Back to Leave No Child Behind

Numerous bugs, but we don't have to identify them or any bugs in a new proposed system since that would be the "educated" thing to do. Lets just rely on faith for this one.

Fox, you frustrate the hell out of me because you refuse to look at anything in an intellectual fashion. When pushed for specifics, you state they aren't important. Well, hate to tell you this but in the real world they are DAMN important. Without specifics a project will in no way meet its desired goals or come in under budget.

It still doesn't answer my question about what "trade school" we should be sending 3rd graders to. What trade these days doesn't require at least an 8th grade reading level?

Please provide specifics about the flaws in the present system. Over 80% of our students in the US presently go to public schools and most of those go on to college and do quite well. What % of students are failing in the present system? Shouldn't we just address those failures and not throw out the 70% that are NOT failing?

Parados writes

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Numerous bugs, but we don't have to identify them or any bugs in a new proposed system since that would be the "educated" thing to do. Lets just rely on faith for this one.

One thing I learned in management school is micromanaging from the top (or from the bleachers) is almost certain to create huge mistakes. You hire the right people or experts to do the job and you get out of the way and let them do it. You call that faith. I call that good management.

P.S. Would you define 'intellectual fashion' for me? I am all ears or whatever.

The problem is not that our schools are failing. The problem is that some of our children are not learning. To leap to the assumption that schools have suddenly gotten worse ignores many facts in existence.

What specifics did I say are unimportant? We have produced 60 plus pages on this thread and I've had posts through a good deal of it. I didn't realize I had been hired to come up with a master plan here. What's my salary? Or if I, like you, are contributing impressions, ideas, concepts, possibilities, I am as qualified as most to do that. And I have. I prefer to spend my time offering impressions, ideas, concepts, and possibilities rather than spend my time trying to tear down the other guy's impressions, ideas, concepts, and possibilities. A solution presented without defining the problem is useless.

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It still doesn't answer my question about what "trade school" we should be sending 3rd graders to. What trade these days doesn't require at least an 8th grade reading level?

It boggles my mind that a cooperative effort between parents and teachers would make consigning an eight-year-old to a trade school necessary. I can handle a third grader and I don't even have a degree in elementary education. Then there is no discipline problem preventing anyone from reading at the third grade level. Is there? This only contradicts your argument that discipline is a contributing factor to children not learning. The largest problem with reading is failure to learn early I think we can all agree on that. Why else are we doing 4th grade testing? But in the very rare case a third grader was incorrigible but not yet ready for reform school or other institutionalized remedy, and the parents didn't wish to help the school help the kid, my best suggestion is the parents would be required to hire a private tutor for their kid to ensure he was proprerly educated. I think that might bring them around to seeing things sensibly pretty quickly.

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Please provide specifics about the flaws in the present system. Over 80% of our students in the US presently go to public schools and most of those go on to college and do quite well. What % of students are failing in the present system? Shouldn't we just address those failures and not throw out the 70% that are NOT failing?

I don't know what percentage of students are failing in the present system. Do you? I do know too darn many highschool graduates these days can't do much basic math, can barely read, cannot write a simple business letter, don't have a clue how to do research except on the internet, etc. Nevertheless many are quite bright and gifted in many ways. Nobody can tell me they couldn't have been educated had anybody taken the time to see that they were.

Specifics? Many specifics I have already posted, but here are some of them again:

Check Squinney's post earlier today. The stats (unspported I might add) I guess you didn't bother to follow the link I posted. you quote here are not even close. Many many school systems are not graduating 80%, much less 90% or 100% of their students these days. I never stated schools were graduating that many. You claimed near 100% from when you went to school. Here is another source that confirms my earlier source. http://www.manhattan-institute.org/html/cr_baeo.htm Parents were chased off decades ago when schools decided they wanted to form the minds of the kids all by themselves and now parents are used to being uninvolved. That situation has to change. Administrations are top heavy and bloated and siphon off huge chunks of the funding that in no way does anything about educating the children. Anecdotal evidence. Social promotions are inhumane and cruel to the students producing large numbers of highschool graduates who can't read or write well enough to adequately fill out an employment application. The public schools are dangerous places for many students and, though I have no data to prove it, You have no data to prove it but I should believe your solution will work well? Sorry, I see no reason to do that. I like facts before I throw money down a rabbit hole.I suspect this and the social promotions is a very large reason many kids just give up and leave. Rules for and/or enforcement of deportment, dress, manners, speech,and conduct is almost nonexistent for both students and faculty.

Schools waste way too much time of the school day. Ask any homeschooler who tries to get back into the public school system.
No evidence to support this, only anecdotal. Doesn't define the problem.

Mostly schools seem to see themselves as being in the business of being a school instead of being in the business of educating children. Give any skilled teacher good material and a reasonably adequate and safe environment to teach it, and kids will learn.

Well Parados, when you follow all the steps on your model for basic problem solving whenever you express an opinion on a message board, I will take it under advisement whether that would be an "intellectual fasion' or just plain dumb.

Let's start doing that with this quote, so much more 'intellectually fashioned' than my observations, okay?:

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The problem is not that our schools are failing. The problem is that some of our children are not learning. To leap to the assumption that schools have suddenly gotten worse ignores many facts in existence.

Define failure using the model for problem solving you provided. How do you know some children are not learning. How many is 'some'? Provide detailed statistics for this please. Please provide documented analysis for the facts that schools have not gotten 'suddenlyworse' as well as documentation that 'suddenly' was ever suggested. And please outline and explain all those facts in existence that have been ignored.

Or would you prefer to just be able to offer an opinion like everybody else does without being criticized for not providing it in an intellectual fashion?

Poor academic performance is the single strongest school-related predictor of dropping out (OERI Urban Superintendents Network 1987; Hess, et al. 1987; Wood 1994). The most recent Department of Education annual dropout report relates that students who repeated one or more grades were twice as likely to drop out than those who had never been held back, and those who repeated more than one grade were four times as likely to leave school before completion.
Student-related risk factors include personal problems independent of social/family background. Substance abuse, pregnancy and legal problems are frequently reported along with school-related problem behaviors such as truancy, absenteeism, tardiness, suspension, and other disciplinary infractions.

Parents play a crucial role in keeping young people in school. The degree and nature of family support are determined by such factors as a stressful/unstable home life, socioeconomic status, minority membership, siblings' completion of high school, single-parent households, poor education of parents, and primary language other than English (Horn 1992).

Lest these correlations be misunderstood, it is also important to point out that, of the community-related factors, it is poverty that is the strongest predictor of dropping out. "When socioeconomic factors are controlled, the differences across racial, ethnic, geographic, and other demographic lines blur" (OERI Urban Superintendents Network 1987, p. 5).

Higher teacher pay, lower classroom sizes and ability of private and voucher schools to choose cream of the crop teachers also gives them an edge with which public schools can't compete.

I'd like to see the status of teachers increased. Give them the respect and tools they need to do their job. Make it a noble profession again that draws top professionals.

How does Harvard draw better professors than State University? How does Duke draw better staff than Georgia Tech? Is it just by pay rate? Or, do they have higher standards for hiring?

Now Mills says raise teacher's pay, reduce class size, and improve school buildings. In my opinion that is not for the Federal government to do but for the local community or state to do depending on how your schools systems are structured.

In many, maybe most school districts, the tax payers are in full revolt mode unwilling to pump more and more money into what they perceive to be bloated administrations and a failed system.

If the schools want more parental involvement, they have to insist on it and enforce it. The parents need to feel the school is an ally and that it reinforces parental values and that the parent's input is both heard and valued. Too often these days the parents feel their values are run over and undercut by the school. That does not mean that the school should cater to every nut out there, but the school should respect the values of the community or it will be in an adversarial role and will not receive respect and support from that community.

That little backwater one horse oil patch town I grew up in? There was no preschool program and kindergarten was a luxury for a very privileged few. There was no Ritalin or other 'behavior controlling' drugs. No school psychologist. Almost all classes above second grade had 29 to 35 kids in them; a few had even more. But it was a great learning enviroment because the persistently disruptive kid was sent to the principal's office, sent home with a note from the teacher or principal, suspended, or expelled. The teacher was the captain of his or her ship, dressed professionally, commanded complete respect from the entire community, and s/he taught real subjects in interesting ways to kids who were expected to learn them. It never occurred to any of us kids that we had any rights whatsoever and we knew what was expected of us. And it was safe and secure and, for the most part, a good place to be.

Mills75 wrote:

The Hoover Institute, on the other hand, was founded specifically to develope and promote conservative ideology while sponsoring and nurturing conservative idealogues--there is no attempt whatsoever at objectivity. Any fellow at the Hoover Institute who expounded leftist ideology would quickly find him or herself out of a fellowship, and already leftist scholars are simply not hired by or awarded fellowships in the first place. In other words, the Hoover Institute is a conservative think-tank.

Have you looked at the work produced there lately? The Hoover Institute does not follow a particular line other than that stated in their mission statement, which makes it an interesting site to visit.

Also, in response to the issue of the Hoover Institute, if one can be both liberal and objective, would it not follow that one can be both conservative and objective? I think the members of the Hoover Institute would definitely think so, especially since so many of them are Libertarian, as I believe is Thomas Sowell. And you'll find some pretty impressive left-leaning members of the institute especially on the media fellows list.

Teachers are not overpaid in our area. To attract new teachers, the city/county government helps teachers buy homes in our area. Their pay would make it impossible for new teacheres to move here; starting at about $35,000/year is poverty wages in our area. The average pay is $75,000. How does our schools attract good teachers for poverty wages? To assume teachers are overpaid or the school budgets are bloated with overpaid administration doesn't understand the facts and issues of public schools. Those days are long gone; a administrator that overspends will be taken to task immediately by the superintendent of schools and the parents before anybody cries "wolf." In this climate, no administrator would last very long in their job if they are sloppy with their budget.

Mills, I have never said any teacher was overpaid. And I know my personal experience was anecdotal, but evenso it is constructive that it is possible to do a good job of educating children even with larger class sizes and less than ideal circumstances. We did quite okay with too-large class sizes, no computers, no air conditioning, no cafeteria (every kid brought his/her sack lunch in grade school), beat up desks, and not exactly state-of-the-art buildings. The fire escape was a large tunnel-like tube from a second story window to the ground. (Great fun if the playground monitor didn['t catch us crawling up it.) There can be a danger of romanticizing memories of course but I did not have a happy childhood. I nevertheless got a quite adequte education in that school system.

The tax payer revolt may not exist in your community. It does in mine as testified by the rhetoric in the newspapers and on the TV and radio and verified by repetitive votes. Some school funding initiatives do pass. An awful lot are defeated.