Sharlonda Buckman, CEO of the Detroit Parent Network, says jail Detroit teachers.

[madfloridian]

Run time: 04:29 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1UPDp0O1G2M   Posted on YouTube: December 13, 2009 By YouTube Member: Views on YouTube: 0   Posted on DU: December 14, 2009 By DU Member: madfloridian Views on DU: 2960

 
Buckman says jail the teachers

Some parents think that teachers should be held accountable for failing Detroit's students, even suggesting jail time for school employees who don't meet their expectations. During a Saturday forum hosted by the Detroit Parent Network just after the test results were released, upset parents expressed such concerns to Bobb:

The Detroit News, Dec. 12: Sharlonda Buckman, CEO of the Detroit Parent Network, called for jailing and civil lawsuits against anyone in the city's educational system that is not doing his or her share to help properly educate children. "Somebody needs to go to jail," she said in a tearful address to 500 parents gathered Saturday for the organization's annual breakfast forum. "Somebody needs to pay for this. Somebody needs to go to jail, and it shouldn't be the kids."

More on the topic of jailing Detroit's teachers

Detroit's official unemployment rate is at 17 percent, and the poverty rate in 2007 before the 2008 Wall Street heist was 33 percent. No telling what it is now. And ever since the conservatives prevailed in a 5-4 decision in the Milliken v. Bradley case in 1974, the apartheid future of Detroit schools has been sealed. Today Detroit schools have a 219 million dollar deficit.

None of this, however, seems to matter to outfits like The Skillman Foundation, a corporate non-profit tax dodge in Michigan with a 50 year history of accumlating tax credits for friends of the Ford family, all the while pushing public policies that are corporate friendly. The Foundation is a founding funder of the the Detroit Parent Network, and it was this weekend that the Network's CEO (yes, Virginia, parent groups now have CEOs) of that illustrious group, Sharlonda Buckman, called for jailing Detroit teachers, who must be to blame for the latest NAEP math scores for Detroit, which show that children in the City without Hope don't give a neighborhood rat's ass anymore about how they do on, yet, another meaningless test.

While Sharlonda doesn't seem to care about is that the corporations who pay her for her services, or the State of Michigan, or the U. S. Department of Education don't seem to have any plan to help alleviate the $219 million dollar hole in the Schools' budget or to help improve learning in the Schools. Never mind that that Skillman Foundation has almost a half billion in corporate assets (non-profit assets, of course) that they are not interested sharing to pay down the Schools' debt. What Sharlonda and her handlers are supporting is the plan to take $500 per month from each teacher's salary to bring down the budget deficit--with a promise to pay back at retirement time.

First we jail all the teachers...?

[Craftsman]

1. The 1st responsiblity of raising and education your kids belongs with you

My wife and I have sweated bullets picking a preschool for my 4 year old twins, we work with them nightly, have read to them since the first night home from the hospital.

[roguevalley]

25. When I got fifth and sixth graders who couldn't tell me the sounds of

the alphabet and who were hoodlums, some of whom I could never turn my back to -teach facing them always- then fuck that.

[madfloridian]

2. Other charter groups also form parent groups and fund them.

Green Dot charters does it for sure.

Groups formed by corporations to fight against public schools

One place to start looking at the tremendous growth of these seemingly grass-root groups of parents is in the city of Los Angeles where not only 250 schools have been given the bums rush out of the corridors of public management, but they are due to be thrown into the laps of non-profit outfits like Green Dot Public Schools or Alliance Public Schools, to name just a few. It is truly astounding, for in the case of the non-profit school systems that are emerging, these non-profit EMO’s are bent on creating a new, national retail chain of charter schools with outlets in as many states and school districts they can possibly get their hands on and their tactics are not unlike the ‘grass-root’ town hall health care meetings.

Take the group "Parents Union". Steve Barr, the originator of Green Dot Public Schools, a non-profit EMO out of LA, started Parent Union in Los Angeles a few years ago. According to a document put out by Green Dot in 2008 entitled, Green Dot Public Schools & Los Angeles Parents Union the company said they realized the urban school failure and:

Green Dot responded to this grassroots demand for change by saying, in effect, it’s not that you want a charter school per se, you simply want – and deserve – a high-quality school for the young people in your neighborhoods. Recognizing the need for parents to organize and work collectively to demand high-quality education, Green Dot formed the Los Angeles Parents Union (lapu), a citywide grassroots organization of parents that pushes educators, administrators, and public officials to improve their schools (Green Dot Public Schools & Los Angeles Parents Union, 2008

What is said to be grassroots may be more than that?

[robo50]

3. Oh Goodie! Let's all point more fingers and further demoralize the urban

educational system that is in the depths of a local DEPRESSION!!

The anti-intellectualism of the right wing tax dodgers and their spokespersons, simply amazing!

If one can't be part of the solution, one sure can compound the problem, as this idiot shows us.

[winyanstaz]

4. Parents need to step up and do their job as well...

but to jail a teacher is just plain wrong.
To fine the teachers is also wrong.
If the teacher is failing to do their job..fire them and hire another...but we cannot fire a teacher when they have so many kids in their classes that they cannot get to them all. This is the states fault...not the teachers...not the parents.
If we spent half the money we spend on wars on education we could send every kid to college.

[cornermouse]

10. Add my kids years of public school education up (1 per year)

and you're talking about a minimum of 48 teachers. I made a point of going to parent teacher conferences. Out of 48 teachers I only ever had one teacher who I thought was a problem. At least four of them immediately come to mind as exceptionally good.

The problem is not the teachers. It is the parent's fault. If the child is mentally able and the parent is following up on homework and contacting the teacher if the kids are having trouble so that you know both sides of the story and can proceed effectively with a solution, there is no reason they should be in danger of failing to learn.

[winyanstaz]

12. I agree...

All three of my sons could read and write before they ever entered school.
It was the time I took to be with them and read etc that made the difference for them.

[waiting for hope]

18. It all starts at home - I have made this comment

over and over - When I was working, the stress of having only 2-3 hours a night to get homework done, dinner on the table and baths to bedroom was enough to set me on edge because I wanted to provide everything I could for my child. For the majority of all households, both parents have to work - and I couldn't even imagine being a single parent and trying to have quality time in the early evening, especially since I have a four year old too. Teachers can't be blamed if there is a missing parent, or if there is no time at night to do what is needed.

[madfloridian]

5. And we need to remember who funds her parents' group:

"While Sharlonda doesn't seem to care about is that the corporations who pay her for her services, or the State of Michigan, or the U. S. Department of Education don't seem to have any plan to help alleviate the $219 million dollar hole in the Schools' budget or to help improve learning in the Schools. Never mind that that Skillman Foundation has almost a half billion in corporate assets (non-profit assets, of course) that they are not interested sharing to pay down the Schools' debt. What Sharlonda and her handlers are supporting is the plan to take $500 per month from each teacher's salary to bring down the budget deficit--with a promise to pay back at retirement time."

http://www.schoolsmatter.info/2009/12/detroit-parent-groups-ceo-calls-for.html

[JDPriestly]

6. If Sharlonda and other parents in Detroit talk to their children in the violent that she talked to

manner that Sharlonda spoke to that audience, then I am not surprised that the kids' test scores are low. She was hysterical.

If you want your children to do well in school, cultivate a calm, peaceful atmosphere in your home. Be patient with your children. Take lots of time to teach them things they like to do. Teach them to be patient and careful in their work. Children do not learn from scolding and hysteria. They learn from their parents' examples. If the parents are calm and analytical in approaching difficult tasks. If the parents calmly start over after failing at a task.

If the parents simply teach the child to accept defeat and difficulty in life and in work and to try harder and be more patient and careful and learn from their mistakes, then the child will do well in school. This mother needs to learn some non-violent communication.

If she is capable of homeschooling and does not feel the schools are doing a good job for her children, then she should try it. Given her personality, I suspect that after one year of homeschooling, she will have a completely different attitude toward the public schools. I'd be surprised if she has the patience to teach children much of anything.

[madfloridian]

8. Good points you made. I gather her position is a paid one...

with the Skillman Foundation of the funders. Public schools have little chance against big corporations like that, I fear.

[Fire1sKid]

7. How about we try to go back to parents actually raising their children!!!

Instead network television,ipods,video games,and music videos raise the children of today.How do you actually expect for any educator to put a solid emphasis on education to a child of the urban community when they return home,turn on the television,and look at a guy in a video with over 100k in jewelry on?READY FOR THE ANSWER (DRUMROLL).......IMPOSSIBLE!!!!!!It is up to the parents to raise their children on a solid emphasis of the importance of education and they would aspire to be major contributions to mankind.


:rant: :mad:

[cornermouse]

9. Crazy talk from Ms Buckman.

Where are the people with the white jackets when you need them? In all honesty, you couldn't pay me enough to stand in front of a classroom today. Throw in $500 fines per month and threats of jail? Who do they think they're going to get to teach their kids when all the teachers quit?

[Mithreal]

11. There's always Sunday School.

[winyanstaz]

13. Right...when all the teachers walk out....they will have a fine mess on their hands...

[liberalhistorian]

17. Whenever people ask me why I, the daughter of teachers, didn't

follow in their footsteps, I point to attitudes and articles such as this one. I grew up watching what my parents went through, how hard they worked, including evenings and weekdends (lesson plans, grading, leading activities such as yearbook, newspaper, drama, etc., etc., etc.) and how little they received in return in both compensation and respect and appreciation and how they were always blamed for everything even when their students wouldn't do their work or had parents who didn't care. NO FUCKING WAY was I EVER going to go through that. And now it's even worse, with even solid Dems attacking teachers and their unions (which greatly improved their working conditions and rights, as compared to having terrible conditions and no rights when my parents first started teaching 47 years ago), NCLB, which makes teachers responsible whether or not their students have enough to eat or are neglected/abused or have parents who don't care and don't do any work with them, etc., etc. NO THANK YOU.

[GaYellowDawg]

30. I'd like to SEE that asshole home-school her kids.

Maybe she'd get a clue.

[LisaM]

14. Wow.

Yes, I agree that a lot of it should be the parents' responsibility. But I think we also need to assess what teaching to the test is doing to the education system - this testing is insane - as well as quit giving taxpayer money to charter schools.

[madfloridian]

15. You are right. The testing is written in secrecy.

Scored in secrecy.

Yet people are being formed into groups by corporations, then agitated to work against public schools almost mindlessly.

Students are weighed and found wanting by tests made and scored secretly without regulation.

he media assume that tests are valid and accept the claims made for them. If tests say American schools are lousy (they don't but fear mongers use them that way), then it must be so.

In fact, tests are so much a part of the educational air we breathe, we probably don't think of them as needing regulation. Just like we didn't think about regulating the quality of peanut butter--until recently.

Testing often tries to put on a white hat as part of the educational enterprise, trying to help kids succeed. In reality, the test companies are as full of greed and avarice as the financial sector or any other part of the economy. We don't notice it because...there is no regulation. Test companies make enormous claims for the ways in which their products will help your kid, or your school or your district. Is there any research to back up these claims? No. Are there any sanctions for overstating what the tests can do? No. Companies are totally free to claim whatever they wish.

The relationship between those who make tests and those who use them is way too cozy. In most other industries, such relationships would be banned as sources of conflict of interest.

[kurtzapril4]

16. Re: Wow

Teaching to tests is not new, and believe me, teachers don't like it. I, as a student, don't like it. It needs to be done away with.

That being said...PARENTS need to start taking responsibility of their children's educations. Making sure they do their studying and homework. I fail to see why this is the responsibility of teachers. If a kid doesn't come to school prepared to do the work...how is it the teacher's fault?

[waiting for hope]

19. K&R

[bertman]

20. With people like Sharlonda leading the charge for the Corporate School Privatization movement

it's a wonder ANY children will get educated.

She's yelling about teachers striking. No frickin' wonder! If there are others like her exerting influence over the schools, ALL the teachers should go on strike. Let her homeschool her kids until she comes to her senses.

This is a very sad situation with parents watching their children fail to get educated, but feeling they are powerless to change it. They are ripe for corporate activists to "pick" them.

Rec.

[madfloridian]

22. We are so far down the corporate path, it looks okay to many.

Younger folks have been taught to despise teachers instead of respect them.

It did not take long.

[MessiahRp]

21. Does this remind anyone of the lady that opposed Joe Clark in Lean on Me?

That's what immediately popped in my head here.

Rp

[madrchsod]

23. putting the blame on the parents is`t the answer either

the complexity of the problem takes more than just blame to solve the problems in a city like detroit

[cornermouse]

24. It starts at home.

Putting the blame on parents is exactly where the blame should go most of the time. There are too many parents who don't teach their children to see doing well in school as their goal.

[madfloridian]

26. I am putting blame on corporately organized parent groups...

who are openly attacking public education for corporate reasons.

[madrchsod]

33. you,bill ayers, and i agree.....lol

[wolfgangmo]

27. By that logic anyone working for any Wall street bank should ...

... be in jail from now until forever.But Nooooooooooooooooo. Let's pick on the very people who are actually trying to make the world a better place for the next generation.

I am sick of the uber wealth getting away with this raping of our country. It is high time that someone did something.

[BrklynLiberal]

28. Is she pathetically misinformed or just willfully ignorant?

[Number9Dream]

29. Maybe it's the school board who belongs in jail, not teachers?

Nobody has questioned how the Detroit school district got $219 million in debt in the first place. Whoever is responsible for such mismanagement should be prosecuted.

Here in the Lehigh Valley, PA, the school districts charge astronomical school taxes for Taj Mahal schools, and have been investigated by the PA Auditor General for shady business dealings.

http://www.lehighvalleylive.com/bethlehem/index.ssf/2009/11/auditor_generals_probe_finds_s.html

It's no mystery why many tax payers are furious.

[winyanstaz]

31. If we really wanted to improve the schools and America...

We should start with throwing this twit out on her butt along with the rest of the sell-outs, corporate shills and traitors to the Constitution and to America.

[Angry Dragon]

32. She has all the answers

My suggestion is for her to go into the classroom and show everyone how it is done. If she can not do it or refuses to teach then she should just keep her mouth shut.