Get the Kids Out - 0f public school

[PaulinVA]

Okay, people, look past the hyperbole and rhetoric and answer real questions.

1. What you are advocating is creating an overlay of several school systems where there is now only one, the public school.
   A. How does the state ensure that the tax money is being spent well, and that the students from any “system” are being adequately taught?
   B. How do the poor people (literally and figuratively) left in the public school survive with the long commutes to the remaining open public schools, and a general lack of resources?
2. The creation of a huge number of private schools will create a need for administrators and teachers.
   A. There is a finite pool of teachers. The same teachers who are now teaching in the public schools will be hired by the private schools. Where’s the change or improvement in that?
   B. The administrators that are now in the public system will either shift to oversight of the various private schools or actually administer the private schools. Where’s your change there?

 

[Shin]

Okay, people, look past the hyperbole and rhetoric and answer real questions.

Those do not sound like real questions to me, they sound like fake, setup questions.

 

[buffalo]

Okay, people, look past the hyperbole and rhetoric and answer real questions.

1. What you are advocating is creating an overlay of several school systems where there is now only one, the public school.
   A. How does the state ensure that the tax money is being spent well, and that the students from any “system” are being adequately taught?
   B. How do the poor people (literally and figuratively) left in the public school survive with the long commutes to the remaining open public schools, and a general lack of resources?
2. The creation of a huge number of private schools will create a need for administrators and teachers.
   A. There is a finite pool of teachers. The same teachers who are now teaching in the public schools will be hired by the private schools. Where’s the change or improvement in that?
   B. The administrators that are now in the public system will either shift to oversight of the various private schools or actually administer the private schools. Where’s your change there?

1. It doesn’t assure it now. The feedback would come from people voting with their vouchers. If we are happy we stay if not we flee.

Bussing. Integration started bussing kids outside of their locality years ago. In addition integrate distance learning. A laptop is a lot cheaper than a teachers salary.

We would be shifting resources not creating new ones. You could have two schools competing on the very same campus.

A and B - over time the failures would be purged from the system. Failing administrators would be replaced. And there is no question whatsoever the public system has built an administrators heaven.

 

[PaulinVA]

Okay, people, look past the hyperbole and rhetoric and answer real questions.

No, they aren’t strawmen. They are real questions. Sure, they are hard to answer.

 

[Sailor_Kenshin]

The idea of a public school sounds good. In practice, well, look at what we have.

It would be much better if we could, instead, give this money to our parishes. Then they could run tuition-free parochial schools.

I realize that that will never happen, but it would be better to do it that way. I am in favor of charity and sharing. I do not think it is AT ALL helpful to involve the government. That not only puts the education in the hands of people terribly distant from the children involved, it is also a colossal waste of resources.

I like the idea. We need a lobbying group.

 

[PaulinVA]

1. It doesn’t assure it now. The feedback would come from people voting with their vouchers. If we are happy we stay if not we flee.

Do you really think the run of the mill parent is capable of evaluating a school?

Bussing. Integration started bussing kids outside of their locality years ago. In addition integrate distance learning. A laptop is a lot cheaper than a teachers salary.

My smart alack remark is that kissing in school shouldn’t be allowed anyway. Now, BUSING, was never a positive. Think of inner cities. Computers? Distance Learning?

We would be shifting resources not creating new ones. You could have two schools competing on the very same campus.

Once again, what is the problem with the current schools? How would using the same teachers and administrators solve those problems?

A and B - over time the failures would be purged from the system. Failing administrators would be replaced. And there is no question whatsoever the public system has built an administrators heaven.

How would failing administrators be purged from the system? By arbitrary and capricious decisions by a parents’ panel at the school? Yeah, people will want to work in that environment.

This whole idea of a market-based economy in the school system won’t work. Market-based forces don’t work in the public sector, unless it’s tightly controlled. Well, tightly controled and market based are the antithesis of each other.

 

[Joseph_L_Varga]

Okay, people, look past the hyperbole and rhetoric and answer real questions.

1. What you are advocating is creating an overlay of several school systems where there is now only one, the public school.
   A. How does the state ensure that the tax money is being spent well, and that the students from any “system” are being adequately taught?
   B. How do the poor people (literally and figuratively) left in the public school survive with the long commutes to the remaining open public schools, and a general lack of resources?
2. The creation of a huge number of private schools will create a need for administrators and teachers.
   A. There is a finite pool of teachers. The same teachers who are now teaching in the public schools will be hired by the private schools. Where’s the change or improvement in that?
   B. The administrators that are now in the public system will either shift to oversight of the various private schools or actually administer the private schools. Where’s your change there?

A partial answer:

Not the state, but rather I the parent will ensure that my money is spent wisely and my child gets a good education. I trust myself more with taking proper care of this than I trust the state.

If private schools will suck away the best teachers, so be it. If magnet schools within the public school system do it, all the better. Anything that creates competition, a real incentive for academic achievement, and exposes the corrupt nature of the present system, would be welcome. Hopefully it will also provide better opportunities and more recognition to teachers who excel in their profession.

The expansion of private schools will lower the price and give an opportunity to more poor kids for a good education. Same for magnet schools. More magnet schools with a competitive admission would provide more opportunities to poor children who take school seriously.

 

[buffalo]

Do you really think the run of the mill parent is capable of evaluating a school?

My smart alack remark is that kissing in school shouldn’t be allowed anyway. Now, BUSING, was never a positive. Think of inner cities. Computers? Distance Learning?

Once again, what is the problem with the current schools? How would using the same teachers and administrators solve those problems?

How would failing administrators be purged from the system? By arbitrary and capricious decisions by a parents’ panel at the school? Yeah, people will want to work in that environment.

This whole idea of a market-based economy in the school system won’t work. Market-based forces don’t work in the public sector, unless it’s tightly controlled. Well, tightly controled and market based are the antithesis of each other.

Yesirree I do. Parents are the first teachers. I will pick parents over elitist educators any day.

Then teachers who don’t want to work in that environment should leave. ( let them get a job in the real world) Teaching students should be their first priority. Their boss is the parents.

 

[Joseph_L_Varga]

This whole idea of a market-based economy in the school system won’t work. Market-based forces don’t work in the public sector, unless it’s tightly controlled. Well, tightly controled and market based are the antithesis of each other.

Market-based forces such as competition and a quest for excellence are successfully employed in the colleges and universities of the USA, and in the public school systems of other countries.

 

[pnewton]

Do you really think the run of the mill parent is capable of evaluating a school?

Not being an elitist, most definitely!

We should not live in an oligarchy. We even allow everyone to vote for the highest office in the land! You do not know how frightening you statement is. Parents should have children, but since they lack the intelligence to raise them, let the State do it. Let us just reduce the masses to the level of cattle and breed so that we can train them.

 

[buffalo]

Not being an elitist, most definitely!

We should not live in an oligarchy. We even allow everyone to vote for the highest office in the land! You do not know how frightening you statement is. Parents should have children, but since they lack the intelligence to raise them, let the State do it. Let us just reduce the masses to the level of cattle and breed so that we can train them.

Mother Government is the only capable one.

 

[PaulinVA]

Not being an elitist, most definitely!

We should not live in an oligarchy. We even allow everyone to vote for the highest office in the land! You do not know how frightening you statement is. Parents should have children, but since they lack the intelligence to raise them, let the State do it. Let us just reduce the masses to the level of cattle and breed so that we can train them.

I never said that. I never said that parents don’t know how to raise their children.

I said that evaluating a school, and evaluating teachers, is more complicated than just “Teacher A” gives too much homework or “Administrator B” doesn’t let kids have bathroom breaks in between classes. It’s more complicated than looking at test scores.

Elected school boards decide policy. In the trenches, administrators, professional educators, work out the implementation details. You insult educators when you suppose that you can do their job with no training and no expertise.

 

[pnewton]

You insult educators when you suppose that you can do their job with no training and no expertise.

It would not be the first time. However, it is not the competence I question in public educators as much as the motives. I also deem it to irreleevant if the school board could do a better job than the parent. The parent still has the absolute right.

No doubt there are many whose knowledge of politics leaves them unable to make a good choice for president. They stiill got their chance to vote.

What you said was:

Do you really think the run of the mill parent is capable of evaluating a school?

If that is no elitist, I do not know what is. You live too close to D.C

 

[PaulinVA]

If that is no elitist, I do not know what is. You live too close to D.C

Did you really just end your argument with an ad hominem attack? Oh, well.

I didn’t say that a parent can’t decide how to educate their child, such as public versus private versus homeschooling. I meant that in the context of creating multiple school systems or charter schools or whatever it is you are advocating, parents with no formal training will be influencing educational decisions for children. Educators will be forced to do what is popular, to boost enrollment, instead of what is right.

I’m not sure what the overall answer is, but anarchy is not it.

 

[sanctamaria17]

What you said was:
If that is no elitist, I do not know what is. You live too close to D.C

I live right in DC! Geez, way to slam the whole MD/DC/VA contingent on CAF! Is that what we call charitable on this site?

Gosh, someone has a differing opinion on something that consists of neither absolute doctrine nor the teachings of the Church and we’re all fighting over who gets salvation because of it?

OK, some people want vouchers, some people like public school. But as for, I’m not paying for someone else’s education, what do you think your tithes go to? If I’m not mistaken, I believe parish tithes go to the upkeep of a Catholic school?

I know I’d rather my tax dollars go to education than abortion!

 

[pnewton]

Did you really just end your argument with an ad hominem attack? Oh, well.

Acrually sanctamaria17 got it right. It was not ad hominem, but rather a swipe at the federal government, which most here, even those educatied in private schools, know is the capital of the U.S.

I am not alone in considering Washington to be the black hole in the space of commons sense. I truly did not mean it to reflect on those living in Virginia, or even Maryland, but rather on my lack of confidence in our federal government to so anything except try and control us poor masses.

 

[PaulinVA]

I am not alone in considering Washington to be the black hole in the space of commons sense. I truly did not mean it to reflect on those living in Virginia, or even Maryland, but rather on my lack of confidence in our federal government to so anything except try and control us poor masses.

There’s a reason a river separates Virginia from the District, and it isn’t to keep us out.

I think you are giving government workers way too much credit for initiative and coordination.

 

[pnewton]

There’s a reason a river separates Virginia from the District, and it isn’t to keep us out.

I think you are giving government workers way too much credit for initiative and coordination.

Now* that* was funny.

FYI, my in-laws live outside Fairfax and I get them a hard time too. I love the North Virginia country-side.

 

[PaulinVA]

Now* that* was funny.

FYI, my in-laws live outside Fairfax and I get them a hard time too. I love the North Virginia country-side.

I am surprised that people feel the way they do about the public schools, quite frankly. Fairfax County schools aren’t as vaunted as they used to be, due to the standardized tests (Standards of Learning) killing any innovation, but my experience is not that bad.

If my system, which is rather affluent, has trouble, I can’t imagine how others in other places are surviving. That said, I can’t see how fragmenting the public money can actually do any good.

 

[pnewton]

That said, I can’t see how fragmenting the public money can actually do any good.

Because money does not solve problems caused by poor goals. If academic education was the only goal of public schools, I truly would not have a problem with them. Nor would they struggle if they focused on this one objective.