Public schools in this country are, by and large, swamps of miseducation. The evidence of failure is rampant, and yet we allow the “soft” lobotomizing of students to continue when amelioration would be soooo easy.
13. Require remedial education for PARENTS when their children fail to attain…
12. Objective standards in reading, math, written English.
11. Burn down “schools of education” and
10. Put education professors and remote educrats to work on chain gangs making big rocks into little rocks (as punishment for their abuse of students)
9. Vouchers.
8. Pay school administrators at minimum wage. Give them bonuses for keeping their mouths shut.
7. Introduce State and Federal politicians who want to “fix” public education (after having been one of the chief causes of its problems) to Dr. Tarr and Mr. Fether. Seriously. *heh*
6. Shoot Big Bird and all his partners in crime.
5. Eliminate “No Child Gets Ahead” (disingenuously named by politicians, “No Child Left Behind”)–the current political attempt to create the world of Harrison Bergeron as filtered through the rose colored glasses of Lake Wobegon…
4. Track students. Face it, we do NOT live in Lake Wobegon. Half of the students ARE “below average” in intellectual ability. Only a very few can benefit from a genuine university experience. But we keep insisting that kids need to prepare for college, when less than a third of them really can qualify… (and that’s part of the reasonj that colleges are now turning out students who graduate as illiterates *sigh*)
3. Fire crappy teachers. Really. Credentialitis has now laded school systems down with folks who really do make a mockery of even the old slander “Those who can, do; those who can’t, teach,” so that it is now all too often, “Those who can, do; those who can’t, can’t teach either… but they have tenure!”
2. Let each and every local school board determine what subjects will be taught, what services will be offered, what teachers will be hired and fired, without outside interference.
And the number one thing that we can do to improve public education in America is…
1. Completely, totally, absolutely and permanently extirpate ANY messing around with public education by the “feddle gummint”–including razing to the ground every office that houses Education Department educrats and their evil *heh* minions, seizing all the assets of these blood sucking parasites and putting them to work on chain gangs with their buddies, the FORMER education professors.
Now, I know some very fine teachers who teach in public schools (AKA “prisons for kids”) who do their utmost to lead the little honyocks in their care into some semblance of civilization, despite the interference of politicians, bureaucrats, administrators and parents (who are themselves, now, all too often “edu-lobotomized” products of a failing system). I am even aware of a few (yes, a few) good schools where teachers, parents, students and the rare administrator have fought the good fight against the fall of night.
But these exceptions to the rule are far too few.
And yes, I know there are other things that can be done to improve public education, but NONE of them will be done by politicians, remote educrats, professors of education or schools of education. All those segments will do is what they have done for years: create more and more ways to destroy our most precious resource.
Trackposted to the Thursday Thirteen Hub and to Outside the Beltway, Blog @ MoreWhat.com, Perri Nelson’s Website, Rosemary’s Thoughts, DeMediacratic Nation, Right Truth, Nuke’s News & Views, Shadowscope, Webloggin, The Bullwinkle Blog, The Amboy Times, Colloquium, Pursuing Holiness, Right Celebrity, Woman Honor Thyself, Gulf Coast Hurricane Tracker, and The Yankee Sailor, thanks to Linkfest Haven Deluxe.
Wow, that’s a tough one. I’d be lying if I said I didn’t agree with some of your premises…but your conclusions? nope nope nope. If it’s broke[n], it’s the public’s job to fix it….
You forgot about “teaching for the test” we really need to stop devoting 1/2 of our time teaching them what’s going to be on a test and just TEACH them. (and I mean standardized testing not regular end of the chapter testing)
This is why I homeschool…
I still remember my year and a half of public school quite vividly. I actually had one teacher who refused to sign the papers to let me test for the honors class because she didn’t like me and she told me that. And the school lunches were just as wonderful too.
Oh, I SOOOOOOO agree! Our educators are there for one another – not for the students. My daughter was in a class where the teacher refused to answer her question… continuing to say over and over, “I don’t understand your question.” Finally I complained and asked that my daughter (in an honors class) be moved to another class where the teacher was able to answer questions. i was told that she could drop the class and take no grade and then make it up later, but they wouldn’t change her simply because of the teacher. Hmmm… sounds a little backwards, doesn’t it? This teacher liked to sit on boys’ desks and let them check out her cleavage… She was fired the following year – unfortunately those students who had questions (and weren’t horny teenaged boys) were ignored for an entire year…
I wonder why so many of our kids are unprepared for college? Hmmmm
You totally forgot my personal favorite: institute a system of discipline (including physical by parental permission) which actually punishes children for inappropriate, antisocial, rude or obnoxious behavior.
That and the total elimination of political correctness as currently applied.
I figure as long as we’re dreaming, might as well go the whole way.
And yeah, Sniz. This is exactly why we bailed out too.
RY,
Didn’t exactly forget, just prioritized a bit, since I only had thirteen slots… *heh* I do think disciplining the parents first is the way to go (and yeh, punishing the parents for misbehaving kids would be a dream. Putting them in remedial classes when their kids screw up academically is a start, though :-))
Annie,
Keep in mind: nearly 2/3 of the kids don’t really need and won’t really benefit from a real college education. Most would benefit more by training for a profession (training is distinctly different to education), and of course many colleges are headed toward (or have already become) merely trades schools for white collar jobs. That’s not necessarily a bad thing BUT
1. The liberal arts stuff that’s “taught” along with the job-specific stuff is woefully inadequate at the college level… below what OUGHT to have been taught by the time the kids have left junior high, in most cases.
2. All that wasted money, time and… mindpower, simply to indoctrinate (read: “soft” lobotomize) another set of sheeple. Most four year college degrees don’t manage to teach two years’ worth of useful info to the white collar “trades” cubicle hamsters, and waste the time of those who actually could benefit from a real college education, as well. All a four year degree is really a sign of these days is that the student (or his support group) was able to tough out four meaningless years worth of crap, thus proving their ability to stick to a task (a worthy characteristic in a job applicant).
J. Lynne,
“School lunches”–does the child abuse in public schools (AKA “prisons for kids”) have no end? *heh*
Sniz,
Good on you (and RY too, of course :-))
mnm,
Well, if “the test” made any sense and actually represented useful material that students needed to learn, “teaching to the test” might have benefits. But of course, “the test” is meaningless crap. I don’t really know if public education (AKA “prisons for kids”) is really salvageable (as is evidenced from my list; how many of those items–all of which are essential to saving public education, IMO–have a snowball’s chance in hell of being implemented, short of a genuine, real life revolution?). But “just TEACH them” doesn’t work, either, since much of what is mandated as essential subject matter is crap, and many (a sadly growing number) teachers don’t even have a firm grasp of their own subject matter, let alone sound (as in, “Not recognized by faddish “schools of education”) pedagogical principles!
Damozel,
What the heck do you mean? If “…your conclusions? nope nope nope. If it’s broke[n], it’s the public’s job to fix it…. ” is addressed to my “13” then it makes no sense. Every single one of my “13” would take “public” action to implement. If the statement’s addressed to those who have decided to homeschool, then it also makes no sense. Removing their children accomplishes several purposes for the public good:
1. Places pressure on public education to address the issues that their direct involvement in public education (AKA “prisons for kids”) could not. From having been on the “inside” of prisons for kids (and having some “fifth columnists” still in those situations), I can assure you that the growing homeschool movement is causing some angst in those quarters.
2. Saves at least THEIR children from the lobotomizing process of public stupifaction, thus making possible at least some citizens in the future who can actuially, well, reasons from facts (and discover facts, make assessments of their relative value, etc.).
3. Provide examples of well-educated students, using modest resources, as opposed to the uneducated students using vast resources resulting from the enstupiation model used by public schools (AKA “prisons for kids”).