Posted on 06/23/2008 4:10:42 PM PDT by Amelia
...they take lingering looks at Douglass’s teachers and administrators as they work and at its students as they, more often than not, don’t work. Though eventually the Raymonds (just barely) take sides — they seem not to be fans of Mr. Bush’s program — their dismaying film isn’t really asking whether No Child Left Behind can help Douglass. It’s asking whether anything can.
The film finds a few success stories among the school’s 1,100 students, but it is filled largely with teenagers who are drowning in apathy and attitude, those who seem well beyond any “To Sir With Love”-style rescue.
It is filled as well with emptiness. At “back-to-school night” for parents early in the school year the camera pans the auditorium; it is largely empty. At the Christmas concert the school’s well-regarded choir is belting out a lovely “Messiah,” again to a largely empty auditorium....
HBO, Monday night at 9, Eastern and Pacific times; 8, Central time.
(Excerpt) Read more at nytimes.com ...
This list is for intellectual discussion of articles and issues related to public education (including charter schools) from the preschool to university level. Items more appropriately placed on the “Naughty Teacher” list, “Another reason to Homeschool” list, or of a general public-school-bashing nature will not be pinged.
If you would like to be on or off this list, please freepmail Amelia, Gabz, Shag377, or SoftballMominVa
At the time of filming, many of the students read at an elementary school level. More than 500 freshmen matriculate each year yet only 50 percent return for their sophomore year. Only 10 percent passed the reading proficiency tests; math scores are at 1 percent. Some 67 percent of the teachers are not certified.
snip
"Urban education is a moral tragedy in this country," ...If you're depressed [after seeing the documentary], it means that we've succeeded."
I'm interested in seeing this movie and I'd like to ask the help of anyone who believes, like I do, that the state of urban education is shameful, how does anyone, charter, private, home schooled, teach a child who is a senior, reads at an elementary level, and doesn't want to be taught, to learn?
I'm looking forward to the suggestions and insights from the learned Freepers here.
Urban eduacation is bad because THE KIDS DON’T CARE. Nothing less, nothing more. They largely have no fathers in the home, and nobody to tell them that learning and education matters.
Therefore, they don’t care. And no amount of money, or NCLB program, is going to change that.
66 percent of the Douglass educators are not certified, we’re told. The school is running on substitutes and other emergency fill-ins. And that is the bottom line for schools like this. Bureaucrats can make all the rules and set all the benchmarks they want, but none of it will change anything if no one can be found to do the hands-on work of teaching. As seen in this film, it’s not just a thankless job; it looks disconcertingly as if it might be an impossible one.
I thought the South lost the Civil War.
Would charters or vouchers solve it, in your opinion?
Human teachers are obsolete. Replace them all with computers. The most interesting learning I ever experienced was computer based. If the kid has a question or needs clarification, you could have one “teacher” a thousand miles away provide the info.
Parental involvement is essential to whether a student performs, regardless of the school's perfomance.
There is a lot wrong with our ed system, but I say kids fail, not schools. It starts at home.
Charters and vouchers only solve the problem if the kids want to learn and the parents want something better for their kids. Unfortunately, it seems that modern day poverty in the U.S. is not so much a matter of circumstance, but choice. There are more than enough programs to get people out of poverty but those people have to want to use them.
The state took over the school system in Helena, Arkansas just for these reasons.
Do you think that would help the students in this story do better? Or would they just be looking up rap lyrics and cool tennis shoes?
If a student read 6 grades below grade level and didn't want to learn, would this work in that case?
They couldn’t get enough certified teachers? Were the students that bad, or was there another reason?
“Would charters or vouchers solve it, in your opinion?”
As long as parents are not interested in helping their children NO school can make up all of the disadvantages these children start with and have to endure.
If public schools could discipline, dismiss and choose their students like private schools their success rate would be the same.
Vouchers only help a small minority of students and are a bailout for the parochial school system which in many cases in no better that the public system. Their shining examples are usually selective high tuition schools. This is why in many areas the parochial schools refuse to be tested and compared on an even footing with the public schools.
Before we start another “government program” lets see where we stand on both sides. Bleeding one system to help another may be a bad idea in the long one. My wife has taught in both and she hates the Priests (ministers) and the teachers unions equally. They have their own agendas.
You don't. It is possible to inspire someone to want to learn, but there is no way (in our society) to force them to learn.
In a theoretical society, public flogging or execution of the lowest-scoring student in the school at the end of each week would work wonders. But we're not allowed to use such drastic methods.
These teachers are not poor teachers because they aren't certified, but because they are poor teachers.
Certification does not magically make someone a good teacher.
BTW, over 30 years ago Marva Collins proved that even the worst students can be taught successfully. It requires hard work, dedicated teachers and committed parents. And very little attention to the "fad of the year" in teaching methods.
We've known how to teach students for centuries. We just aren't doing it.
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.