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I can’t imagine ever having kids… but if I did I wouldn’t be able to put them in public school. It’s a circus. It’s daycare for the 80%. It’s not education. I’

I can’t imagine ever having kids… but if I did I wouldn’t be able to put them in public school. It’s a circus. It’s daycare for the 80%. It’s not education. I’d homeschool for sure. It’s a big commitment but I feel that’s the way to truly be a responsible parent.

zitterbewegung 5y ago
It is not just daycare. I live in Chicago and CPS is generally regarded as never closing for the simple fact that its the easiest way to feed children.
- notadev 5y ago
  My school keeps sending my kid home with food for “supper” simply because they keep buying so much of it to act like a soup kitchen and they need to get rid of it all. I keep telling them not to accept it, but they apparently have no choice. It’s weird.
  - zitterbewegung 5y ago
    I don't have children but making them all take home dinner versus letting them choose isn't really a good idea because they don't necessarily make the best decision.
gregorymichael 5y ago
I felt the same way before having kids. We live in Brooklyn, which offers Pre-K for all, and we decided to try for it if for no other reason than free daycare. We had a great experience in Pre-K, our daughter learned a lot, made a bunch of friends, and we all gained a community. We had the same experience in Kindergarten before Covid hit. We unenrolled her for first grade, homeschooled instead of doing the school's remote option[^1], and also had a great experience. That said, after a year at home and the birth of our second daughter, we were all ready for her to return to public school for second grade, and we are all are thankful she's back. Parenting is a continual exercise in evaluating tradeoffs. With all due respect, folks don't know what they'll do as a parent until they're a parent. 1: https://baugues.com/homeschool https://baugues.com/homeschool
- NikolaNovak 5y ago
  >>"With all due respect, folks don't know what they'll do as a parent until they're a parent." Oh man... Are those words ever true. I lived through civil war, Was a child refugee, switched countries and continents, lost parents and loved ones, had first job first love first wife,and generally had a fairly interesting life... And ALL of that was "Phase 1". Nothing compared to complete transformation of life priorities prerogatives options perspective free time disposable income attention sleep et cetera that having a child did. It's astonishing to me how ... Pervasive and common, and yet unique and personal and shocking the experience is! :-) But I will be first to admit that pre-children me and post-children me will have multiple areas of vehement disagreement and inability to understand each other :->
  - xwdv 5y ago
    Is it possible to have children without succumbing to the lifestyle of a common parents?
    - NikolaNovak 5y ago
      As a non parent I had 100% faith and intention. As a parent, yes I think it's possible and eminently achieveable,if that is and remains your goal. BUT! Some stereotypical parenting behaviours that I found ridiculous before, now make a lot more sense. Silly illustrative example - I spent years trying to persuade my friends against SUVs and large vehicles. Braking distance visibility handling price etc, I vehemently made my arguments. Now I cheerfully drive a minivan because it makes my life manifestly better and I couldn't care less about image or non-parent perception or judgement :-) More importantly, There are also a lot of relationship paradigms that make a lot of sense when you are a young independent couple, that completely break down when you are sleep deprived not for a day or week or even a month but seminpermanently, while having the biggest demands and constant responsibility for your actions and behaviour, and influence on and safety of another human being! Add lack of free time and lack of disposable income and your preferences are definitely nudged in certain direction. And don't get me wrong, it's not that you are forced to behave a certain way... It's just that things that were impractical or undesirable before, are now practical and desirable. It's transformarive, in a way that I 100% know I would not be able to even explain let alone convince my pre-children self. That being said, for empirical counter example - Musk still be Musk :-)
femiagbabiaka 5y ago
Only poor kids get the daycare experience actually. Many public schools have incredible facilities, teachers, honors and AP classes, extracurriculars… the question is why not supply that for everyone regardless of socioeconomic background.
- whalesalad 5y ago
  Poor kids? That’s a shallow assertion. Reading between the lines I think you’re trying to say that poorer communities without as many resources offer a lesser experience than a wealthier community. That’s part of the issue - it’s not the same across the entire country or even within small municipalities. If you live in a community where the school system is good - that can work. But that was pre-COVID and pre- all the other shit that is surely about to come crashing down like a house of cards. Masks? No masks? Metal detectors at school? Do we need armed police? When are we going to knee jerked our kids back home to remote zoom “learning”? It’s traumatic and absolutely has a detriment to mental health and learning potential/performance. It sucks to be a student right now. Then in a more broad sense: the American dream is on the verge of collapse. Inflation is here. Homes are unaffordable. People are fed up and don’t want to take low income jobs. Boomers set us up for their notion of the American dream - go to college, get a solid job, pay your dues and you’ll get yours. But it’s a fallacy. So what is our education system preparing people for? It’s all going to change. It already has.
- DarylZero 5y ago
  I went to one of those "incredible facilities" schools and it was no better than daycare for me, because none of the classes were appropriate for me. And of course nobody cared, instead I was punished.
  - femiagbabiaka 5y ago
    I had a similar experience, I empathize heavily. One of the big gaps in all public school is that it has to optimize for the middle 50% of all kids. Given constraints that ends up being probably good for society, but so many people get left behind to fend for themselves as a result.
acdha 5y ago
> It’s daycare for the 80%. It’s not education. This is a popular trope heavily marketed in certain circles but it’s not even remotely true and it’s deeply disrespectful to the teachers working in an underfunded but critical position. Beyond the obvious politics, the other thing to remember is that student performance very closely tracks the parents’ socioeconomic status. This is most known for explaining the gaps on international testing but it also leads to people misinterpreting school data and drawing the wrong conclusion. My son’s school is notably bimodal because it has both recent immigrants who tend to be poor and affluent professionals, and people sometimes look at the averages and conclude that the school is bad when it’s really just rediscovering that being poor in America sucks.
- deleted 5y ago
  [deleted]
- mannerheim 5y ago
  Teachers have earned every ounce of disrespect they receive.
- ZephyrBlu 5y ago
  I don't live in the US, but from seeing my brothers go through school it seems pretty true to me. Butts in seats matters more than students actually understanding the material.
- indymike 5y ago
  > This is a popular trope heavily marketed in certain circles but it’s not even remotely true and it’s deeply disrespectful to the teachers working in an underfunded but critical position. This is a quite shallow dismissal. I'm the father of five and my wife is a teacher. The truth is, many public schools have deteriorated into free day care, and the poorer the area the school serves, the more this rings true. > student performance very closely tracks the parents’ socioeconomic status. Perhaps, but this is often an urban/suburban issue where wealth is concentrated in a (usually) suburban school, and that in turn leads to the school being better resourced.
  - 5y ago
deleted 5y ago
[deleted]
jac241 5y ago
One of my former coworkers who went to private schools said the same thing. All I could think to myself was that we have the same job and title except my education cost $300k less after going to public school and a public university. If it's a circus I guess I'm just a stupid monkey who didn't get an education dancing my way to becoming a neurosurgeon...
- dudul 5y ago
  And we all know that salary and title are the true measure for one's happiness and fulfillment.
  - deleted 5y ago
    [deleted]
siquick 5y ago
The social skills kids pickup in daycare and school is fundamentally important in a child's development. Yes, you can have kids hanging about with your friends kids but the ability to interact with strangers, and people outside your bubble is incredibly important. I'm sorry you went to a bad public school but there are hundreds of millions of us who went to public schools and turned out just fine. If you didn't go to a bad public school and have formed a blanket opinion that poors == bad then you're proving my point. Any parent who have home schooled during the pandemic will tell you that most teachers are worth their weight in gold. It's not remotely anywhere near as easy as you think it is.
- jtbayly 5y ago
  By far the best kids I’ve ever seen in terms of interacting with strangers have all been homeschooled.
  - DarylZero 5y ago
    Homeschooled from early age. The other poster was talking about kids taken out of schools. Once they're in that group institution a while they get "institutionalized."
- baryphonic 5y ago
  > Any parent who have home schooled during the pandemic will tell you that most teachers are worth their weight in gold. It's not remotely anywhere near as easy as you think it is. I've been homeschooling my oldest this year. I first started teaching him to read last year while he was in Pre-K at a parochial school, and decided to just continue teaching him this year rather than do the public school thing. It's honestly been a joy. I love his curiosity and his joy learning new things and his excitement when he does it. Yes, there are days where he's just in "a mood" and doesn't want to do school, but those are also times where I can talk with him father-and-son about integrity and hard work and discipline, and empathize with him over the fact that, in fact, some of the things we have to learn are boring. The time I spend teaching him is something I wouldn't trade for the world. I'm just lucky I have the opportunity - I wish all families could.
forgotmyoldname 5y ago
This depends on the school and town. I went to a northern suburban public middle school and it basically felt like college. We were encouraged to explore our interests and there were classes catering to basically everything—loads of foreign languages, 3D art, wood shop (in 7th grade, not even high school), cooking, and so on. Few students acted out. Then I moved to the south for high school. Want to continue learning the foreign language you’ve studied since 6th grade? Nope. We only offer that for upperclassmen because young students don’t have the mental maturity for language learning(what?). Want to explore art? Nope. You’re painting by numbers. Fights everyday. Straight up gangs and kids selling drugs when the teacher is looking away. Teachers chatting on the phone with friends all class everyday and just playing random movies unrelated to the subject. My public education in middle school was far beyond what I got in high school. I’d dare say I regressed since I was doing less advanced subjects in high school. But my point is—great public schools exist. It’s all in where you live.
danans 5y ago
> I wouldn’t be able to put them in public school. It’s a circus. It’s daycare for the 80% As someone with kids in both public and private school, let me assure you that both are 80% daycare. And someone without kids might not understand this, but daycare is highly educational. Children don't learn by sitting through a lecture, they learn through the process of someone taking care of them. Also while we're both throwing around totally unsubstantiated statistics about other fields of work, I would suggest that white collar work is also 60% daycare for the worker, since jobs are a in large part an income redistribution technology.
deleted 5y ago
[deleted]

zitterbewegung 5y ago

It is not just daycare. I live in Chicago and CPS is generally regarded as never closing for the simple fact that its the easiest way to feed children.

notadev 5y ago
My school keeps sending my kid home with food for “supper” simply because they keep buying so much of it to act like a soup kitchen and they need to get rid of it all. I keep telling them not to accept it, but they apparently have no choice. It’s weird.
- zitterbewegung 5y ago
  I don't have children but making them all take home dinner versus letting them choose isn't really a good idea because they don't necessarily make the best decision.

gregorymichael 5y ago

I felt the same way before having kids. We live in Brooklyn, which offers Pre-K for all, and we decided to try for it if for no other reason than free daycare. We had a great experience in Pre-K, our daughter learned a lot, made a bunch of friends, and we all gained a community. We had the same experience in Kindergarten before Covid hit. We unenrolled her for first grade, homeschooled instead of doing the school's remote option[^1], and also had a great experience. That said, after a year at home and the birth of our second daughter, we were all ready for her to return to public school for second grade, and we are all are thankful she's back. Parenting is a continual exercise in evaluating tradeoffs. With all due respect, folks don't know what they'll do as a parent until they're a parent. 1: https://baugues.com/homeschool https://baugues.com/homeschool

NikolaNovak 5y ago
>>"With all due respect, folks don't know what they'll do as a parent until they're a parent." Oh man... Are those words ever true. I lived through civil war, Was a child refugee, switched countries and continents, lost parents and loved ones, had first job first love first wife,and generally had a fairly interesting life... And ALL of that was "Phase 1". Nothing compared to complete transformation of life priorities prerogatives options perspective free time disposable income attention sleep et cetera that having a child did. It's astonishing to me how ... Pervasive and common, and yet unique and personal and shocking the experience is! :-) But I will be first to admit that pre-children me and post-children me will have multiple areas of vehement disagreement and inability to understand each other :->
- xwdv 5y ago
  Is it possible to have children without succumbing to the lifestyle of a common parents?
  - NikolaNovak 5y ago
    As a non parent I had 100% faith and intention. As a parent, yes I think it's possible and eminently achieveable,if that is and remains your goal. BUT! Some stereotypical parenting behaviours that I found ridiculous before, now make a lot more sense. Silly illustrative example - I spent years trying to persuade my friends against SUVs and large vehicles. Braking distance visibility handling price etc, I vehemently made my arguments. Now I cheerfully drive a minivan because it makes my life manifestly better and I couldn't care less about image or non-parent perception or judgement :-) More importantly, There are also a lot of relationship paradigms that make a lot of sense when you are a young independent couple, that completely break down when you are sleep deprived not for a day or week or even a month but seminpermanently, while having the biggest demands and constant responsibility for your actions and behaviour, and influence on and safety of another human being! Add lack of free time and lack of disposable income and your preferences are definitely nudged in certain direction. And don't get me wrong, it's not that you are forced to behave a certain way... It's just that things that were impractical or undesirable before, are now practical and desirable. It's transformarive, in a way that I 100% know I would not be able to even explain let alone convince my pre-children self. That being said, for empirical counter example - Musk still be Musk :-)

femiagbabiaka 5y ago

Only poor kids get the daycare experience actually. Many public schools have incredible facilities, teachers, honors and AP classes, extracurriculars… the question is why not supply that for everyone regardless of socioeconomic background.

whalesalad 5y ago
Poor kids? That’s a shallow assertion. Reading between the lines I think you’re trying to say that poorer communities without as many resources offer a lesser experience than a wealthier community. That’s part of the issue - it’s not the same across the entire country or even within small municipalities. If you live in a community where the school system is good - that can work. But that was pre-COVID and pre- all the other shit that is surely about to come crashing down like a house of cards. Masks? No masks? Metal detectors at school? Do we need armed police? When are we going to knee jerked our kids back home to remote zoom “learning”? It’s traumatic and absolutely has a detriment to mental health and learning potential/performance. It sucks to be a student right now. Then in a more broad sense: the American dream is on the verge of collapse. Inflation is here. Homes are unaffordable. People are fed up and don’t want to take low income jobs. Boomers set us up for their notion of the American dream - go to college, get a solid job, pay your dues and you’ll get yours. But it’s a fallacy. So what is our education system preparing people for? It’s all going to change. It already has.
DarylZero 5y ago
I went to one of those "incredible facilities" schools and it was no better than daycare for me, because none of the classes were appropriate for me. And of course nobody cared, instead I was punished.
- femiagbabiaka 5y ago
  I had a similar experience, I empathize heavily. One of the big gaps in all public school is that it has to optimize for the middle 50% of all kids. Given constraints that ends up being probably good for society, but so many people get left behind to fend for themselves as a result.

acdha 5y ago

> It’s daycare for the 80%. It’s not education. This is a popular trope heavily marketed in certain circles but it’s not even remotely true and it’s deeply disrespectful to the teachers working in an underfunded but critical position. Beyond the obvious politics, the other thing to remember is that student performance very closely tracks the parents’ socioeconomic status. This is most known for explaining the gaps on international testing but it also leads to people misinterpreting school data and drawing the wrong conclusion. My son’s school is notably bimodal because it has both recent immigrants who tend to be poor and affluent professionals, and people sometimes look at the averages and conclude that the school is bad when it’s really just rediscovering that being poor in America sucks.

deleted 5y ago
[deleted]
mannerheim 5y ago
Teachers have earned every ounce of disrespect they receive.
ZephyrBlu 5y ago
I don't live in the US, but from seeing my brothers go through school it seems pretty true to me. Butts in seats matters more than students actually understanding the material.
indymike 5y ago
> This is a popular trope heavily marketed in certain circles but it’s not even remotely true and it’s deeply disrespectful to the teachers working in an underfunded but critical position. This is a quite shallow dismissal. I'm the father of five and my wife is a teacher. The truth is, many public schools have deteriorated into free day care, and the poorer the area the school serves, the more this rings true. > student performance very closely tracks the parents’ socioeconomic status. Perhaps, but this is often an urban/suburban issue where wealth is concentrated in a (usually) suburban school, and that in turn leads to the school being better resourced.
- 5y ago

deleted 5y ago

[deleted]

jac241 5y ago

One of my former coworkers who went to private schools said the same thing. All I could think to myself was that we have the same job and title except my education cost $300k less after going to public school and a public university. If it's a circus I guess I'm just a stupid monkey who didn't get an education dancing my way to becoming a neurosurgeon...

dudul 5y ago
And we all know that salary and title are the true measure for one's happiness and fulfillment.
- deleted 5y ago
  [deleted]

siquick 5y ago

The social skills kids pickup in daycare and school is fundamentally important in a child's development. Yes, you can have kids hanging about with your friends kids but the ability to interact with strangers, and people outside your bubble is incredibly important. I'm sorry you went to a bad public school but there are hundreds of millions of us who went to public schools and turned out just fine. If you didn't go to a bad public school and have formed a blanket opinion that poors == bad then you're proving my point. Any parent who have home schooled during the pandemic will tell you that most teachers are worth their weight in gold. It's not remotely anywhere near as easy as you think it is.

jtbayly 5y ago
By far the best kids I’ve ever seen in terms of interacting with strangers have all been homeschooled.
- DarylZero 5y ago
  Homeschooled from early age. The other poster was talking about kids taken out of schools. Once they're in that group institution a while they get "institutionalized."
baryphonic 5y ago
> Any parent who have home schooled during the pandemic will tell you that most teachers are worth their weight in gold. It's not remotely anywhere near as easy as you think it is. I've been homeschooling my oldest this year. I first started teaching him to read last year while he was in Pre-K at a parochial school, and decided to just continue teaching him this year rather than do the public school thing. It's honestly been a joy. I love his curiosity and his joy learning new things and his excitement when he does it. Yes, there are days where he's just in "a mood" and doesn't want to do school, but those are also times where I can talk with him father-and-son about integrity and hard work and discipline, and empathize with him over the fact that, in fact, some of the things we have to learn are boring. The time I spend teaching him is something I wouldn't trade for the world. I'm just lucky I have the opportunity - I wish all families could.

forgotmyoldname 5y ago

This depends on the school and town. I went to a northern suburban public middle school and it basically felt like college. We were encouraged to explore our interests and there were classes catering to basically everything—loads of foreign languages, 3D art, wood shop (in 7th grade, not even high school), cooking, and so on. Few students acted out. Then I moved to the south for high school. Want to continue learning the foreign language you’ve studied since 6th grade? Nope. We only offer that for upperclassmen because young students don’t have the mental maturity for language learning(what?). Want to explore art? Nope. You’re painting by numbers. Fights everyday. Straight up gangs and kids selling drugs when the teacher is looking away. Teachers chatting on the phone with friends all class everyday and just playing random movies unrelated to the subject. My public education in middle school was far beyond what I got in high school. I’d dare say I regressed since I was doing less advanced subjects in high school. But my point is—great public schools exist. It’s all in where you live.

danans 5y ago

> I wouldn’t be able to put them in public school. It’s a circus. It’s daycare for the 80% As someone with kids in both public and private school, let me assure you that both are 80% daycare. And someone without kids might not understand this, but daycare is highly educational. Children don't learn by sitting through a lecture, they learn through the process of someone taking care of them. Also while we're both throwing around totally unsubstantiated statistics about other fields of work, I would suggest that white collar work is also 60% daycare for the worker, since jobs are a in large part an income redistribution technology.

deleted 5y ago

[deleted]