I won't purport to speak for wintertime, but despite the internet screaming of what you will and will not do as to running to nanny if anyone disobeys your pretentiousness, refuses to do your research for you, actually disagrees with you, or "libels" (if possible which it is not legally since libel is never of a group but only of specific individuals), I will disagree with you when, as and if I please whether you like it or not. No one died and left you dictator. I will become more moderate when, as and if I please as I have at the respectful request of softballmominva (whose efforts as a public school teacher I can and do respect and she is not alone in that) and when I do, I will do that in spite of and not because of you.
If you don't like criticism of gummint skewels, stop taxing me and other conscientious objectors to gummint misedjamakashun to pay for them. Then you will have earned the right to be ignored on more levels than just academics. If you love those socialist skewels so much, then volunteer or pay for them yourself. Hold bake sales. Run bingo. Have rummage sales. Forego taxpayer paid marching bands, football and other sports programs, swimming pools and the rest of the non-educational window dressing. Solicit VOLUNTARY contributions from the public to pay your school's bills. On such an even playing field, gummint skewels would not last a decade. The "free" babysitting service aspect, if done away with, would destroy gummint skewels in no time.
This is a conservative website. The least you can do is maintain a decent respect for those involuntarily forced to provide your pay and perks. If you don't, that says more about you than it does about us. The blackboard jungle and antimorality training centers at all too many skewels best described as PS 666 speaks for itself too eloquently for you to successfully cushion with the latest union talking points.
Time was when I did not dare hope to live long enough to see the Iron Curtain fall but fall it did. Many dare not hope similarly as to the fall of gummint edumakashun but, if academic achievement is any indication, perhaps we should dare.
Have you noticed?
**General** criticism of government schooling or their employees is often followed with some variant of the following sentence:
“You have **personally** insulted **me** ( as a specific individual) because I ( fill in name of appropriate government school defender) work for or support the government schools!” This is sometimes accompanied with threats to contact the moderator.
What is the point of this? The purpose is to close down totally all general criticism and its institutional flaws. Any **general** criticism is applied personally and all debate is effectively muffled.
Geeze! What a great debating technique!
By the way, I do wonder if some the debating techniques seen on this board are used in the classroom on immature and unsophisticated students. If they are, I would consider this abusive.
Two questions/observations as you may have a longer view than I do. Do you know when sport teams became expected in the public schools? I know my father had a football team at Roosevelt High School in Atlanta, GA when he graduated in 1952, but was this the norm in the 1950's? When did this become an integral part of schools?
Also, one thing I have noticed in my local school is that sports end up being 'funded' after many years of an 'unfunded' status. In an unfunded status parents pay 100% of the cost of supporting the sport, with the exception that the school provides transportation if practice is off-site of the school. After a few years, the group approaches the school board and asks for progressively more money until the group is funded. I've seen this in my own district where golf, lacrosse, swimming, and gymnastics are all on this path. Next year, golf will be fully funded, swimming about 3/4, and the others just a stipend, but I know what will happen in the end - they will all be funded.
In a funded status, the school covers the necessary insurance, the cost of the coaches, and transportation to and from all games, however, even unfunded sports still raise money for extras. I would say I probably spent in the neighborhood of $750 a year for each of my girls to do marching band and probably around $200 for softball. But, the amount we put in is far less than the schools portion.
So in my probably somewhat rambling post, my question comes down to this... when and why were schools EXPECTED to provide these services? What was the impetus? Why are schools required to teach other subjects that are non-curricular related? And in the times of tight budgets, what gets cut? There are so many strings attached due to Title 9 that I'm sometimes surprised that schools don't just say to heck with it and cut out all extra-curriculars.
Will there come a time that some parents will simply hand their kids over to the schools for a 24/7 day care? I know that some people see it as the schools taking, but from this side of the desk, I can tell you that in many many situations, it's the parents wanting the schools to do more and more so that the parents can be the friend.
Why are the schools expected to be mom and dad and coach and counselor and agent and adviser and nurse and law enforcement?
1) The sweeping generalizations of "ALL" government schools as evil institutions designed with nothing but nefarious purposes.
2) The sweeping generalizations of "ALL" public school employees as "Marxists" and "Useful Idiots"
3)The unrelenting assault with out citing specifics
I am quite grateful that the people of this county pay my salary, and I am proud that they feel confident enough in my abilities to entrust me with the education of their children.
What I will not do is sit by idly by while fanatics and zealots make personal attacks on me and my chosen profession.