Re: OT: CA Libs Tell Parents They Have No Right To Educate Their Children!!!

On Sat, 8 Mar 2008 12:01:38 -0500, "MZ" <mark@xxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:

"McDuck" <wallyDELETEMEMcDuck@xxxxxxxxxxx> wrote in message
news:vm95t35eriv6fnk65m2o0tpmmj0r7oip13@xxxxxxxxxx
I have no problem with your critique, except the pat about the
parent's most basic right --- where did that right come from? You
accept the basic notion that the state has obligations to see that
kids get a decent education. The rest is implementation.

By virtue of the fact that they're a parent, and that the term has more
connotation to it than "one who spits out a kid." Our society doesn't seem
to have a problem with the notion that parents are to parent (verb) in
whichever way they choose, assuming that there isn't some kind of abuse
going on. Well, actually, we do allow a little bit of physical and mental
abuse, but that's another story. But for some reason, education has a
special permit that circumvents all that. We don't care much if parents are
cold to their children, or if they're teaching them shitty values, or if
they're shoving three kinds of drugs down their throat because their emo
story is scary to them,or if they let them sit on myspace for literally 12
hours a day. But if they're not teaching kids about Constantinople and the
cube root of 27 and having hygeine classes, then we flip out. That's
apparently when it's time for the state to step in? Doesn't make any sense.

I think that there is some level of concern about poor parenting, but
we also have no good means for fixing the problem, other than doing a
small bit through the schools. The schools do give us some window into
the home and some limited opportunity to detect abuse. Lots of schools
are not very good, of course. We suffer from Galbraithian public
poverty in the country (as in many others). Teachers are under paid
for what they are expected to do, although, as you note, some are not
particularly qualified and may be over paid for what they actually do.
Not an easy problem to fix, although some twons have fine pubic
schools, including the town I live in (but not the town I grew up in
<g>).



I'd like the program implemented in the best way possible, with
minimal interference with parents making reasonable efforts to
actually educate their kids. Don't know much about what is actually
happening in the field, so to speak. I don't particularly like the
idea that kids are being deprived by their parents of a decent
education b/c the parents don't want the kids to learn about
evolution, or other bedrocks of science.

You won't get an argument from me about the screwy rationale some parents
choose to use when they decide to homeschool. I'm not terribly fond of the
lack of diversity (intellectual and social) that often accompanies
homeschooling in the name of religion. And I certainly don't like the idea
that they're essentially teaching falsehoods and poor reasoning to kids.

But what measure are you using to describe schools as "decent education"?
We box up these kids for 12+ years. Look at the outcome of your typical
graduate. I think you're glorifying a system that, fundamentally, is
inefficient and really only serves those who are incapable of teaching their
own kids and don't have the means to pay someone else to do it.


Not meaning to glorify anything. I was speaking aspirationally.


You overgeneralize, to be sure, about people with education degrees.
There actually is a lot to be learned about how to teach. I certainly
don't deny that many programs are weak and some of the students are
weaker. You didn't mention it, but I'd add that there is some
unfortunatel politics to the requirements.

Well, sure. But I've had a good look at the behind-the-scenes of the
schooling system to know what I'm talking about. And yes, whenever talking
about huge groups of people all you can do is generalize. There are a lot
of brilliant teachers out there. I know some myself. I shouldn't have to
issue that disclaimer though.

Not my point. I don't begrudge generalizations. My point is that
"education" as a subject is not nonsense. There is a lot of learning
on what works and what doesn't, how to motivate. How to present
materaials and involve the student to aid in the learning process. I'm
not objecting to your claims that the degree is often nonsense. Not my
area, really.


This isn't a popular thing to say, but there are a lot of people who
graduate from college with bull*** degrees. Education is one of them. We
usually try to hide from that fact. I don't know, maybe some of us are
afraid that our own degrees will be called into question. If you ever want
a good laugh, spend some time in some of the classes that they teach to
master's students in education. There are plenty of teachers out there who
went through that bull***, went on to be terrific with kids and teaching
them things, etc, and all those classes did for them was get the state off
their backs.


That said, if the state is to exempt kids from the compulsory
education rules because their parents claim to be running their own
"school" for their kids, it ought to have some system for determining
whether the parents are competent for that task. Happy to have someone
fix the system for accrediting teachers. A problem, I concede. But
THAT is the problem, not its application to parents claiming to run
their own private school to avoid the compulsory education laws.

They make that claim not because they necessarily want to emulate a school,
but simply so that they can make their kids exempt from the law.

Fine, but THAT is the claim, and, without it, they are not exempt. So
it is quite proper for the state to see that it is not just a cover
story for avoiding the law.


But anyway, I think the state is faced with a difficult task if they're
going to try to determine whether parents are competent in raising their
children before they even get a crack at it. For some reason we view
education as separable from the rest of growing up, which is really an
absurd idea. This is probably because we've become accustomed to having
home-life and school-life with very little mixture between the two of them.
So the state is going to decide whether or not parents can teach their
children how to learn, how to reason, how to be good people, and how to live
life. How do they do that? Well California is taking the step towards
solving that issue by requiring that they have a state certificate that
requires a college degree -- as if that somehow makes me capable of being a
parent and imparting knowledge to children. Dammit, that outlook is half
the problem with the entire system right there.

Not really. Of course, it is impractical for the state to determine of
parents are competent at raising their kids. Silly to even talk about
it at current funding levels, but I'm not sure that more bodies in the
filed would help. We have no criteria for judging failure, other than
two --- abuse and no education. So the focus is on those two. And
those are the two for which there seems to be decent public support.
But I think you are stretching when you suggest that California is
trying tosolve the poor parenting problem with state certificates. It
is simply trying to root out sham home schools (or so it seems to me,
from a great distance).


Compulsory education came in at a time when many parents could not
even read. The world has changed, and adaption is good. By the way,
education historically has been primarily a state (not federal)
function. I'd not want to see the federal government involved in
monitoring home schooling.

Neither would I. Although I imagine that's probably obvious...


Yes, I would imagine so. But you did start off talking about rights,
and, in our system, rights seem to flow from the federal down. That
is, most of what people talk about as right are from the amendments,
or from the amendments as later incorporated into state law by the
feds or by copycat constitutions. And "rights" are often just a way of
stating certain limits on state power, usually claiming a federal
source. I think "some" interference with parenting is essential to
protect children, but that interference should come at the lowest
possible level of government IMHO b/c such interference can become
nothing more than an effort at government control, etc.
.

Loading