Parental Perspectives on Public Education (A lighter thread)

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Hello all,

I would like to ask what your opinions are (particularly parents) on school vouchers and public schools?

Also, what would you do to improve the public school system?
 
I feel a lot of this is very local-area dependent.

I’ve been a public school teacher and my eldest is registered for public kindergarten in the fall. There are only a couple concerns I have about curriculum, but I feel confident that these can be addressed reasonably and they are several years away. The district we live in is solid academically and has involved parents, but it’s not (as far as I’ve seen and heard) a super competitive crazy place, and emphasis is on community and neighborhood. There’s some ways that can go wrong, but I think it’s great for the elementary level.

As a former teacher I believe the strength and weakness of any school is how much the community of students and their families care about it. (Larger districts can have problems with this because decisions are so far removed - I am not sure I like county-wide districts although I can understand eliminating so much administrative overhead in favor of (hopefully) retaining teachers and support staff.)
 
Do you think with large districts, the issues can be balanced by having parent-teacher councils or family advisory boards at the school level?

And could it be possible for schools to counteract any community problems through the schools, military academies and safe, quality public boarding schools or simply a positive close-knit, family oriented campus culture (nurtured by experiened, veteran teachers and committed administrators) come to mind.
 
The only way to improve a public school system is to participate in school board meetings. If there is something wrong going on, address it with a solution instead of a complaint and you get a lot further. Districts where the community, parents, and local businesses are involved tend to be a lot better.
 
Public schools aren’t inherently bad.

Every family has specific reasons why they want to go public, private, homeschool, etc. A lot of people are okay with school choice.

I would hate a county-wide system just because last year we were in a larger school district and hated the bureaucracy and culture of the district. Bigger doesn’t mean better.

I love our new district. Not because it’s smaller, but because the teachers and administration really took the time to answer our questions about our son’s IEP. (He has some learning challenges).

Good people can be bad educators. I knew that they cared, but they also didn’t like people asking questions either.

It really depends on the district how relationships are cultivated.

While ours is a great system, you go down to Detroit and their schools are in a fiscal mess; a lot of the buildings are awful; the teachers have to worry about being paid and whether they have supplies for the kids. Then, they wonder why parents look for alternatives in the suburbs.

It’s just a really sad situation because (in a lot of cases) the kids need more resources than what the school is able to provide (emotional and physical), then you have the grown ups behaving badly and/or just not caring about their jobs. The latest scandal is that some of the higher ups were embezzling money. This comes out a couple of weeks after the teachers had a “sick out” and were asking the state for more money.

And the irony is that a few of Detroit’s schools are really solid, quality schools, but the district as whole brings their reputation down.

All I’m saying is that these things work both ways.

The district we’re in serves people from 4 small towns/townships and the parts of 2 larger ones. Two of the small towns are in a different county. We have a good thing going and I’d hate to see it broken up.
 
John Taylor Gatto, a former public school teacher who won many teaching awards in New York, has written a lot of interesting things about the defects of our public education system, not so much about the successes/failures of individual schools or districts, but about the flaws inherent in the system and the philosophies and people that guided the creation of our modern education system. His writing is can be a real eye opener. I’ve found some of his books at our local public library.
 
I predict that catholic schools will receive some kind of funding to make Catholic schoolaffordable for all, and catholics will love the solution… Sadly,I predict this to happen about 6 months after our youngest graduates from high school.😛
 
It really depends on the school.

I went to public school until Grade 10, when I transferred to a Catholic school. I was lucky to be able to attend a Catholic school that had both high academic standards and solid Catholic teaching.

My concerns with public school are the ones many Catholic parents have: teachings that are often directly contrary to ours and the fact that there is basically no room for God in the system. I also have concerns locally with the level of educational standard that some schools offer…it seems watered down compared to the level offered at Catholic school. (i.e. I went from an A-B student to a B-C one for a while at Catholic school because I was far behind the other students from being in the public system,despite the fact I had been a good student.).

That said…some public schools are very good, and some Catholic ones don’t have the greatest standards. Some Catholic schools are also seemingly focused on being elitist and exclusive, and charge sky-high tuition and seem to have lost their Catholic values. My sister went to one like that, she got good teaching on social justice but that was about it. We had kids coming from Catholic junior high to my school that didn’t know basic prayers , the rosary, etc. It was pretty appalling.

I recommend touring a few schools and talking to teachers to see what the best fit for your child is, and your budget.

I plan to send my daughter to Catholic school, but am going to talk to/visit a couple to make sure they are appropriate. Some are “Catholic” in name only, sadly.

Ps. What is a school voucher? I haven’t heard of that in Canada…
 
School vouchers sound like a good thing. Helping the poor to pay for a school of their choice is very laudable. The issue I take with vouchers and why I am against them is that vouchers as implimented, force the accepting school to certain conditions. In our state, one accomodation a school must make when they agree to accept voucher money is to allow a child to not participate in any religious practices. Say you have a school that mandates daily mass as part of the curriculum, a voucher paying student would be allowed to skip that part of the school day. (Having a child attend mass with his class is not forcing sacraments, but having them part of the class and the beauty that is the mass.) Mass can be counted in the “hours” of class instruction. When the state deteremines what is and is not part of class instruction, the state has stepped too far into a private school.

It’s the camel’s nose poking into the tent. How far do you let the government in? How much can they dictate when the “allow” voucher money to be spent in private schools?

Public school? As with any school, it is only as good as the teacher your child has. I do tend to think the bigger the school the worse it is. It’s not so much class size but the school size that can lose a kid. If there are 50 kids trying out for the play, why should I try out? But if there are only 5 kids trying out I might have a shot! It’s easier for a kid to be involved when the school is small than when it is large. Being actively involved in school is a big indicator of a child’s success in school.
 
mommy_k said:
I predict that catholic schools will receive some kind of funding to make Catholic schoolaffordable for all, and catholics will love the solution… Sadly,I predict this to happen about 6 months after our youngest graduates from high school.😛
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:rotfl:

True!
 
MomaMary8 said:
:rotfl:

True!
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Yes hubby and I heard of a concept called retirement…we have no idea what it is as we have spent all our money sending our kids to catholic school;)

But our kids are great-so no complaints here.
 
Public schools (and school in general) are only as good as the families behind the scenes working for the good of the school. This is resulting in the biggest separation of economic classes. The quality of schools is dependent upon your neighbor’s and your address. I have a close friend who live 5 minutes from me, and her school would be poor rated, or bus her child far away. She moved. Now her child is in the top rated elementary school in the state. However, the principal had to leave due to a scandal. The mothers who made this school amazing have moved on to middle and high school. Time will tell if a blend of principle and parents can maintain this schools reputation. Meanwhile, I see our school as the upcoming big place because of an outstanding principle and out-of-the-ballpark parents who would do anything for their children.

I watched the movie, “Waiting for Superman” which is a movie about the public school systems. The school systems (public and private) are failing in bringing a futuristic working class from the schools. It also made clear to me what happened to me in my school career; which I floundered at. I was raised by my dad. He didn’t do all the reading, writing, and math that the other parents probably did. This resulted in me getting stuck in the “temporary classrooms” (trailers) to catch up on RRR. From day one, I was always ten steps behind. Finally, when I got sent to a boarding school (whoops, my bad) did I finally catch up. I can now see the trail of failed teachers I got from my kindergarten achievements. This was in a quality public school. Now, I shutter to think what happens to children who live in lesser neighborhoods. They probably start at where I was classified as low achievement and move down from there.

What does this do for separation of economic classes? We have seen forced opportunities in housing, jobs, and schools. It comes down to family? Who’s your family? When your family is affluent, stable, and have opportunity then the blessings are passed to close family. When there is trial and hardship, they are able to protect and weather the situation. At the opposite end we have economic classes which are classified as segregated. Why? Well, if a person from a segregated community breaks through and moves up, they have little family/ethnic bond to help maintain them there. It also natural that they would want to surround themselves with family and friends. This has some return to their grass roots, and not rise as high and forgo the school opportunities of another school districts.

What can possibly help neighborhood’s that do not have the quality principals and parents? It seems to me that the parents need more resources to make their area’s better. Churches might collectively unite to provide addition resources (child care, adult schooling, child schooling) to the poorest of their dioceses. Since the population migrates, dioceses need to have some flexablity in going with the migration of the poor.
 
Morality is widespread. The morality inside a public school is a highly interesting topic from Rome.
 
RCIAGraduate said:
Hello all,

I would like to ask what your opinions are (particularly parents) on school vouchers and public schools?

Also, what would you do to improve the public school system?
Click to expand...
I homeschool. I think vouchers are a bad idea. It is all of our collective responsibility to contribute to the education of the children in our society.

As for improving the schools. That is simple yet hard. Pick ONE curriculum/ approach and stick with it. The way it is now every time new politicians get in the standards, testing and curriculum changes. That’s too much of a gamble with our future.

I would also encourage vocational education especially in trades.
 
I would actually be less concerned about curricula than about the social engineering that goes on and the things a child may be exposed to on the way to/from school. Have you heard stories of people who drive their kids to school now because their kids were exposed to pornography from another kid’s phone on the bus? I have.
 
Piney_Woods said:
I would actually be less concerned about curricula than about the social engineering that goes on and the things a child may be exposed to on the way to/from school. Have you heard stories of people who drive their kids to school now because their kids were exposed to pornography from another kid’s phone on the bus? I have.
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Heard of it? :rolleyes: Try already has happened on my kid’s bus.

Long story short - it comes down to a few things I think each parent has to think about:
  1. What is your parental attitude/mindset towards missionary work? 😉 I see myself and my children as somewhat of missionaries in our public school system. The truth, as I see it, is that if all of us (Christians) leave the system, then the system will truly be God-less.
I have NO problem with parents who choose not to send their kids to public school. The issues can be very real. On the other hand, I feel a strong call to this course and it has numerous benefits to my children as well as the inherent dangers and so it is the path we (as a family) have chosen to take. My view is that “the world” is exactly where my kids are going to have to go function when they are adults. 🤷 Add in the excellence of our local public schools and some issues with our parish school and we made our decision.
  1. How much are you willing to be involved? Daily discussions about issues and morality? Volunteering several times a month to get to know the staff and pick up all the information that you might otherwise miss? Make friends with a ton of other parents? Be willing to go to the superintendent and school board when needed, but also be willing to refrain and pick your battles wisely?
  2. As everyone else has basically said - schools are highly dependent on parental involvement. Over the years I’ve seen many, many people sound off - in articles, conversations, FB posts, message boards, etc about this or that regarding schools, the kids in them, what’s wrong. Over that same number of years, I’ve seen relatively few who show up for PTO meetings, volunteer in the school, monitor a bus stop, help with fundraisers and so on - and that has been true at both the Catholic and public schools my kids have attended and continues from preschool thru college.
 
CradleJourney said:
Heard of it? :rolleyes: Try already has happened on my kid’s bus.

Long story short - it comes down to a few things I think each parent has to think about:
  1. What is your parental attitude/mindset towards missionary work? 😉 I see myself and my children as somewhat of missionaries in our public school system. The truth, as I see it, is that if all of us (Christians) leave the system, then the system will truly be God-less.
I have NO problem with parents who choose not to send their kids to public school. The issues can be very real. On the other hand, I feel a strong call to this course and it has numerous benefits to my children as well as the inherent dangers and so it is the path we (as a family) have chosen to take. My view is that “the world” is exactly where my kids are going to have to go function when they are adults. 🤷 Add in the excellence of our local public schools and some issues with our parish school and we made our decision.
  1. How much are you willing to be involved? Daily discussions about issues and morality? Volunteering several times a month to get to know the staff and pick up all the information that you might otherwise miss? Make friends with a ton of other parents? Be willing to go to the superintendent and school board when needed, but also be willing to refrain and pick your battles wisely?
  2. As everyone else has basically said - schools are highly dependent on parental involvement. Over the years I’ve seen many, many people sound off - in articles, conversations, FB posts, message boards, etc about this or that regarding schools, the kids in them, what’s wrong. Over that same number of years, I’ve seen relatively few who show up for PTO meetings, volunteer in the school, monitor a bus stop, help with fundraisers and so on - and that has been true at both the Catholic and public schools my kids have attended and continues from preschool thru college.
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I like this. I think it is something for our family to aspire to. 👍 Thanks!
 
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