20 Comments

• 1. OhioOrrin  |  March 28th, 2008 at 7:15 am

  Vouchers are a PROPERTY RIGHTS ISSUE !

  I’ve no prob w the transfer of local property tax $ outside the local school district provided the local voters in fact VOTE TO TRANSFER THEIR TAX $.

  NO CHILD LEFT BEHIND CANNOT BE ASSUMED TO SUPERCEED THE WILL OF THE LOCAL VOTERS & UNDEMOCRATICLY ERODE PROPERTY RIGHTS!

  Reagan’s GOP would agree.

• 2. phnx  |  March 28th, 2008 at 7:29 am

  “Across the valley, 90.5 percent of 17,586 students who took the new end of semester exams for Algebra 1 failed, scoring at 59 percent or lower.

  In Geometry, 87.8 percent of 18,792 students earned the equivalent of an F.

  The 10,032 students in Algebra 2 also made a dismal showing, with 86.6 percent unable to achieve a passing grade.”

  But on the positive side, Administrators point with pride to a report which shows that 85% of students polled felt they aced the exams, a clear indication that the self-esteem programs are working. whooo hoo!!!!

• 3. Eric T  |  March 28th, 2008 at 8:03 am

  32% Graduation rate in Detroit! The teachers are always crying that they don’t make enuff. But they got pensions, premium health care packages, summers off, Most of them
  make good money.

  They hike up the taxes on my home every year to give the teachers raises, ect..

  I think looking at that grad rate, shows we are not getting value for our tax money. This is a prime example of why education should not be dominated by the government run schools.
  Private schools and homeschools are good for competition and gauging the success of public schools against their performance rates.

  www.detnews.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20080225/SCHOOLS/802250382 - 61k -

• 4. js  |  March 28th, 2008 at 9:25 am

  the feds need to get out of the school business

  ever since they invaded, the quality of education has been dropping like a rock

  left to our own devices, we had much better results than the feds do today

  if you look at the economy, they teach our kids all kinds of BS and omit the one thing that makes them successful in society

  the education part (instead of social engineering)

  no kid left behind should have been named no illegal immigrant left behind, because thats who benefits the most while we ignore our own kids

• 5. SEW  |  March 28th, 2008 at 10:13 am

  Yet in Texas, the top 10% of them are automatically admitted to the state u of choice, and this year 81% of admits are top 10%ers. No other qualification needed.

  My guess is 40% of admits are not qualified otherwise, thus displacing 40% who are qualified and actually did very, very easily pass algebra and geometry. Top 10% is just another way to propagate affirmative action at the expense of those who are in fact overqualified.

• 6. Almiranta  |  March 28th, 2008 at 10:34 am

  phnx, don’t you understand? It’s not about how they DID, it’s how they FEEL that counts.

  js is right, there is not only no reason for the feds to be involved in education, it’s downright unconstitutuional for them to be. I looked, and education is not delegated to the federal government, nor probhited to the state governments—therefore, it is a state issue.

  NCLB was a nice try, a sincere effort to etstablish guidelines and standards so that every child going to school in this country would leave with the same basic knowledge. But NCLB could not circumvent the teachers, who stalled, who whined, who complained, and who often taught just for the test in hopes their students would get good grades, not caring if they actually learned anything.

  Yet some of the Lib trolls will dismiss these results and assert that the only reason parents choose home-schooling is because they want to abuse their children without the risk of the school system finiding out, that they just want cheap labor, or that they just want to be able to indoctrinate the children in some outlandish cult, such as Christianity. (Wiccan parents would be exempt from critiicism…)

  This blog is a prime example of the quality of education many are getting in this country. Aside from the predictable and unavoidable typos, the grammar and spelling we see here are atrocious, and the Rogue Apostrophe is rampant.

• 7. TiredofLibBullSh**  |  March 28th, 2008 at 11:18 am

  Libs complain about public education. Yes, there are those that do complain and want vouchers.

  However, this is contrary to the special interests that the libs are so eager to please.

  And yet, these are the same libs, who complain about the degredation of the school system under fed gov’t control, that want to entrust our medical system.

  Amazing, but libs believe that America is great and is only advanced by government.

  But again, history has proved otherwise.

• 8. Mark Noonan  |  March 28th, 2008 at 12:26 pm

  Where are our liberal commenters? Surely, they have something to say on this subject?

• 9. Casper  |  March 28th, 2008 at 1:49 pm

  Mark,
  Several years ago My wife and I checked into the Clark County School system when we were thinking about moving. What we found at that time was a system with low pay and large class size (35-45 students) that was unable to keep up with the growth the area was experiencing. It’s not a surprise that it’s not succeeding.

  As for vouchers, I’m all for them as long as the schools receiving the vouchers are held to the same standards as public schools (test scores, taking anyone who wants to transfer, etc.).

  “The people being educated - certainly beyond 5th grade - should only be people who want to be there,”

  Just wondering what you are going to do with all thsoe 11 year olds that aren’t making it. Turn them loose on the street?

• 10. kimberly4victory  |  March 28th, 2008 at 1:50 pm

  I am having huge fights with my daughter’s school right now. I’ve talked to the principal and the teachers. I have another meeting with them on Tuesday. It’s about their accountability system.

  Child A: Receives a D on her report card, and yet, she has been rewarded to go on an educational field trip.

  Child B: Does not consistently turn in his homework (those accountability marks are removed each quarter!), and he gets rewarded to go on an educational field trip.

  Child C: Did not turn in her book report (only 10 out of 28 turned it in) and yet, she is rewarded to go on an educational trip.

  Child D (My child): has to stay at school while others, who obviously care about their education, go on the educational field trip. My child has consistently turned in her homework. She got straight A’s this quarter, even in advanced math. She turned in all of her reports and received A’s on them.

  Why can’t she go on the educational field trip? Because she chews gum in class and she hugged her friend who happened to be a boy. Oh, the horror!

  What’s wrong with this picture? They are teaching students A, B, and C that it is okay not to turn in your homework, to get bad grades, and to not turn in your reports. They are teaching my child that gum chewing and hugging a boy is worse that all of the above.

• 11. SteaM  |  March 28th, 2008 at 2:02 pm

  I’d rather teach my own child. My public school sucked.

• 12. Casper  |  March 28th, 2008 at 2:05 pm

  kimberly4victory,
  I would be on your side on this one. Unless a child is very disruptive he or she should be allowed, even required to go on an educational field trip. Chewing gum and hugging a friend are hardly reasons to keep a student from going on a field trip.

• 13. Mark Noonan  |  March 28th, 2008 at 2:13 pm

  Casper,

  Well, keeping them in schools where they don’t learn anything isn’t actually being helpful, now is it?

  For the kids who aren’t making it, I figure there are one of two things going on:

  1. The kid is just not well adapted to book learning, but may have a excellent and potentially lucrative skill set - carpenter, mechanic, artist, plumber, etc, etc, etc which we can draw out of him by setting up a flexible system of education which will search out needs and abilities and adapt to the child.

  2. The kid, by one means or another, has just become incorrigible - not that he can’t learn, but that he won’t learn; not books, not trades…he’s just recalcitrant.

  In the first case, I think you can easily see that a system of vouchers and tax credits would provide the monetary incentive for people to set up various forms of schools - certainly, the kids need to learn the basics, but beyond the basics comes the realities of life…and not everyone is capable or desireous of going to college…so, rather than try to force advanced math or literature on a kid who just doesn’t want it, why not send him to a school of mechanical arts where his adeptness with tools, etc, can blossom?

  As for the second case - some kids are screwed up. More so in this sad, dishonest modern age than previously, but in all ages there have been kids who have, by a certain point, become unteachable save by hard experience. So, yes, we cut them loose - not too early, but certainly by the time they are 13 or so they know full well the difference between right and wrong…if their parents are failing them and they won’t respond to repeated efforts to reach them, then why should we wreck everyone else’s chances by keeping such in school?

  Of course, even then, since the resources would be available, there would be school still willing to give such kids a chance…but there comes a time when background and parenting no longer rule the day, and the kid is now making his own decisions, and if they are bad decisions, then he’s going to have to pay the price for them.

• 14. kimberly4victory  |  March 28th, 2008 at 2:22 pm

  It is totally unacceptable, Casper.

  Where is the positive reinforcement? If my daughter didn’t have any accountability marks for not turning in her homework, why can’t they take off one for turning in her homework? Take off one for getting straight A’s? Take off one for turning in all of her reports? After all, they take off ALL accountability marks for not turning in your homework, even if the child has 8 of them!

  To make matters worse, my daughter doesn’t want to go to school each morning like she used to. She’s afraid she’s going to get accountability marks (for ridiculous things) and not be able to go on the end of the year trip to Sea World.

  My sister, a retired teacher, is going to attend the meeting on Tuesday with me. I felt the need for additional support to state my case.

• 15. Casper  |  March 28th, 2008 at 2:45 pm

  kimberly4victory,

  Since this is an educational field trip then my argument would be that she shouldn’t be deprived of an important piece of her education because of a behavior issue. A detention or some other punishment would be more appropriate.

• 16. kimberly4victory  |  March 28th, 2008 at 2:54 pm

  Thanks, Casper … I will bring that up.

• 17. FoolYouTwice  |  March 28th, 2008 at 3:25 pm

  and not everyone is capable or desireous of going to college…so, rather than try to force advanced math or literature on a kid who just doesn’t want it, why not send him to a school of mechanical arts where his adeptness with tools, etc, can blossom?

  Does this type of system not exist already? Maybe not in Vegas apparently but programs exactly like this are alive and well in the United States. Did you think this was some kind of novel concept of yours? You complain about the public school system and then propose something that the public school system already does. Is that really what you meant to do?

• 18. Almiranta  |  March 29th, 2008 at 11:49 pm

  Any time you have a system where people get paid whether or not they produce, you are going to have a decrease in quality.

  Vouchers would allow parents to choose their schools, even private schools, and then there would be competition for the best schools. When there is competition for the best schools, the schools that set the bar for quality, then other schools will have to raise their standards to remain competitive. It’s a win/win situation, except for the poorer teachers, those whose teaching skills do not make them competitive. But the best teachers will be sought by the best schools, and pay will rise accordingly for those who earn it.

  Kimberly, you clearly have some legitimate issues. What is the advantage of discouraging an excellent student and making her afraid to go to school?

  I remember talking with a car salesman while waiting for some paperwork to go through, and he told me that he had always encouraged his children to go to college. They all had, all had lost jobs due to various business issues such as buyouts, and he said if he had it to do over again he would have encouraged at least one son to go to tech school—he said the top mechanic in his shop made more than $100,000 a year and had excellent job security—-other auto dealers kept trying to hire him away, and they had to keep giving him raises and more benefits to keep him.

  But even a tech school requires a good education.

  I remember my cousin showing me an essay written by her 3rd grade daughter. It was a charming story, but nearly every word was misspelled and the grammar and structure were terrible—-and she got an A+ and a big red star and EXCELLENT!!! written across the top.

  My cousin said that the teacher wanted to empahsize creativity, and said the spelling and grammar would come “later”. “When?” I asked, and my cousin said she should probably ask that, herself. Uh, yeah…..

  So the idea was to keep lying to children and telling them they were doing better than they were, for their “self esteem”—-only for them to either have to catch up later after they learned they had been condescended to and misled by the people they trusted, or—worse—to graduate them with high grades and let college take a year or so to try to bring them up to speed.

  Or hope they would go into teaching……….
  Kimberly—stick to your guns. I recently shared in a victory over a major sheriff’s department regarding their refusal to prosecute an animal abuser, after many of us put so much pressure on him he actually HAD to do his job. And I just heard on the radio yesterday that several parents had been succesful in forcing their childrens’ schools to show a documentary about the fallacy of man-made global warming when “An Inconvenient Truth” was shown. It is possible to get things done, if you have the will to keep the pressure on.

  Just be grateful your five-year-old son didn’t kiss a classmate on the cheek, as happened near here recently. The child was kicked out of school and branded as a sexual offender. The parents are still fighting that one………

• 19. Almiranta  |  March 29th, 2008 at 11:51 pm

  A serious, honest question here—-

  I have heard hard-core BDS Liberals bash Bush for NCLB, saying he pushed the program through but then failed to “fund it”.

  I have never been able to get an answer about why it was supposed to cost more to teach correctly. Is there something about NCLB that really would make it more expensive?

• 20. Casper  |  March 30th, 2008 at 12:21 am

  Almiranta,
  The NCLB requires more testing, which costs both time and money. In some cases it requires the use of a different curriculum, which requires extra training, which again requires time and money, which isn’t always provided. The tests we use require a lot more writing than the tests they replaced, which means teaching our students a different skill set than we have in the past, which means again more training. The law has a lot of other requirements that also suck up resources. New administrative positions have to be created to track all of the information, which again costs more money. Since the funds provided by NCLB are limited, funds are pulled from other areas.

  I should note that I have no problems with most of NCLB. I believe we need to have good data to help determine the best way to teach our children. I also believe in using the best curriculum available. The part that I have the most problem with is that I feel some of the goals are a little unrealistic.

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