3 ms·

> In a working-class pocket of Michigan, school administrators have tried almost everything, including pajama day, to boost student attendance. Wow, pajama day

by diggan 3y ago

> In a working-class pocket of Michigan, school administrators have tried almost everything, including pajama day, to boost student attendance. Wow, pajama day didn't bring back students? So strange. I wonder if they tried less homework, shorter school-days and/or later start of the day? Basically the three reasons I myself was chronically absent from school for as long as I can remember.

iammjm 3y ago
I remember getting to school for the 7:45 AM class as some of the worst times of my childhood. Imagine a deep Polish winter, it’s -15 Celsius, you get up at 6:30 in complete darkness, you walk to a bus station to get on an overcrowded bus where you can barely even stand as all the other kids are going too. then starting the day with an hour of math with a sociopathic, incompetent teacher… it took me years to appreciate school and learning again
- grugagag 3y ago
  I have some similar horrible experiences with school but hey, isn’t it like an authentic prep for the real world?
  - kwhitefoot 3y ago
    > isn’t it like an authentic prep for the real world? No. And if it were don't you think it would be better to teach the children how to improve the state of the world instead of perpetuating its evils?
- AtlasBarfed 3y ago
  "fat psychopathic wives would thrash them within inches of their lives!"
542458 3y ago
The article highlights that many parents whose children are absent are treating the posted assignments/homework as the primary teaching tool, so cutting that back hurts absent kids (I also understand that homework’s has been massively scaled back already in most places). Shorter days unfortunately interferes with school’s role as state-provided daycare for working parents. Later days is a solid idea, and I believe research shows it improves student performance at the highschool level, although if I understand correctly this is largely a scheduling/budget issue with how busses are staggered today.
- JumpCrisscross 3y ago
  > if I understand correctly this is largely a scheduling/budget issue with how busses are staggered today My California public school district had no busses. I still remember miserably making 7AM classes.
  - alephnerd 3y ago
    They still don't, even when I was a kid and even today.
- alephnerd 3y ago
  My mom's a teacher in a decent school district in California, and later school times didn't have a significant effect on post-pandemic absences in her experiences (for the students who did come in, it did have a positive effect on their performance though). The brutal truth is a subset of parents just don't care too much about education. It doesn't matter if it's an affluent or a working class district - there will always be a subset of parents that are either unable to (fairly common among impoverished parents sadly) or uninterested to (fairly uncommon among more affluent parents sadly) become much more involved parents Basically, teachers assume parents will intervene in their students lives to give structure. Parents in the other hand assume teachers will intervene to give their children structure in their lives. And neither side will budge. Some autonomy for kids is critical, but there also needs to be some amount of structure as well. You can't be 100% disciplinarian nor 100% free roaming. A happy balance is needed, and sadly, a handful of bad apples among both teachers and parents have deteriorated that relationship among these critical caregivers.
  - HWR_14 3y ago
    Did schools really start later post-pandemic? Your entire first paragraph confuses me because I'm not aware of any shift in school start times.
    - alephnerd 3y ago
      I'm speaking only about California and specifically, the school district my mom works for. As of 2022, Middle schools can start at 8am at the earliest, and number of school districts transitioned to a 8.30-9am start time. Some affluent school districts already did this transition in the late 2000s and early 2010s. The US has roughy 13k school districts. Each one has it's own different sets of rules, regulations, and local political culture, and aside from limited State and Federal DoE regulation, implement their policies based on local political constraints due to the School Board and PTA. Some School Boards and PTAs are apolitical in nature. Others are hyper-political and used as a stepping stone to enter local and state level politics (eg. Mayor, City Council, State Assembly, Congress) as donors won't donate without a proven electoral track record. Most younger (< 60yrs) Congressmembers started their political careers this way.
bluedevil2k 3y ago
Less homework? My teenage children are in honors and AP classes and barely have any homework. I think they should have far more homework. When I was their age I spent a few hours a day on homework. Parents I talk to feel the same way. Give the kids more work to do at home to keep them off their phones and YouTube.
- kwhitefoot 3y ago
  Homework has been demonstrated over and over again to not result in higher attainment. If your children are so smart they can surely do some reading and research of their own. That's what I did back in prehistoric times (1960s and early 1970s). In the subjects I enjoyed I was consistently ahead of the bulk of the class and occasionally of the teachers simply because I read all the text books and spent time in the library. It was enthusiasm that drove my performance not the imposition of extra homework.
  - anon__coward 3y ago
    References please. The claim that hw does not help retention sounds pretty unbelievable.
    - muaytimbo 3y ago
      HN is a fact free zone, didn't you know that?
    - kwhitefoot 3y ago
      From the abstract: “Although previous research has shown that homework improves students’ academic achievement, the majority of these studies use data on students’ homework time from retrospective questionnaires, which may be less accurate than time-diary data. We use data from the combined Child Development Supplement (CDS) and the Transition to Adulthood Survey (TA) of the Panel Study of Income Dynamics to explore the effects of time spent on homework while attending high school on two measures of academic achievement: high school GPA and college attendance by age 20. We find that homework time has no effect on these measures of academic achievement.” Rønning, M. (2008). Who benefits from homework assignments? (Discussion Papers No. 566). Oslo, Norway: Statistics Norway, Research Department. Retrieved from https://eric.ed.gov/?id=EJ908287 https://eric.ed.gov/?id=EJ908287 Full text available http://www.ssb.no/a/publikasjoner/pdf/DP/dp566.pdf http://www.ssb.no/a/publikasjoner/pdf/DP/dp566.pdf
Ajay-p 3y ago
..or maybe if they focused more on academics, reducing bullying and violence, and less political-socializing students would feel they are getting something out of it.
- kwhitefoot 3y ago
  How many academics do we need? How about teaching more crafts? Definitely agree that reducing bullying is a good idea though!
deleted 3y ago
[deleted]

by diggan 3y ago

iammjm 3y ago

I remember getting to school for the 7:45 AM class as some of the worst times of my childhood. Imagine a deep Polish winter, it’s -15 Celsius, you get up at 6:30 in complete darkness, you walk to a bus station to get on an overcrowded bus where you can barely even stand as all the other kids are going too. then starting the day with an hour of math with a sociopathic, incompetent teacher… it took me years to appreciate school and learning again

grugagag 3y ago
I have some similar horrible experiences with school but hey, isn’t it like an authentic prep for the real world?
- kwhitefoot 3y ago
  > isn’t it like an authentic prep for the real world? No. And if it were don't you think it would be better to teach the children how to improve the state of the world instead of perpetuating its evils?
AtlasBarfed 3y ago
"fat psychopathic wives would thrash them within inches of their lives!"

542458 3y ago

The article highlights that many parents whose children are absent are treating the posted assignments/homework as the primary teaching tool, so cutting that back hurts absent kids (I also understand that homework’s has been massively scaled back already in most places). Shorter days unfortunately interferes with school’s role as state-provided daycare for working parents. Later days is a solid idea, and I believe research shows it improves student performance at the highschool level, although if I understand correctly this is largely a scheduling/budget issue with how busses are staggered today.

JumpCrisscross 3y ago
> if I understand correctly this is largely a scheduling/budget issue with how busses are staggered today My California public school district had no busses. I still remember miserably making 7AM classes.
- alephnerd 3y ago
  They still don't, even when I was a kid and even today.
alephnerd 3y ago
My mom's a teacher in a decent school district in California, and later school times didn't have a significant effect on post-pandemic absences in her experiences (for the students who did come in, it did have a positive effect on their performance though). The brutal truth is a subset of parents just don't care too much about education. It doesn't matter if it's an affluent or a working class district - there will always be a subset of parents that are either unable to (fairly common among impoverished parents sadly) or uninterested to (fairly uncommon among more affluent parents sadly) become much more involved parents Basically, teachers assume parents will intervene in their students lives to give structure. Parents in the other hand assume teachers will intervene to give their children structure in their lives. And neither side will budge. Some autonomy for kids is critical, but there also needs to be some amount of structure as well. You can't be 100% disciplinarian nor 100% free roaming. A happy balance is needed, and sadly, a handful of bad apples among both teachers and parents have deteriorated that relationship among these critical caregivers.
- HWR_14 3y ago
  Did schools really start later post-pandemic? Your entire first paragraph confuses me because I'm not aware of any shift in school start times.
  - alephnerd 3y ago
    I'm speaking only about California and specifically, the school district my mom works for. As of 2022, Middle schools can start at 8am at the earliest, and number of school districts transitioned to a 8.30-9am start time. Some affluent school districts already did this transition in the late 2000s and early 2010s. The US has roughy 13k school districts. Each one has it's own different sets of rules, regulations, and local political culture, and aside from limited State and Federal DoE regulation, implement their policies based on local political constraints due to the School Board and PTA. Some School Boards and PTAs are apolitical in nature. Others are hyper-political and used as a stepping stone to enter local and state level politics (eg. Mayor, City Council, State Assembly, Congress) as donors won't donate without a proven electoral track record. Most younger (< 60yrs) Congressmembers started their political careers this way.

bluedevil2k 3y ago

Less homework? My teenage children are in honors and AP classes and barely have any homework. I think they should have far more homework. When I was their age I spent a few hours a day on homework. Parents I talk to feel the same way. Give the kids more work to do at home to keep them off their phones and YouTube.

kwhitefoot 3y ago
Homework has been demonstrated over and over again to not result in higher attainment. If your children are so smart they can surely do some reading and research of their own. That's what I did back in prehistoric times (1960s and early 1970s). In the subjects I enjoyed I was consistently ahead of the bulk of the class and occasionally of the teachers simply because I read all the text books and spent time in the library. It was enthusiasm that drove my performance not the imposition of extra homework.
- anon__coward 3y ago
  References please. The claim that hw does not help retention sounds pretty unbelievable.
  - muaytimbo 3y ago
    HN is a fact free zone, didn't you know that?
  - kwhitefoot 3y ago
    From the abstract: “Although previous research has shown that homework improves students’ academic achievement, the majority of these studies use data on students’ homework time from retrospective questionnaires, which may be less accurate than time-diary data. We use data from the combined Child Development Supplement (CDS) and the Transition to Adulthood Survey (TA) of the Panel Study of Income Dynamics to explore the effects of time spent on homework while attending high school on two measures of academic achievement: high school GPA and college attendance by age 20. We find that homework time has no effect on these measures of academic achievement.” Rønning, M. (2008). Who benefits from homework assignments? (Discussion Papers No. 566). Oslo, Norway: Statistics Norway, Research Department. Retrieved from https://eric.ed.gov/?id=EJ908287 https://eric.ed.gov/?id=EJ908287 Full text available http://www.ssb.no/a/publikasjoner/pdf/DP/dp566.pdf http://www.ssb.no/a/publikasjoner/pdf/DP/dp566.pdf

Ajay-p 3y ago

..or maybe if they focused more on academics, reducing bullying and violence, and less political-socializing students would feel they are getting something out of it.

kwhitefoot 3y ago
How many academics do we need? How about teaching more crafts? Definitely agree that reducing bullying is a good idea though!

deleted 3y ago

[deleted]