Oprah: American Schools in Crisis -- Is 'separate but equal' still implemented?

Parent Cafe
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<p>Parents, I was watching Oprah yesterday and was completely shocked at how disadvantaged some lower-income schools are around the country. New York City, for example, which boasts a high population of students living in poverty, has one of the five highest dropout rates in the nation (which is terrible for a city that also has some of the best public schools in the country). New Jersey has the highest graduation rate in the nation. Even moreso, I was a bit bothered by the facts provided by Oprah. A young valedictorian from the south was a year behind in college, because her high school was easy cruising. She dreamt of going to an ivy league, but because of financial constraints and a lack of preparation for such an education, she had to go to a local state school – and did not exactly thrive there. Two Chicago area schools were featured. One was wonderful-- fully equipped and not surprisingly, it was mostly white & middle class. The school boasted a plethora of AP courses and had a graduation rate of 99%. The other area school was a badly equipped, low-income, primarily black school, which had a very high dropout rate and only offered two AP courses. When the students switched schools, the A students from the lesser funded school were completely lost. The students from the higher-quality school were very shocked. I know that all of this is sad, but true, because I’ve had to deal with a lack of resources (not a stifling lack of resources, but a lack nonetheless). What I would like to know from you parents is: did you go out of your region to provide your child with a grade-A education? To those of you who opted private schools, did it have anything to do with the quality of public schools? Also, do you believe success is determined by the resources you are provided or by an individual’s will? </p>

<p>For anyone interested in Dropout Nation, Oprah is going to have continued coverage on it today. You can also buy Time Magazine to read about these sad occurrences. </p>

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<p>The rest of the article is on the TIME website or this weeks’ TIME Magazine:
<a href=“http://www.time.com/time/magazine/printout/0,8816,1181646,00.html[/url]”>http://www.time.com/time/magazine/printout/0,8816,1181646,00.html&lt;/a&gt;
How would you compare the school you went to to the schools your children attend? Also, have you noticed differences between your kids’ schools and your local, zoned schools? </p>

<p>I just really wanted parents’ opinions. :)</p>

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<p>Lived it. One of the things that became more apparent to me as a parent, which I did not even think about as a kid, is that race and money does play a large role in the way that students are educated in NYC. (I went through life in a series of gifted/ SP/ and specialized high school, so my school experience was very different from a lot of my friends and even some of my siblings).</p>

<p>As a parent, I was one of those parents who said my child would never go to public school. I remember when D was accepted to private school, at that time it was $8100 per year ( not counting after school programs, money toward fundraising, etc). My sister was so up in arms about the the fact that some one would charge $8100 for kindergarten, she commented, “I am a grad student at Columbia, and I don’t pay $8100 to attend school”. </p>

<p>I did check out the public school system, aand D ended up attending elementary school in Tribeca, which was truly and eye opening experience (at the time I actually lived across the street from my zoned school which was # 600 on the NYC school listing for reading and math, while the school she attended was #1). The school’s philosopy was collaborative education and multiage grouping (teachers had the students for 2 year- k/1, 2/3 and 4/5). so each year, students had the experience of being the youngest and the oldest students in the class. </p>

<p>There were curriculum nights where teachers talked about what the students would be learning through out the year, math nights to where parents learned how math was taught in school, complete with problems (they were big on Marilyn Burns- Math for smarty pants) such as how many squares are on a 64 sqaure checker board (2nd grade). Reading was whole language, there were reading logs kept, kids at “share” time discussed their books, there were book groups where we went throught the whole Redwall and CS Lewis series in 2/3 grade. D’s 2/3 grade teacher spent 10 years teaching at the $8100/ yr private school before coming to elementary school (felt like someone had just handed me $16000).</p>

<p>The PTA raised a few hundred thousand dollars per year for the enrichment program (computer lab in addition to class room computers, librarian, school psychologist, full music program for every student, K-5 and an Art teacher). The school was (and still is) one of the top performing schools in terms of reading and math scores. The level of fundraising was something like I had ever seen. There was no selling of candy, there were large scale events like the Taste of Tribeca which is actally a street fair where resturants in the neighborhood (owners were also parents at the school) set up tastings, there was music and you paid $25 for 6 tastings. The event would raise something like $30,000. </p>

<p>There was the summer home auction, winter fair and silent auction, which raised huge amounts of money (and also got me some really great vacation destinations). Parents were artist, crafts people, entertainers, worked at banks, investment firms and the exchanges: they were able to get their companies underwrite a lot of the fundraising projects so the expenses associated with having a fundraiser were taken care of and the money raised went straight to the school. One parent had their company cover all of print and copy services(black and white, color, book, bindery services, offset printing, posters) for the for the whole 6 years their child was in school saving the school tens of thousands of dollars each year.</p>

<p>I remember from kindergarten, parents were talking about which middle school you should attend and if your kid did not get in (as 2 schools were magnet programs) you were almost considered to be a failure as a parent. Daughter did attend the magnet school (which was the #1 middle school in terms of reading and math scores) and it was the same experience, with a lot of kids turning down admissions to Stuyvesant and Bronx science to stay there for high shool (which had the same academic rigor in a much more relaxed atmosphere). I never knew that public school could be like this.</p>

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<p>I used to go to private school in NYC, but when I finished elementary school, we moved to suburban ct so i could go to a school that was just as good (if not better), but free. Public school in manhattan was never really considered.</p>

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<p>parental involvement is so important
Schools have difficulty getting parents involved- but parents are needed to run tutoring programs- to raise money for teachers after budget cuts- to support the kids at home by having education and attendance at school a priority.
Our city has a ratio of 51% of adults with a bachelors degree, but only 60% of children living in the city attend public schools.
Are these adults ( who are mostly young) going to still be living in the city when their children are school age? I doubt it- the private schools are already very expensive and difficult to get in, while the suburban schools are in general considered much better. Immigrants generally go right to the suburbs, the city is too expensive and too difficult to raise a family. The ones that are left are the families who can afford private school or can’t afford to move.</p>

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<p>Hmmm, how long will it take for any discussion about New York school to veer in the direction of the “positive” impact of teachers’ unions? Dropouts are one syndrome. Should we talk about the rampant absenteeism of unionized teachers and the percentage of substitutes used in the past few years? Should we talk about how much the failing schools do spend on education versus administration and perks? </p>

<p>In the end, the victims are always transformed into culprits, and their parents into accomplices. </p>

<p>The first step towards a solution should be to acknowledge that the current system is broken beyond repair.</p>

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<p>Do the work? What is exactly Randi Weingarten job description?</p>

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<p>I saw just a few minutes of the oprah show ( my daughter had the remote- we are on vacation in BC :slight_smile: ), but of course they are going to pick extreme examples of schools to make their point.</p>

<p>Here in Seattle which is generally a middle class city, in any school you could have students who do very well ( in high school) have difficulty in college.</p>

<p>I was a college advisor at a community college for a few years, and I saw students who had done well in high school according to their transcript, but at the CC where you are tested for class placement, instead of automatically being assigned to the next math or english class, I had to tell many students that they did not pass the test and had to take a remedial class before they could take one for college credit. This was not by race or income level, but because many of our high schools are not preparing students for college. Of course it isn’t really their fault, the academics that students are receiving in elementary and middle school make high school the time that they play catch-up. Ironically, high schools get less money per student than do elementary or middle schools. Our PTA last year funded 4 teachers to teach students who were reading at less than at middle school level, but even with 4 teachers, the program was not large enough to help all the students in the school who needed help with reading.</p>

<p>Students need the help earlier and their parents need to be involved with their education. It should not be a surprise when your child is a senior, yet only has a handful of high school credits.</p>

<p>Our district changed the classification of high school sophomore who aren’t passing enough classes to actually be sophomores, but they haven’t changed the classification of juniors or seniors.
<a href=“http://www.theolympian.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20051014/NEWS06/510140339[/url]”>http://www.theolympian.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20051014/NEWS06/510140339&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/p&gt;

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<p>Sybbie:</p>

<p>Except for the parents raising $30k and the concern about middle school, my S’s k-8 school sounds very much like yours. Same multigrade philosophy, same use of whole language (modified by the time S2 came along), reading Redwall, etc…
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One distinguishing feature was the heavy involvement of parents, as you noted, compared to some other schools in the district. The parents do raise money by holding auctions; they also chaperone kids on field trips, attend curriculum nights, portfolio breakfasts, help mount school plays (my S’s 6 grade class performed As You Like It), take part in hiring committees, volunteer in classrooms, etc… </p>

<p>The teachers are all unionized; in fact, the best teacher my S had was the union rep for the school. I am told that teacher qualifications and pedagogical styles are not very different among schools. But the level of parental involvement is. There are some schools in the district where it is impossible to get parents to attend meetings, however crucial some of the decisions to be discussed are to their children’s future. Maybe they have limited English, maybe transportation is a problem, maybe they work several shifts… The difference is huge. And so are the college admissions results.</p>

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<p>We live in one of the biggest school districts in the country. It is suburban, not city. Although each hs exceeds the state averages, there is a huge disparity between the schools that draw from wealthy areas and the schools that are just the opposite. The whole area has always been diverse and is a draw for lots of legal AND illegal immigrants because of job opportunities. Realtors obviously can’t steer people one way or another but it’s simple enough to do your own research to see scores etc.</p>

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<p>But the level of parental involvement is. There are some schools in the district where it is impossible to get parents to attend meetings, however crucial some of the decisions to be discussed are to their children’s future. Maybe they have limited English, maybe transportation is a problem, maybe they work several shifts…</p>

<p>My daughter has attended very diverse schools- as cochair of parent group, I spent a lot of energy trying to get parents to attend meetings.
We offered child care & even pizza or potluck so they wouldn’t have to worry about dinner. Rides were avaliable in case somone had difficulty with transportation. Since the school is in a far section of the city, yet had students from all over the city, we held meetings in the opposite corner of city.
Since our parent board did not look very diverse, we tried to heavily recruit parents “who looked more diverse” not only for meetings but for the board. We asked teachers to help us in getting more parents to participate. I attended community meetings in a heavily minority section of the city in an effort to gather information about what would be helpful for parents to feel that their participation was wanted and needed.
The result was, for the year after I left the school, we had recruited a black parent for co-chair, even though she had not attended the parent meetings previously. UNfortunately, ( she was an attorney) her work schedule ultimately proved to be too cumbersome, and she was only able to attend one parent meeting the next year as cochair.
This was a great disappointment, as what I had learned from talking to other black parents, was that they didn’t feel welcome, and instead of stepping in to fix things, their first reaction was to pull back.
I felt that seeing a more diverse board would have helped minority parents to see their opinions as valued.
Of course the school where I am now, we have two parent groups- one PTA for everyone & Parents for African American Student Excellence- which the black families I know think is elitist.
apart from a couple parents, most of the members of PAASE, don’t attend the regular PTA meetings.</p>

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<p>One of my favorite topics. There is a LOT of inequity in schools. I know this because I’ve been fortunate enough to teach in both environments.</p>

<p>When I first graduated from college I taught in a city school system in Mississippi. It was the same city school system that I had grown up in so everything just seemed normal to me. The district is majority African American and majority free and reduced lunch. At the first elementary I taught in we were 99% African American and 98% free and reduced lunch. Our PTA was not active at all…but not for lack of trying. I think this stemmed from the fact that 1) we had a lot of parents who didn’t finish high school or who were teen mothers and really didn’t know quite what to do, 2) We had a lot of kids with at least one parent in prison, and 3) We had a lot of hard working great parents who happened to work the night shift or two or three jobs and they really didn’t have time for PTA. At our PTA meetings we were lucky to attract 10 parents even though our student body numbered over 500. Every year we had a couple of parents who would make phone calls and visit homes trying to drum up support but with few results. </p>

<p>The kids at my school dealt with a lot. Many cared for younger siblings after school, in the evenings, and in the morning. Many had parents who severely abused drugs. Most of the parents were young. (Ex: On the first day I taught I was 21 years old. A girl came up to me and recognized me from high school. She was all excited to see me and indicated that her daughter was in 3rd grade at the school. This was the norm.) We had a 6th grader who got pregnant because her mom was prostituting her out to earn extra money for the family (couldn’t make that up if I tried!). The first year I taught I knew of two guns brought to school. A good deal of our time as teachers was spent disciplining. We also had to spend a good deal of time just listening to these kids and trying to help them emotionally. It was a HARD job and you burned out in a hurry. I taught little ones so they were usually loving and open…but they started getting defiant and violent as they got older. A fifth grade teacher at my school was told she had a gang hit out on her and a 6th grade teacher was bitten. I also taught in the middle school in this district where a teacher was rushed to the hospital one day after a child threw a full water bottle at her head.</p>

<p>Notice I haven’t even mentioned instruction. That’s because there was a bit of survival involved before you could think about the curriculum. Many kids didn’t come with supplies. We had to purchase everything from scratch. We couldn’t take field trips because the district couldn’t afford it and we couldn’t ask the parents to pay. If we took one it had to be free. </p>

<p>I now teach in a suburban district outside of a large city in Alabama. It’s a completely different world. Our population is upper middle class and decently diverse in terms of black, white, and foreign students. The PTA raises humongous sums of money for us each year and individual parents offer to bring in anything you could ever imagine as well as physically volunteering to help. Kids come with extra supplies and we are able to take field trips wherever we want. Severe behavior problems are limited. Most kids live with both of their parents, and if they don’t, they are at least in contact with both. Their parents help with their homework and take them to enriching activities on the weekend both in town and out of town. Many of my students have even been overseas even though they are elementary age. </p>

<p>The difference in these two districts is night and day. I never knew what else was out there until I taught in a different district and I was amazed. I feel like the kids in my old district are cheated out of a lot for something that’s just not their fault. I used to lecture them in the SECOND grade about going to college because I was scared to death they wouldn’t even graduate from high school for various reasons. My mom was reading the crime report to me from my home town paper and I recognized two names on that day from my initial school as being arrested. </p>

<p>Sorry to get SO long winded but I’m so passionate about this. People just don’t realize how bad it is in these low income schools or how hard it is to work in them day in and day out. It can be frustrating and depressing and you feel like you are fighting an uphill battle. You want something better for these kids SO badly but you are so scared that they are never going to get there no matter how smart they are. I would say the number one factor in that was the parents! If they had parents behind them stressing the importance of education then they worked. If they didn’t, then school was play time and a babysitting service for the parents.</p>

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<p>While pointing at differences makes everyone feel like there is an easy solution (more money) the fact is that at some very good schools with mixed student bodies such as Evanston HS, Shaker Heights HS, Garfield HS the AA students typically perform far below the level of the white and Asian students.</p>

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<p>However Barrons-
what is ignored is at Garfield students can take challenging classes if they have that as a priority.
My daughter has friends who are AA who are in her AP classes AND in her remedial classes.
However, it is a lot of work to make up the material that you didn’t get earlier. Many students do not want to work so hard, and their parents aren’t around to make sure they do.</p>

<p>To supplant the parents support, tutors are available after school and in the community, ( for free) oftentimes teachers stay more than one day after school to help, and also make themselves available by phone.
Students will rise to the level of our expectations or lower themselves.
It takes hard work to do well academically in school- outside of her participation on the track team- my daughters time is consumed with schoolwork. She doesn’t party on the weekends- she struggles with her homework.
We have education as a value, and are willing to pay for tutoring to make up what the school can’t, as well as encourage her to call her teachers when she needs help. I also try to check in weekly with teachers, especially when she is struggling in her classes.
Some parents not only don’t contact teachers, but never even show up at the yearly open house where you are given important information about your childs classes and schedule.</p>

<p>I wasn’t raised with education as an important value- I never graduated from high school, but I see education as a way up for my kids.</p>

<p>These parents also see education as a way up- but they don’t have time to make sure their kids are in school
<a href=“http://seattlepi.nwsource.com/local/266361_eastafrican12.html[/url]”>http://seattlepi.nwsource.com/local/266361_eastafrican12.html&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/p&gt;

<p>( although the article didn’t explain why David Ambaw passed two other high schools everyday in order to attend Hale- I think students attending schools in their neighborhood will help families get more involved with the schools- incidentally the school my daughter attends is in his neighborhood, and my mother and grandmother lived right off of his street- it isn’t the “poor” neighborhood they are portraying in the article)</p>

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<p>“While pointing at differences makes everyone feel like there is an easy solution (more money)”</p>

<p>More money is not an “easy solution” when what is needed is to triple it (for three generations), and provide an endowment. Works for Andover.</p>

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<p>America’s schools are not equal, even in the same school district, if one school has wealthy families it also will have political clout. This means that troubled kids will be easily transferred out of these schools but they will not have space to accept anyone elses problems. Where do the troubled kids go, usually down a chain of schools toward the bottom where parents have the least amount of clout and the Principals are almost always new to the school and system. New Principals have the least political collateral and connections so their schools often are hurt the most.</p>

<p>Schools have their own cultures. In most schools, hurting or cursing out a teacher will get a student removed, sometimes transferred but too often just a short suspension. A suspension means having the troubled youth come back into your room an additional two or more days behind the rest of the class. Expulsion too often means the kid has been lost. Schools should replace home suspensions with in-school suspension where they have to continue to keep up with the daily lessons. We need to hire more counselors, and not discard them whenever budgets get tight.</p>

<p>Funding for many of our inner city schools is being eroded by the higher cost of small charter schools and the new ala carte small high schools. Each require a disproportionate amount of school funds for administration ect. </p>

<p>Our schools need to be revamped, availabilty of residential schools for kids who are not getting the support they need at home, elementary programs that have the kids working with a small group of teachers over thier elementary careers…so teachers and students can be better connected…especially in areas where adults are absent from homes because of multiple jobs or other circumstances. Kids need continuity.</p>

<p>I became a teacher who wants to teach multi-cultural, economically disadvantaged kids, many of the teachers I work with share this desire. I would suggest that most of us (teachers) would agree the things that impede kids success the most are…parental misunderstanding or disregard for what education can do, the erosion of teacher authority in a classroom, and administrative requirements that sound good but just waste time and money. I can’t tell you how many computer programs I have been trained on, only to have the program replaced by the next year. </p>

<p>I wouldn’t use Oprah or any one hour television program as my source of background for education reform. I think Bill Gates would benefit from conversations with teachers instead of administrators who look to profit from his help, and I know that Kevin Johnson’s schools in Sacramento have cost the taxpayers a lot, while demonstrating little advantage for kids. The number of students who fled from Sac High put a huge burden on the remaining public highschools in the district. </p>

<p>The comment above about teacher absentesism is worthy of a response…I used to wonder the same thing until I became a teacher…I was sick most of my first two years…every new cold or sore throat that came into my classroom, two cases of flu in two months…but now I am fairly immune to everthing…it takes time…but since most teachers quit during their first few years…the number of absent teachers is high…and health care will always be a bargaining issue. Incidentally, I have been absent from my class five times this year…once for ilness and doctors visit, once for union business (paid for out of union dues) and the other three days for district training (a new computer program!) </p>

<p>California’s decline in Public school status started right after prop 13, a coincidence, I think not. Fund schools and pay parents decent wages. This is all about poverty…don’t cha know!</p>

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<p>*and administrative requirements that sound good but just waste time and money. I can’t tell you how many computer programs I have been trained on, only to have the program replaced by the next year. *</p>

<p>I think the district is just in business to provide work for “consultants” and “trainers” to run workshops</p>

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<p>Andover does not take every kid off the street. That’s a meaningless comparison.<br>
Evanston and Shaker Heights are very real world situations with good funding at all levels from K-12. Teachers are highly paid. Most of the parents of all races are at least middle-class. Yet the achievement gap is large and persistent. </p>

<p>Before we consider throwing vast amounts of money at a situation, I want to know how they plan to improve the results.</p>

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<p>Marite’s point about all public teachers being unionized should keep this discussion down to earth. Even the most outstanding districts have a poor teacher or two, so New York’s problems cannot be laid entirely at the foot of the teacher’s union.</p>

<p>Yes, I must agree that today income and race play a horrendous role in the provision of a quality primary/secondary education. The New York City situation is just ridiculous because parents have to navigate the straits of Megellan just to get their child into decent elementary school. But I will not let unattentive and uninvolved parents off the hook; too many of their children become disruptive and consequently a major problem for classmates.</p>

<p>Parents are the key to solving the problems of public schools. And don’t tell me that low income and minimally educated parents can’t do better for their own children. No excuses, please. There are just too many past examples of such parents keeping a close eye on their kids and finding a way to lead the kids to academic success and a lifetime of achievement.</p>

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<p>Here we go with the same refrain … </p>

<p>More money is needed for public schools! Alternative schools erode the funding of public schools! It’s the fault of the parents!</p>

<p>Well, I happen to think that parental involvement is very important. However, it also underscores the frailty of the current system and that the parties that HAVE the responsibilities are simply unwilling or unable to deliver. Our country presents the split image of having a superb K-4 or K-6 education, having a tertiary education that is the envy of the world, but also having a complete disaster in most of middle school and high school. </p>

<p>Allow me to ask you this simple question. How much parental involvement is there in our universities and college? When is the last time any of you were polled by your college for your PARENTAL knowledge? The reality is that the high school do NOT have any more interest in what you think than colleges do. However, they fail so miserably that they have no choice than to look for an unsuspecting group to share the blame. </p>

<p>Except for homeschoolers, parents are outsourcing their education needs and they do PAY for it … and quite a lot. A fact that seems to remain so foreign to our friendly educators who view the entire education budget as part of their own little fiefdom. </p>

<p>As far as private school or charters eroding the public school budgets, one would hope it to be true and to develop at a quick and large scale. It is the hegemony and quasi monopolistic position of the public schools that compounds the problem. Evidence that competition for students helps both the private AND public schools surfaced from the voucher projects in Florida. </p>

<p>Again this system is broken beyond repairs. The current system of relying on property taxes has reached a maximum level of “lawful extorsion.” Expecting unending rising budgets will soon be part of the past. Doing more with less money will be needed, as well as accepting the fact that a different funding mechanism will be needed if the expenses are not reined in. Nothing but a complete overhaul of the system will work. A overhaul that would eliminate all the deadwood that currently hides in the administrative and militant part of education, but would also reward the overwhelming number of good and dedicated teachers who unfortunately get most of the blame. </p>

<p>Why is so hard to get rid of the bad apples? Don’t we know who they are?</p>

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<p>“Before we consider throwing vast amounts of money at a situation, I want to know how they plan to improve the results.”</p>

<p>Simple. Harkness Tables. Maximum 12 students per teacher - for three generations. Never even one more. One-on-one guidance counseling beginniing at age 5. Health infrastructure to serve the needs of all students. Massive and beautiful physical plants, lots and lots of green, all well-maintained and manicured. Minimum of 15 sports, and a host of other afterschool activities. No window remains broken for more than 24 hours. Heating and cooling systems and bathrooms work - ALWAYS. College counselors beginning in 5th grade. Pulitzer Prize poets and National Book Award biographers make regular visits. Want more?</p>

<p>Works, too! Just ask the Exeter parents.</p>

<p>“Andover does not take every kid off the street.”</p>

<p>I know. That’s why you probably need about double the funds for the kids off the street as you would for the Andover kids. The most important thing is that it be reliable - for three generations. That way, there is the opportunity to make mistakes, fix 'em, and move on.</p>

<p>Heck of a lot cheaper than the war in Iraq.</p>

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<p>Mini, is that what the rest of the world does? Should we not see what countries with half our resources accomplish? </p>

<p>Educators love to organize their conferences in Hawaii. Could they not travel to less exotic locations and learn how others cope with smaller budgets? Are Don Ho and the little umbrellas in the Mai Tai really that important? </p>

<p>We cannot build 50,000 Exeters, but we sure can make our existing schools better and allow even better ones to co-exist. It only takes different people.</p>