Re: Blech!!!!


"Zeke" <yashkamash@xxxxxxxx> wrote in message
news:cb2dnUhQW8msSPvZnZ2dnUVZ_sGdnZ2d@xxxxxxxxxxxxxx
Sorry to everyone for turning a celebration thread into a downer.

On the other hand, thanks to billy and Gully for their thoughtful,
educational posts. Good discussion is, after all, the reason I come here
day after day.

Personally, we're lucky parents. No worries about our kids. But it is
frustrating, and depressing, to watch our HS drift towards state
intervention (yes, it's already been threatened). And it's quite
irritating to know that your own kid is capable of so much more, but is
not being challenged at school. This is especially true when you know the
type of education being offered at schools in other states. The bottom
line: our kids are not given the kinds of opportunities or resources that
prepare them for the best colleges. We don't have kids at our HS moving
on to Stanford, or Harvard, or Princeton, or Yale, or even to Berkeley
(and we're a Cali school). It's just not reality at our HS. Parents try
and fill some of the gaps at home, but we're not educators so we really
don't know what to do. Besides, when the Admissions office at these
schools see our HS name on the student's application, well... they know
what kind of education the kid got, and even straight A's and a great SAT
ain't gonna do it because of the HS attended.

Our principal is the most dedicated, hard working, inspirational person
around and she's really made a difference in the short time she has been
here. She tried her best to get these teachers to wake up and vote out
the block schedule, but they voted to keep it anyway. She's frustrated,
as are a lot of parents right now.

There's no denying that our test scores have dropped bigtime since the
block was implemented 8 years ago. And it's not because demographics have
changed. Years ago, they closed the HS on the poor side of town and moved
the kids from those neighborhoods to our school. But that was 20 years
ago now. This drop in test scores has been more recent. I suppose it's
possible that our poor side of town has gotten poorer and even less
educationally aggressive over the past few years, but I don't think that's
it. I think - as do others - it's the block schedule.

Regarding tests taken in September, billy's right, you wouldn't take a
STAR test in September. However you might take an SAT or an ACT test;
especially if it's a 2nd or 3rd shot. Now, if your last math or science
class ended the prior December and it's been 9 months since you've done a
math or science problem, then you're at an obvious disadvantage.

Mainly, I'm just depressed by the 3rd world-like state of education in
Cali. We are what... 40th out of 50 now? Worse? We used to be #1. This
is the state with more business & technology than most countries, yet our
schools are a absolute national disgrace.

When I read about parents living in the REAL world - especially back East
where education is such a priority - it really pisses me off. Not towards
the people back East, but towards the politicians and educators of this
state, the people who've let it go to ***. Because when I moved out here
and bought my house I thought I was doing something GOOD for my kids.
Given the price of real estate out here, and the school district that I
specifically bought my house in, I sure as hell never dreamed that they
would be attending an "underachieving" high school.


I don't think you've any need to apologize...just about every concern you
brought up is a valid concern, one worthy of discussion.
I don't mean to sound at all patronizing or condescending...if anything,
just the opposite...but it's kind of refreshing to read what you've written
from a parent's point of view.
Yeah, my colleagues and I (both within my district, along with colleagues
from other districts, both in California and in other states) have spent
many an hour hashing out these
very same matters/concerns. It's good to know that we're not the only ones
that worry about such items as what you've brought up.
In the end, if it's only those of us in the education biz that talk about
these things, then there really isn't a hope in Hell that things will get
better.
As I've said before, we only get students for six hours a day, 180 days a
year...the rest of the world has these children for the remaining 18 hours a
day (as well as weekends, holidays and vacations).
And, really, there's only so much that can get done within a six hour chunk
of time.

For sure, I can understand your feeling more than a little disillusioned
about moving to an area where you expect the school system to be a sound
one.
I know that one of the factors that led me to leave V-Town for Benicia was
the quality of the secondary schools.
Yeah, I wound up paying at least a third more for our monthly mortgage
payment...but that same money would have otherwise gone towards putting our
daughters in private schools.
As is, there came peace of mind from knowing that they were in a school
district where student achievement was pretty high...as well as incidents of
random student violence being pretty low.
It's nice to be able to afford to pick and choose in such a manner, but
unfortunately not everyone who lives in California has that luxury.
And that's something that can set my blood boiling.
After all, in Oakland (a district that's been taken over by the state for
failing to be fiscally solvent) the parents have been very involved and very
vocal...to the point where the state-appointed head of their school system,
Randy Ward, has just walked away from parent/community forums that he's held
when parents voice their concerns. It got to the point where his forums and
school board meetings got so heated that he felt the need to hire a
bodyguard after a parent voiced something that he perceived as a threat (in
actuality, the parent was making a general comment about the senseless and
random nature of school violence that has infiltrated so many of that city's
schools). Still, these aren't always or all that often the most affluent
parents...but they care enough to voice their concerns and speak out.
And I see no reason why their children should be denied every bit as quality
an education as those who live in more prosperous areas of California....
I swear, I think there is the makings for a lawsuit along the lines of Brown
versus the Board of Education when one looks at the glaring and varied
inequities of what we'd deem "quality" education
from city to city in California. Even where I live, all one has to do is
drive five miles to see the pretty profound difference of those who have and
those who have not.

While your take on block-scheduling is not something that I'd be quick to
dismiss (I know as many teachers/parents who hate this form of scheduling as
those who find merit in it), I think there is probably more at play than
just that. Over the course of working as an educator in Vallejo for over a
decade I've seen the decline in test scores...and the growing amount of
excess baggage/needs with which students enter the classroom. A class-size
of 20 is now starting to feel what a class-size of 32 felt like a decade or
so ago. Nowadays, though, it's not at all unusual to have students come in
who've not eaten a meal since the last free lunch served at school (purely
anecdotal...but at my previous school site we had a pair of students whose
parents would regularly get takeout chicken...and wouldn't even share it
with their own children, telling them to wait until they came to school to
eat). I've got kids who are in the middle of contentious custodial battles
and divorces...and their minds are, understandably, often a million miles
away from what's going on in the classroom. Add to that the ever-growing
number of more gratifying distractions from academics: video games, Ipods,
myspace.com, text-messaging...and the list goes on and on...and it's often
hard to compete with these things when having to teach what can often be
pretty dry material. On top of this...and this may ring true for your son's
school...there seems to be a large number of parents who are abandoning the
public school system (and I can't say that I blame them), scurrying to get
their children into private schools where it's pretty much a given that
parents are going to be active, academic expectations are going to be high
(and if those expectations aren't met, then they have the folks who run such
schools can show the parents/student the exit door) and there will be a zero
tolerance for disciplinary problems or student violence. So, a lot of
California's brightest and highest skilled students are testing remarkably
well...and performing wonders academically...they're just not doing so in a
public school setting. Then to top off the top, there is also a noticeable
exodus of families leaving California, since it grows increasingly more and
more expensive to live here...and the opportunities for solid/lucrative jobs
just isn't quite what it was a decade or so ago.

Man, I thought this was something that was plaguing cities/districts such as
Vallejo, Oakland, Richmond, Los Angeles and such. Not even. While riding
BART over to the Springsteen show last May, I sat with a couple on their way
to the show. It wound up that the wife was the Assistant Superintendent of
Schools in Orinda (which is a pretty affluent community). She was filled
with stories of woe about the huge number of families that were leaving
California for greener pastures. Orinda was one of the last places in the
Bay Area where I expected to hear of such woes...

Bottom line, education is a mess in California...and there really aren't any
easy answers or quick-fix remedies to make it better. Intervention programs
that are designed to meet the needs of the lowest performing students often
result in the highest skilled students getting the short end of the stick.
The No Child Left Behind legislation has pretty much forced every student to
be molded into a like student...and this often works out as well as trying
to make a square peg fit into a round hole. As is, vocational training is
becoming a thing of the past as a result of the lofty (no...make that nearly
impossible) goals set by NCLB. Not every student is cut out for
college...and there's no crime in that. But it is something of a crime to
do away with vocational ed...hell, it's often these very classes that
motivate a student to get out of bed and come to school each day. Within
our own district, those classes have pretty much been done away with. Our
district went so far as to lay off a high school teacher who'd been doing a
remarkable job of teaching wood-shop for 20+ years in Vallejo (and, when you
think about it, it takes a special breed of cat whose willing to work with
electric saws and other sharp tools with a bunch of students who are
teenagers). Our district offered this guy a job teaching remedial English
or Math courses, provided that he was willing to go back to school so he'd
be deemed "qualified" for the job. Something tells me that he's going to
pass on this offer....

And, as you mention, you and your better half take an active interest in
your child's academic success......and as students progress with each year,
this becomes harder and harder to sit down and help a child with his/her
school work. I'm the first to admit that my mind draws a blank when one of
the daughters comes up to me with a high school Algebra or Geometry problem
that they can't figure out...and the only saving grace is that the missus
remembers a lot of this stuff from 20+ years ago. Yeah, I can help them
with essays or history...but, still. So, I think we're in a similar boat
when it comes to taking an active interest...but having a lot of the
material that's being taught/learned seem as distant as something that was
revealed to us a few lifetimes ago. Imagine the impossible task that must
bring to well-meaning and well-intentioned parents who've not even been
exposed to much of the curriculum that's taught in schools nowadays. To say
that they find themselves feeling frustrated would be putting it a bit too
charitably...helpless would probably be a more appropriate word to use. And
that always kills me alive to see parents who want to be supportive and
helpful towards their children's success in school...but just don't have the
tools or the means to do so (save for being interested and being
concerned...which in itself is a blessing compared to the indifference that
a lot of parents have towards such matters).

And when it comes to that kind of indifference....well, sometimes I have to
take a step back and realize that I'm not walking in the same shoes as a lot
of these parents. I know a good many mothers and fathers (and grandmothers
and grandfathers) who are raising these children by their lonesome. Often
they work more than one job, leave the house before the sun rises and don't
return until after the sun sets. Yeah, it gnaws at a lot of us when parents
take the attitude that it's entirely up to the schools to ensure that their
children receive a sound education. On the other hand, if someone's working
12 to 16 hours a day, I can also understand how and why they might feel that
they've done all that they can do by providing a roof, clothing and food for
their children.

Every year, at the start of the school year or whenever I get a new student
into my classroom, I always give out my home telephone number and my email
address so that I can be easily reached by a parent. In the past I've
gotten calls from parents worried about their children being bullied on the
playground to more mundane matters (such as wondering/worried about whether
or not their children are eating lunch when at school). This year I've been
bowled over by the number of calls/emails that I've received from parents
who've expressed concerns over their children's academic performance.
On the one hand, this is a welcome change of pace (compared to whether or
not J---- ate his oranges that were packed in his lunch). On the other
hand....damn...I can't remember my parents feeling that same degree of worry
when I was a mere child of eight. It's encouraging to have parents take an
active role and concern over such matters...and I get the feeling that they
want to intervene while they are still able to help their children (after
all, assisting/tutoring their children in 3rd grade math is a hell of a lot
easier than trying to do same when that same child is a senior in high
school and is struggling with Calculus or Trigonometry...). So, that part
makes me feel hopeful....and, given the dire straits that California's
schools are in...I find that I kind of live for those now and then glimmers
of light and hope.
Bottom line...our schools are a mess...and I've got a queasy feeling that
they're only going to get worse before they get better.

Alright..enough rambling from me on this matter...but thanks for bringing
these things up. For as much a mess as California's schools might be in, I
think they'd be a bit better if there were more parents out there to express
the concerns that you brought to the table.






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