School Daze

Scenario: Your public school child is gloriously flunking every subject he has, including phys ed.

What to do?

. Do you call his school and ask for a parent-teacher conference with all his or her teachers? Nah, you can’t do that, work schedule and all, and besides it won’t do any good, what could they tell you that you didn’t already know?

. Do you sit down with Johnny or Janey–or Juan or Juanita, or Shaquille or Shaniqua–and read him or her the riot act and threaten to seize his or her cell phone, iPod, TV, pick one or more? Nah, Johnny or Shaniqua would rebel and pout and not talk to you for a week.

. Do you pull your child out of that school and place him in another school? Nah, are you kidding? Kids are locked into whatever school they’re told to attend, or not attend if they’re not in an attending mood.

. Do you find a private or parochial school and enroll the flunker there? Nah, that would cost an arm and a leg and maybe a kidney and you can’t afford it.

President Obama knows exactly what to do when Juan and Juanita and enough of their fellow students were flunking: Fire every teacher, principal, assistant principal, social worker, secretary, security guard, custodian, anyone who has caused the failure of your bright, hard working, and cooperative child.

They did just that up at Central Falls High School in Rhode Island: http://bit.ly/bm3wNf

Literally enforcing provisions of George W. Bush’s No Child Left Behind, NCLB, program for failing schools, the powers that be fired the entire staff, administration, and ancillary personnel of CFHS because that action would presumably alleviate the problem of grossly-underperforming students.

The unstated premises of those firings are that the school board knows what it’s doing, that a change of atmosphere, teachers, and administration will inspire the student population to excel or at least pass their courses.

It also presupposes that pigs can dance and turtles can sing. . .
(Read more at http://www.genelalor.com/blog1/?p=1537)