Posted on 09/27/2009 8:05:16 AM PDT by COUNTrecount
WASHINGTON – Students beware: The summer vacation you just enjoyed could be sharply curtailed if President Barack Obama gets his way.
Obama says American kids spend too little time in school, putting them at a disadvantage with other students around the globe.
"Now, I know longer school days and school years are not wildly popular ideas," the president said earlier this year. "Not with Malia and Sasha, not in my family, and probably not in yours. But the challenges of a new century demand more time in the classroom."
The president, who has a sixth-grader and a third-grader, wants schools to add time to classes, to stay open late and to let kids in on weekends so they have a safe place to go.
"Our school calendar is based upon the agrarian economy and not too many of our kids are working the fields today," Education Secretary Arne Duncan said in a recent interview with The Associated Press.
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Domonique Toombs felt the same way when she learned she would stay for an extra three hours each day in sixth grade at Boston's Clarence R. Edwards Middle School.
"I was like, `Wow, are you serious?'" she said. "That's three more hours I won't be able to chill with my friends after school."
Her school is part of a 3-year-old state initiative to add 300 hours of school time in nearly two dozen schools. Early results are positive. Even reluctant Domonique, who just started ninth grade, feels differently now. "I've learned a lot," she said.
Does Obama want every kid to do these things? School until dinnertime? Summer school? And what about the idea that kids today are overscheduled and need more time to play?
(Excerpt) Read more at news.yahoo.com ...
I hate the teachers’ union even more than you do — because both my parents were teachers, so I know how awful the union is from a teacher’s perspective —
I do want you & everyon else to know that teachers work many, many hours for free when they’re not at school — they stay up late grading papers, they spend weekends doing the elaborate lesson plans that the administrations require,and making tests and exams — they put a lot of private time into tutoring and counseling students.
If students get only three hours a day of real instruction, don’t blame the teachers — they don’t get to design the curriculum. Blame the asini administrators (all the teachers hate them) who keep dumbing everything down.
That’s a good way to turn students against you :)
And longer school terms means higher costs, which must be borne by the taxpayer, mostly in the form of higher property taxes.
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Ah! Property taxes!
No citizen in the United States “owns” their home or business. They are really renters. They pay yearly rent ( misnamed “property tax”) to the government. If they fail to pay their rent ( “property tax”) their landlord ( the government ) will evict them.
And...When looking at property taxes the first rock to look under is the schools.
Schools enslave the citizens in more ways than can be counted.
LOL
All those little know-it-alls that thought Zero was a hero say.... “FUBO” LOL
Next will be a hefty fine for not going to school. If that doesn’t work, then there are the camps they can go to to be re-programmed.
Remember were talking unions logic is out the window it’s all about pay see GM,Chrysler
AMEN to that!
No one is holding a gun to any teachers’ head.
Teachers **willing** agree to make the schools what they are. They do it in exchange for a freely offered and freely accepted paycheck!
If schools are the way they are, teachers **willing** agree to do it in exchange for MONEY!
There is already a hefty fine for not going to the government school. It is called private tuition and homeschool expenses paid in addition to crushing property taxes.
I call it ransom. Some call it jizya.
The simple truth of the matter is that American schools are basically taxpayer-funded day care centers, and extending the school year makes it easier to get more adults into the work force.
This is the underlying pressure behind all of these measures -- including not only extending the school year, but starting school earlier in childhood, extending the school day, serving more meals at school, etc.
I don’t think your response is rasoned. There are many excellent teachers with a real voation who struggle to bring learning and more important, thinking, to new generations of students. If people like my parents didn’t work in the schools, then there would be only the lazy, bad teachers.
And you ignored my statement about how much work teachers do on nights and weekends after school hours.
Well, there's diversity training, learning how to work with Al Gore to save the planet from humanity, practicing putting condoms on cucumbers, you know, important things... < /sarcasm off >
Multiplying crap by a higher number only results in more crap.
If schools are a mess, it is because teachers **willing** agree to nutty policies in exchange for a paycheck.
No one is holding a gun to their head forcing them to do this.
So?...They work hard at nights and weekends. So what? So does every other person in America with any real responsiblity. But...Last I heard teachers do not have pagers on their belts 24/7. Never show up in the middle of the night to literally save someone’s life. And.. They can wear nylons or nicely pressed slacks to work.
If schools are the way they are, it is because teachers **willingly ** agree to do it in exchange for MONEY!
Quote of the day!
I think I'm a very successful person (paid my way through college, got my master's degree, passed my professional licensing exams in engineering on the first try, etc.), and I can tell you that I wouldn't be nearly as successful as I am today if it weren't for the way my interest in engineering as a kid were enhanced by my exposure to things outside school during weekends, on summer vacations, etc.
Actually, I’ve been proposing this for years, for precisely the reason that you say it won’t happen. My proposal is aimed at doing an end around on the teachers’ unions. It would involve a two tier level teaching system, a professional, non-union level that works year around and a union staff that continues to work the union schedule.
The professional level would be responsible for a team of union level teachers and their performance. The summer classes would be both remedial and advanced, as well as sports and arts. Summer classes could also be open to students from other school districts for a fee, so that if one school had a great orchestra program, or sports coach, that was a draw, the school district could make money and fill summer classes with out of district students.
We did 3 hours a day and took off July and Dec.
At age 14 1/2, when our son went to the local high school for drivers ed he knew the answer to your question.
LOL He said the class could be cut in half timewise if the students came in sat down and the teacher did not have to keep after them about behavior or keep repeating the lesson topic over and over. He hated it.
Please read post #29.
You are among those who “get it”. It is amazing how many of those who claim to be conservative don’t.
It's already happening.
The unions WANT more schools and longer school hours because more schooling = more teachers = more money for the unions = more gold chains around the union thugs' necks = more laundered Democrat campaign cash. Ubama doesn't make a statement like this unless the union tells him to, believe me.
My proposal is aimed at doing an end around on the teachers’ unions.
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Please read post #29.
Doing an “end around” the teachers unions will NOT, NOT, NOT, NOT, fix the government schools!
Government schools **are** socialism. Government schools teach children to be comfortable ( just by attending) with taking money from their neighbor for a service their parents want for free. So?...If they can get free education from the voting mob why not everything else they want for free?
Government schools **are** socialism! Socialism can not be fixed.
Again...Please read post #29.
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