violence, every hand went up. These are elementary school kids. Tell me what difference it makes if the teachers make more money if the kids are all on the edge of committing suicide or at least have no hope for the future. Maybe in places where the kids are fine, teachers can strike and ask for more money. I have a kid going into teaching, and one of my best friends did teaching. I taught at a local college, and when half the students don't turn in any work at all, it's not a teaching problem.

sokoloff 9y ago
Pretty much agree. Our kids are in Cambridge public schools (conscious choice on our part) and we volunteer in various ways to try to help all the kids. The spread of preparedness, ability, and focus of the kids even in K-5 and early elementary is stark. Some kids are unable to focus for even 45 seconds. Some kids regularly have no parents showing up for parent events. Some kids can't read (in any language) by grade 2. There's less that teachers can do in the 1000-ish hours of classroom time per year as compared to what the 4500-ish hours of awake, non-classroom time that the families have control over (or the hopefully 3000-ish hours of sleep that they also control). Parents expect teachers to work miracles I think as compared to what's possible. Families have wildly more time and vastly more individualized time theoretically available to them and for a variety of reasons (some circumstance, some choice), I think that time is frequently squandered/not used effectively and then it's the teachers' fault somehow when an achievement gap surfaces.
- RobertRoberts 9y ago
  >Parents expect teachers to work miracles... I think this sums it up well, and it's sad. My wife works in public school for the last few years, and has personally been yelled at by parent that said "my child would never do anything like that!" (the kid had destroyed a school book, even admitted he did it...) The public fight against the teachers, and the teachers are convinced that school should be fun and play time instead of primarily a learning time. So not only does discipline slide, so does learning, and everyone is part of the problem. A dead comment below pointed out the difference between "gun violence" and "simply violence", it just so happened the story I was relaying was about guns. But I think other forms of abuse are pervasive everywhere, and gun violence affects only a tiny amount of the population. Which is why it was such a striking point for that school and those kids. He completely misunderstood the implications. Edit: I want to also reiterate that while I taught in college, the students were more interested in Facebook, video games and their phones than learning. This is a student problem as much as anything else.
ataturk 9y ago
Funny that's the situation within certain ethnicities but is not the norm in typical white, middle class suburbia. These "major metropolitan" areas, they 100% run by Democrats by any chance? Liberals don't want solutions, they want to create problems to further the political divide and thus continue trying to consolidate power under the guise of "once we control everything we will fix all your problems for you." It is a lie, an incredible lie, in fact. It's the kind of lie the Soviets told. It's time for the truth, tough love, and people who actually want to create public policy that will fix things for people instead of making promises and then leaving them hanging. And why is it always "gun violence"--why not just violence? What difference does it make if your mother was shot to death in front of you or beaten down with a iron pipe? The whole "gun violence" bit is just another example of how liberals' minds are being warped to give in to toxic policy that has no bearing on anything other than what I said above--total consolidation of power into the hands of one particular political party.

sokoloff 9y ago

Pretty much agree. Our kids are in Cambridge public schools (conscious choice on our part) and we volunteer in various ways to try to help all the kids. The spread of preparedness, ability, and focus of the kids even in K-5 and early elementary is stark. Some kids are unable to focus for even 45 seconds. Some kids regularly have no parents showing up for parent events. Some kids can't read (in any language) by grade 2. There's less that teachers can do in the 1000-ish hours of classroom time per year as compared to what the 4500-ish hours of awake, non-classroom time that the families have control over (or the hopefully 3000-ish hours of sleep that they also control). Parents expect teachers to work miracles I think as compared to what's possible. Families have wildly more time and vastly more individualized time theoretically available to them and for a variety of reasons (some circumstance, some choice), I think that time is frequently squandered/not used effectively and then it's the teachers' fault somehow when an achievement gap surfaces.

RobertRoberts 9y ago
>Parents expect teachers to work miracles... I think this sums it up well, and it's sad. My wife works in public school for the last few years, and has personally been yelled at by parent that said "my child would never do anything like that!" (the kid had destroyed a school book, even admitted he did it...) The public fight against the teachers, and the teachers are convinced that school should be fun and play time instead of primarily a learning time. So not only does discipline slide, so does learning, and everyone is part of the problem. A dead comment below pointed out the difference between "gun violence" and "simply violence", it just so happened the story I was relaying was about guns. But I think other forms of abuse are pervasive everywhere, and gun violence affects only a tiny amount of the population. Which is why it was such a striking point for that school and those kids. He completely misunderstood the implications. Edit: I want to also reiterate that while I taught in college, the students were more interested in Facebook, video games and their phones than learning. This is a student problem as much as anything else.

ataturk 9y ago

Funny that's the situation within certain ethnicities but is not the norm in typical white, middle class suburbia. These "major metropolitan" areas, they 100% run by Democrats by any chance? Liberals don't want solutions, they want to create problems to further the political divide and thus continue trying to consolidate power under the guise of "once we control everything we will fix all your problems for you." It is a lie, an incredible lie, in fact. It's the kind of lie the Soviets told. It's time for the truth, tough love, and people who actually want to create public policy that will fix things for people instead of making promises and then leaving them hanging. And why is it always "gun violence"--why not just violence? What difference does it make if your mother was shot to death in front of you or beaten down with a iron pipe? The whole "gun violence" bit is just another example of how liberals' minds are being warped to give in to toxic policy that has no bearing on anything other than what I said above--total consolidation of power into the hands of one particular political party.