Five myths about America’s schools

[groovedaddy]

The end of the school year and the layoffs of tens of thousands of teachers are bringing more attention to reformers’ calls to remake public schools. Today’s school reform movement conflates the motivations and agendas of politicians seeking reelection, religious figures looking to spread the faith and bureaucrats trying to save a dime. Despite an often earnest desire to help our nation’s children, reformers have spread some fundamental misunderstandings about public education.

1. Our schools are failing.

2. Unions defend bad teachers.

3. Billionaires know best.

4. Charter schools are the answer.

5. More effective teachers are the answer.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/five-myths-about-americas-schools/2011/05/09/AFunW27G_story_1.html

[msongs]

1. IMO the best predictor of school success is the amount of support in the home, outside of classes nt

[no_hypocrisy]

2. Public schools are complicated and there's lots of reasons why effective teachers

can't reach all students.

Administrators have a conflict of interest of maintaining some order in results of classroom testing and trying to defend their jobs when the numbers aren't "in". In a lot of cases, administrators are former teachers who now answer to parents, the community, the Board of Education, and eventually to the State.

Some parents do their best but it isn't enough due to socioeconomic problems. They lack the education their children are getting sometimes. Their children return home (if they're lucky) to chaos, a poor diet, and no support for their schoolwork.

The community wants lower taxes and the only outstanding target is teachers' salaries, benefits, and pensions. The taxpayer stubbornly assumes that anyone can teach and therefore teachers are easily replaced with a cheaper version and they'll get the same results, if not better.

The teachers don't have the independence to create and execute their best concept of a classroom curriculum as they have to accept NCLB and the added tests in order to justify getting federal aid, to get tenure, etc. Children are not getting the individual attention they need because there is not enough time in the school day (average, 6 hours at the maximum).

The myths that underlie the "solutions" as cited above do not recognize the valid and obvious reasons why public schools are challenged. Some schools are doing fine but they get caught in the net for those who want to tinker the system in the name of "improvement".

[JDPriestly]

4. It is hard for teachers to bring the enthusiasm that children

need to inspire them to learn when the teacher is being treated like a factory worker whose job is just to twist the same screw all day or watch a machine as it works.

Good teaching is creative. It is joyous. The NCLB and dictated standards in our classrooms discourage creativity and joy. That is why NCLB cannot work.

The kinds of "teachers" who will enter the profession knowing that their goals, methods, etc. will be dictated to them do not have much to offer our children.

Think of it though. Our members of Congress pretty much follow the dictates of their corporate owners. They are not creative in their work. Corporations write a lot of the bills. And then the corporations pay the members to vote one way or the other. So, why would Congress think that creativity in the classroom had any value. After all, following corporate orders works in Congress, why not in the classroom?

[JDPriestly]

3. Your link opens to page 2. I couldn't get to page 1.

[QED]

10. I found the link to Page 1

It's at the bottom of the article itself in the lower right hand corner. It is very hard to see so I understand why you missed it.

Good article!

[Lydia Leftcoast]

5. There's a great letter in today's (5/30) New York Times

It's the last one in the section:

The best use that Bill Gates could make of the fortune he spends on education would be to create the kind of schools that he and other extremely wealthy people send their children to: schools with small classes (not necessarily small schools), a good ratio of adults — teachers and support staff — to students, intensive remediation for those who need it, and enrichment of all kinds, including the arts, sports, technology, clubs and trips.

There’s no mystery about quality education. Wealthy people know exactly what it consists of and make sure their children get it. We need to help all the other children in America, and elsewhere, get it as well.

LARRY GUTMAN
Brooklyn, May 22, 2011

http://www.nytimes.com/2011/05/30/opinion/l30gates.html?ref=opinion

[dflprincess]

11. This deserves its own thread n/t

[Smarmie Doofus]

12. Link to new thread:

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=439x1201344

[1monster]

6. A local school, which was established for students who could not, for various

reasons unable to keep up with their classmates in regular schools, is scheduled to lose 85% of their instructors and their principal because they got a grade of "F" for the second year in a row.

The school did not do well enough on the state test.

The irony here is that the school was not supposed to be tested because it is an alternative school.

But the NCLB laws and the idiot "thinking" maintains that there is no student who cannot learn and understand algebras 1 & 2 and chemistry if only the teachers were doing their jobs. Ergo, if the school has a population of students who have learning disabilities, low I.Q., social factors that discourage learning, and a large number of homeless, it is the teachers who are to blame for students' inabililties to understand the subjects.

This school once kept students from dropping out and helped them get their diplomas ... some students stayed until they were twenty, but they got their diplomas and quite often finished high school prepared for a career with no other schooling necessary.

Not any maore. The kids are tested; they are required to take courses which once only college prep students took; they are not welcome to stay past the school year in which they pass their eighteenth birthday...they are passed on to an adult "high school completion" class.

The mandates for higher standards are unfunded, so schools can't hire more teachers to help those who need special help. the requirements for graduating are higher. By 2013, students will be required to pass an end of course exam in order to get high school graduation credits. It doesn't matter one little bit how well the student does in the class. If they don't pass the end of course test (some kids don't do well on tests and/or might be ill on the day of the exam) they fail the course.

While making it that much harder to graduate, the requirements for schools to prevent drop outs (the way drop out statistics are figured is another story and unbelievably skewed) are going up every year.

It is a deliberately flawed system. There is no way to win. Even by cheating.

[proud2BlibKansan]

9. IMO, the worst thing about NCLB is the 100% mandate

We have to test 100% of our kids and 100% must be proficient.

Unbelievably stupid and unattainable.

[texshelters]

14. Ditto

Peace,
Tex Shelters

[iemitsu]

7. a good article. and a surprise to see it in the post.

a good analysis as far as it goes. the major omission is the fact that income inequality is getting worse in the us and it has major effects on a child's ability to learn.
maslow's hierarchy and all.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Maslow%27s_hierarchy_of_needs

[Gregorian]

8. It's the family. No schools.

Our society has begun to produce children who are raised by their peers. The result is that they can't learn like children of the past, who were raised by their parents.

I don't mean to hijack your thread, but I believe this is the thing we aren't focusing on. At the price we have to pay in order to live, we can't grow up as normal animals.

[texshelters]

13. More effective teachers might help if

you could point to those that aren't effective. Testing does not demonstrate that a teacher is effective at all. And studies show that teaching is lower on the list of why students succeed than the economy, economic situation, educational background of parents and other factors.

Read more about this here
http://texshelters.wordpress.com/2011/05/30/how-to-promote-high-stakes-testing-lie/

Peace,
Tex Shelters

[teachingfordemocracy]

15. More Effective Teachers are the Only Part of the Answer

Yes, I believe that teachers need more training.  They are,
afterall, professionals.  However, I think that the immediate
answer would be to even the playing field when it comes to
campuses.  As Jonathan Kozol points out, there are some
schools in East St. Louis with sewage seeping through the
buildings while across the bridge, schools are warm and ready
to inspire learning.  No children is motivated to learn in a
dark and sad (and unhealthy) place.

[alp227]

16. WaPo's "5 myths" series is fascinating and sets the records straight.

Thank you for posting this, I have posted such articles here in the past too.