Shucks, I thought this was going to be about "Parents take control of the California Teacher Unions".

My bad.

This is not a question of Teachers Unions, rather a question of effective education. Wealthy parents may be able to afford to take over a school but that will lead to an educational system meant for the few rather than all. To allow parents to affect the quality of a school system means they have to start making their involvement in Schools a priority. Run for School Boards, Get closely involved in their students progress, homework, friends etc. Then again, that means taking time away from work, their own social circles etc. Public Schools are for the masses not the elite. There ARE NO simple idiological fixes. If students aren't achieving minimum standards or exceeding them then yes, fire the incompetant or under achieving teaches and principals but also it's up to parents to realize that as tiered as you may be after a 10 or 12 hour day at work. The work of a parent is never done. Make sure that algebra homework is done. Go over the English essay for spelling and grammar mistakes. TAKE THE TIME JUST DON'T COMPLAIN.

enuf, I agree to a point. Some single parents however can't do that. My boys are smart and require little of my time, but it is the system that is flawed. I have a teen that is already National Honor Society at 14. Very bright. The school will show up one day with a test for say English. Everything stops until they take that test. Very often he does not do well on these tests and they are graded on them. Now if he, a kid that has a published poem, straight A's, Honor Society, Middles School student of the year is doing poorly on them, what does that tell you???

Tells me plenty, but educators know more than me. Or ????

I am not sure about other states, but here the problem started when the courts got involved. Of course it was because a group of people couldn't pass the standardized tests. No matter how they have been changed, worded, given, changed, worded, given, changed, worded.............results have not varied by much.

Yes teachers need to be accountable, it is the "how" that is a major problem. Plus, have you been in a school lately??? I wouldn't endure what they do and be required to hold a college education.

Most good teacher I know what the standardized tests out and "teaching" back in. That is what seems to be a huge issue.

I don't like the idea of bringing the "profit motive" into the public schools. I also don't like the idea of school board members making six-figure incomes. Worst of all is the necessity of both parents having to work outside the home in order to provide a decent (not extravagant) living income for a family - and that goes to stagnant wages for the past 40 years. Parents used to be a presence in the schools.

Really--and where do you get the information that union teachers "AREN'T" working?

Teachers join unions because any group of 25 students is going to have at least one parent who is a certifiable whack job. The union offers free legal help and also free protection against the principal who just wants the whack job parent to go away and will fire teachers to make whack job happy (whack job will be the teacher's problem for one year, but the principal's problem for 6 or so).

Teachers are bound by the rules of the given school district--each district has a "teaching methodology" that the teacher must adopt. They generally have curricula which must be followed. They buy the books. They set the schedule, etc., etc., etc.

Teachers have about as much control over their classrooms as waitstaff have over a restaurant. Basically none.

Many people in the US have this ridiculous idea that teachers are a cross between ministers, entertainers, and therapists--motivating, engaging, and diagnosing problems and treating them. Each teacher is supposed to devote him/herself to each individual child in turn, like a governess. Look, the teacher is not the goddess of the classroom--the teacher, kind of like a teacher in a gym class, shows up and demonstrates something, guides the class through practice, and answers questions. Whether students learn it or not is kind of up to the students.

When you have an unrealistic expectation, it isn't going to be met. A parent who teaches one or two children does not have a group of 25 people and a huge issue with just crowd control. While I have known bad teachers--those who have personality issues that make them pick on a child, or those who have religious/political views that make them pick on a child, or those who just don't know the subject matter and are faking it (the spelling teacher who told my child to spell 90 as "ninty" comes to mind; even my child knew better)--this is entirely unconnected to whether or not they are/were in a union. Nearly all teachers are in the union because they flatly cannot afford the "malpractice" suits that parents will bring against them.

I honestly have come to the conclusion that we need to just close down all schools, reinvent them as "learning centers" with computer access and a few tutors, and put materials on the Internet for parents to teach their kids or not to teach their kids. Back in the day, when people had nine or so children, they could compare the kids to one another and know which one was bright, which one was dumb, which one was well-behaved, which one was a demon, which one was talented, and which one was going to be digging ditches for life. Now, all children are bright, well-behaved, talented students who are going to be lawyers and doctors . . . not.

Between the small family size and the fact that many parents spend very little time with their own children, one gets parents with unrealistic expectations for their children and unrealistic expectations for a teacher.

Look--a teacher does not have to "love" your child. A teacher does not have to stay at school for hours after school lets out to tutor the kids who are behind. A teacher does not need to call you personally to update you on your little darling. A teacher does not have to return papers the day they are turned in.

A teacher's job is to demonstrate concepts, to come up with activities that will reinforce those concepts, and to grade the work as it is done. That's it. End of story. The teacher doesn't have to motivate, engage, or diagnose issues. Motivating is your job, mom or dad. Engaging is the job of the curriculum developer. Diagnosing and coming up with treatment measures is for the counselor. Tutoring before and after school is for the tutors that the school district will not hire.

Get a set of realistic expectations, and you might realize that the teachers all work. They work hard, for the most part. There are some dweebs, just as there are rotten servers in restaurants, but teachers work, even those in unions.

And, this one (no, I don't teach at a public school and I don't belong to a union) is working hard at teaching you not to make sweeping statements that you can't back up with quality sources. I know you can't, because I know that there is no study that shows any link between teachers being in a union and teachers "not working." I also know that you'd have a fun time finding a whole school full of teachers that polish their nails during school and little more. Have a great day.

Right. Complain about "for profit companies running schools" because we all know that private school graduate achievement scores are always below average. Graduates of private schools never get into universities like Stanford, Harvard, Yale, or Dartmouth. It would be absolutely awful if one of the state's long time worst performing elementary schools turned into a charter school funded by not only tax payers, but also Bill Gates. And then how awful it would be if PARENTS actually got highly involved in the education of their children? Horrible. Awful. Utter Chaos.

Oh...wait...I guess NOTHING I stated above was actually true. In a school where more than two-thirds of the students can't function at the most basic reading or math levels? And it has been that way for years? And there is an actual argument against trying something else?

Hmmm...let me see...we are going to take additional funding (from not just taxpayers but also private money), add into it high levels of parental involvement in running the school, mix it up with an improved curriculum, higher expectations, and a private sector emphasis on goal achievement and success? Wow that sounds like a horrible recipe for education. Those poor kids. They and their parents should just be happy with the district and union status quo. I mean their town and society can function just fine if only a third of the population can read, write, and multiply numbers, right? Just go have a bake sale and stop being concerned!

Sorry...I just can't help the sarcasm.

Standardized tests are only an issue for incompetent teachers. Of course they don't want their performance measured against others! Standardized tests simply mean that students from Santa Rosa, CA are held to the same standards as Whiting, IN. What's wrong with that?

If teachers actually teach the subject students should have no problem with standardized tests. If kids know the material, they know the material. So perhaps CA wants to water down their tests to look good? That's what standardized testing prevents. Will your kid take the SAT's? That's a standardized test!

Profit motive, i.e. competition is the only driver that increases performance. We are so crumby now because there is no competition. That's why unions are so dead set against school vouchers, tenure removal, charter schools, pay for performance, etc., they will no longer be able to defend incompetence.

The average charter school not only does better but is often cheaper than a public school. CA is doing it right, I hope other states follow their example.

I agree. The unions need to be the leaders for change not maintaining tenure and the status quo. It is about educating our children, not maintaining the union. Had they been the leaders in this movement, maybe people would be more trusting of their agenda. There are some very successful charter schools in Columbus and alternative schools. The problem is adminstrators dont want to change. Einstein said insanity is doing the same thing over and over and expecting different results.

Once we get the unions out of the picture teachers will have to worry about getting fired because they aren't performing just like employees in the private sector. There should be NO job security for any public sector worker and we need to dismantle the unions hold they have around our throats.

What is wrong with the parents??? why are their children failing??? because they don't give a crap about their children... stop them from watching tv and going outside until the homework is done.... take away their damn cell phone and texting privileges... Oh but you don't want to be involved in the actual teaching of your children you want someone else to do it for you. And then you bitch when they don't learn guess what unless you stress that education is important through actions not just words then you will accomplish nothing.

Taking over the school will yield some results for a short period of time -- then the same bureaucracy will take over and the same crap will happen. Wake up Parents.. it is your child and your responsibility to teach them...

Valhalla, you obviously do not work in education and know nothing about education.

1) Teaching urban kids is completely different from teaching suburban kids. This is not a state-to-state issue. It is a poverty issue. Urban kids do worse on standardized tests for a variety of socio-economic factors which have been well documented and you could actually learn about this if you tried. There are a myriad of ways that teachers can be fairly evaluated and I look forward to them.

2) Where is your evidence that charter schools do better? Because they say they do? Charter schools may reject any student they like. They do this all the time, and guess where the behavior problems, learning disabled students, etc wind up? Right back at the local public school. They're spending your tax dollars at the same rate, but don't have to do the same job. Now do you think charter schools are so wonderful?

3) Union issues are just as complex as the other issues I've mentioned and since I assume you're not willing to give up that nice two-day weekend unions earned for you, why don't you educate yourself about the other issues as well? You throw the word incompetant around alot, but you clearly haven't EVER talked to a teacher. So why not just address the people in your life whom you're so angry at and leave teachers out of it. You have no idea how hard teachers work.

You need to get a clue about the country you live in and shut your trap if you have nothing relevant and/or constructive to offer.

The fix for what you talk about above is to hold charter schools to more of the standards of public schools if they are going to get taxpayer funding. We don't need to be using taxes to fund private schools, the fact that they are paid for by tuition, rather than taxes, is what makes them 'PRIVATE'.

Charter schools are and are supposed to be PUBLIC education, albeit functioning outside the tradtional district and its structures and strictures. If they are allowed to pick and choose students, and decline to enroll many students that traditional public schools must, they will then OF COURSE look better on standarized testing, etc., since special needs kids and children of extreme poverty tend to drag down the average standardized test scores of ANY school. And if they are going to receive tax dollars, they need to be transparent.

As to the school in question, of course these parents should be allowed to give it a go. It's not like it's performing slightly below norms or has been doing so for a year or two; it's a long-term serious problem. If this was going to be done on a whim, I would be totally against it. I've never been there, but I think that we can assume that perhaps the sort of teachers needed to turn this around are difficult or impossible to attract to what is apparently a remote and sparsely-populated area; it's probably rather offputting of a prospect even to the young and idealistic, let alone settled veterans, and few such places can afford lavish incentive pay in the absence of a wealth of severance taxes from abundant natural resources.

Of course, the parents' administration or the one of their choosing needs to be monitored to see if it really improves things.

Zeezee--

I COMPLETELY agree with you. THANK YOU!!! However, I have one point to make: I am highly against standardized testing. As a student, I think the tests do not adequately test 21st-century skills. Sure, put as many technology questions as you like on the tests, but it won't help as much because some of the skills include communication, collaboration, and creativity. Standardized tests are definitely unable to test these particular skills and more.

Teachers union or not can only work with what they are given to start with. Add to that they need parents to actually be involved in educating their children, providing structure, and a stable home life. My school district has 2 elementary schools. In one 100% of the kids entering kindergarten passed all the tests and are ready for kindergarten. The other school 80% of the kids are not ready to enter kindergarten. The two school communities are not that far apart in income and parental education. Yet that difference follows the not ready communities kids right through college. In high school the not ready bunch have a higher drop out rate, a higher absense rate from school, lower grades, more behavior problems, more drugs, more legal troubles, less accepted to college, less going to college, less getting a degree. If your child is not doing well it might be your fault and it is your responsibility to fix that.

Zeezeee:

Unions had their time and place and they did do some positive things - but now they are a dinosaur and stand in the way of progress. Everything needs to evolve and the teaching profession is no different - the union creates an atmosphere of nonchalance - it is harder to do a good job when you know it is next to impossible to get fired

I think "successful" students take ownership to become a success and give credit where credit is due. "Failing" students will avoid their individual responsibilities and blame everyone but themselves.

Are we checking to see if they are legal to even be in the US ? We would have more than enough money in this country for proper education and would be able to pay teachers more if we were checking and making sure all the kids that attend our schools are legal citizens.

When charter schools have to accept all students, and can show that they get superior results compared to public schools without spending any more per student than public schools, then I will consider them successful. Right now I see them as a way for sponsoring corporations to do away with our present public educational system by skewing educational results. And once they do away with our present educational system, there's nothing to prevent them from eliminating education for the masses in preference for educating only the children of the top 1%.

My experience is that a local school sysem is supported by property taxes. Have the people of Desert Trails voted to increase their property taxes in order to get a better education for their children?

@drwtsn

My experience is that a local school sysem is supported by property taxes. Have the people of Desert Trails voted to increase their property taxes in order to get a better education for their children?

My God, this is the attitude that creates the problem. It's not about how much money is spent it's about how the money is spent. When you're spending money on bloated bureaucracies and crappy teachers who can't be fired you might as well be flushing it down the toilet. People get their panties all up in a bunch when you start to talk about corporations making money but guess what, if corporations fail they go out of business get replaced. When public education fails you get stuck with the same thing repeating itself over and over just like Desert Trails Elementary school turning out failing students year after year after year after year with little, if any, hope for change.

Having taught in the public school environment for 38 years I'm disgusted with the quality of education we now offer in the schools. I was forced into retirement early because the school district decided they needed adult school money to do God knows what. There are so many people who lost out because of this act which many districts chose to do. The point I'm making here is that there are too many administrators making decisions about what goes on in the classroom without really being there to work with the children. The quality of education needs to return to teaching....real teaching and not all this test preparation. Children need to be exposed to the arts, social sciences, science and quality education like which was offered when I was a student in the 1950's and 60's as well as the thematic teaching which existed in the 90's. The children shouldn't be just passed on without a mastery of skills, a true mastery not just enough to pass an assessment. AMERICA NEEDS TO WAKE UP AND START PUTTING A TRUE VALUE ON EDUCATED INDIVIDUALS not just on those who look pretty or who excel at sports. The mind is too precious to waste.

I remember this one kid in class was always talking and throwing things around in class, nobody could pay attention and a few others would start to join in. The teacher would kick him out and he would be right back in class the next day or so. The kids parents would always blame stuff on the school or the teacher, he would be braggin about getting a 'day off' and tell the teacher to f off. He never had to take responsibility for his actions. My parents would never allow me to get in trouble at school and then blame the school, I never understood why his parents did that. That kid never learned to keep out of trouble, God rest his soul.

I don't remember ever having a bad teacher, maybe a few that were unfair, but you better just keep your nose clean so you don't get caught up in somebody's trouble. I don't understand how they put up with us sometimes, but I do remember how great a few of them are. They did it to make a difference and they did, at least for me.

I'm glad some of the parents are getting so involved in this school, that's the only way it will get solved. I just bet it's not the teachers, but those kids, like I had in class. If the school would stand behind the teachers and kick 'them' out, the rest of us could learn from teachers who want to teach us.

Sorry, but public education is not a bad thing. It has served me and my children well. There are things that can and should be fixed in public education, but we cannot forget the biggest factor and that is parenting. Why let them off the hook? This is one issue that should transcend politics.

By golly gosh, you're right! The Founding Fathers and many generations of Americans who believed in public schools and saw to it that all children should have access to an education were just a bunch of dunderhead libs. Thanks for clearing that up!

Methinks you are mostly referring, instead, to the fact that some people believe that adequate public education will help the poor and people of color rise in the world. Odd, but that's exactly what the dunderheads believed about the Irish, the Italians, and the Poles. Kind of worked for them, didn't it, back in the days before there were specific really horrid schools just for the poor?

Except when kids that are failing public school are placed in a charter school they excel. There is no doubt public schools have taken a dive over the years, we used to be #1, now we are worse than many third world nations.

The big issue is teacher unions, they protect incompetent teachers and keep the good ones from getting rewarded. The only thing charter schools do differently is they have the authority to reward good teachers and fire bad teachers, they have no secret formula they won't tell public schools. Yet they consistently outperform their public competition. Teachers ARE the difference!

Once again VP - you don't know squat. Again, this is the difference between charter and public schools:

Charter schools may reject any student they like. They do this all the time, and guess where the behavior problems, learning disabled students, etc wind up? Right back at the local public school. They're spending your tax dollars at the same rate, but don't have to do the same job. Now do you think charter schools are so wonderful?

zz: That's the point "apples and oranges". Who wouldn't want to run a private school which could pick and choose its students, but without that cumbersome "tuition" thing, with it picked up by the taxpayers. Charter schools are only a realistic and viable alternative if held to the public standard, which requires acceptance of all income levels, all levels of abilities, and all but the most disrutive/dangerous students. Hold them to these standards and I am all FOR them. Otherwise, what we have is yet another "public-private partnership" -- public funding and risk taking, private profit taking. If you think that Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac worked the way they were supposed to, then you will think that selective/exclusive chater schools are a great idea, too. In this country, we should be THROUGH with socialized risk and privatized profits, as this is the opposite of "the free market"/

There's nothing wrong with public education, what's wrong is the Dept. of Education (which should be disbanded), and teachers unions, and parents afraid to take a stand. Put the control of schools back to the local people.

Go look up charter schools in Orange County, CA. Many of them are pretty much private schools on the taxpayer dime. Aliso Viejo? Mission Viejo? Laguna Niguel? Irvine? Trust me, their public schools are FAR from failing! They have the best of the best as far as public schools. Yet, you see several charters in these incredibly well off areas. One of them have the WALDORF PROGRAM! Up until charters, you only saw that in elite private schools! Yet, we had a school in Los Nietos School District in Whittier, CA where the school had gone without a school library for TEN YEARS! The PARENTS had to build one out of their own pockets with used equipment from a bankrupted Borders Books. Charters are just another way to break up the public school system and turn them into a profit-making venture and for the wealthy to get a break on private school tuition.

I love the sarcasm but many of the "enlightened" do with-out many common comforts of life so we can send our kids to a good private school. The "enlightened" abandoned the "value" of public schools many years ago.

One need only see that as "teacher" union interference in public education increased private education sources sored and the children enrolled in such schools thrived.

We who send our kids to private schools Are the enlightened; some lib some cons.

@beanathome

By golly gosh, you're right! The Founding Fathers and many generations of Americans who believed in public schools and saw to it that all children should have access to an education were just a bunch of dunderhead libs.

Yeah and our founding fathers knew how to deal with the roadblocks set up by teachers unions...oh, wait.

We HAD a wonderful public education system once upon a time, and then came bloated government bureaucracy and unions that care only for those who pay their dues and not a lick for the children. Now public schools are some of the worst in the world. Coincidence? Not likely.

Stop it SactoJD, you are might be run out of town for pointing out the obvious.

They are at school all day. Your 1 hour of homework won't Get er done!! Too much evidence to the contrary, which is why I have never understood why teachers, who know these numbers keep doing it!!! Oh that;s right, they are so much more intelligent than the rest of us. Now there is a problem!!

Some of these parents cannot read, themselves. Some are single parents who work long, long hours. It would be a great idea to try and see to it that the parents learn to read (if a child cannot read at all by third grade--chances are that the parents cannot read, either)--but a person with too little education cannot help with homework, if the teachers are even sending any home.

If the parents want to take over the school, they sound relatively interested as parents--whether they are well educated or not.

CBS did a report of a charter school in Harlem where most of the kids parents were alcoholics, drug addicts, etc. The school had a 95% graduation rate and a 89% went on to college. Parents are NOT the issue.

I'm thrilled at their result. My experience is that not many charter schools are achieving at this rate, because they are not made up of the same quality teams. In fact, I once interviewed at a charter school that had been open 5 years, and no one at the interview including the principal knew the name of the street behind the school. They also refused to provide a job description ( they clearly hadn't quite decided that, though they were interviewing) nor salary/benefit information. But they did point out that they expected everyone to work until 7-8 pm. I bet your spouse would love you to take a job like that.

Successful students take ownership to become a success and give credit where credit is due. Failing students will avoid their individual responsibilities and blame everyone but themselves.

Valhalla Phil, I understand what you are saying about parents not being the issue, citing the school in Harlem that is seeing good results. I don't know what school you are talking about, but I am familiar with similar programs run by KIPP. They also have students that come from rough backgrounds, and have very good success with them. The way they do it is by requiring students and parents to sign contracts that clearly outline what is expected of them. The students wear uniforms, have very long days in the classroom, and attend classes on Saturdays. It is my opinion that part of their success is due to the fact that they effectively minimize the time the students spend with their families and in their home environments. So that tells me that parents ARE part of the issue. The less time the students spend with them, the better they do. I know from my own experience when I taught, that I have had students with questionable home lives, and it was always amazing to me the amount of "deprogramming" that was required each Monday morning with regard to their behavior, grammar, etc. after time spent at home. It was almost as if we had to start completely over every Monday morning, as there was no reinforcement at home.

To me, the bottom line is that parents and schools must be in partnership together for the success of the child. Parents cannot shirk their responsibilities, which are many, with regard to the child's education. And schools cannot blame their own inadequacies on "uninvolved parents." Everyone has to do their part.

Jahmekan, As a former teacher I couldn't agree with you more. I view education as a manufacturing process: to produce an educate person. With all the "baggage" some students bring to the classroom, they are not even ready to learn for the day. As SactoJD said above, parents need to do THEIR homework. If a child is having difficulty reading, the parent should help that child at home by reading to them. A good curicullum is need also. There is nothing wrong with the old way, rote memorisation or to learn by sounding words out: PHONICS!

Read some letters from common soldiers that served in the Civil War and marvel at their level of language.

RockDoctor, I wish I could "love" your comment one thousand times! It hits the nail on the head. We've been doing virtual school(public, at home) for two years now and what we've found is that we really do need to monitor our children's 'practice' more. So what if it's boring for us to hear the times tables by rote a thousand times a week or having to sit down with them and listen to them read from a book a bit every single night. That's what parents SHOULD be doing. We need to show them that we are just as capable of using the skills they are being taught so they don't feel so disconnected from us. Also, this opens avenues for discussion on personal ideas they have(and we have) and can open the door to REAL discussions about meaningful things going on in the world today.

Oh, for heaven's sake, soldiers in the Civil War came in two groups--those who could read, and those who could not. Those who could read wrote wonderful letters because it was the only way of communicating long distance and they had a lot of practice at it; those who could not got those who could read to write for them, and their families got the pastor to read the letter to them.

By the way, it's "curriculum" and "memorization." I don't think this has to do with any problems of reading or intelligence on your part--but I do think that perhaps you should realize that simply because students don't display a marvelous level of language, neither do you. It's a manifestation of people not using the written word much any more.

"Memorisation" is actually the preferred spelling in Britain, as is "civilisation", so it isn't truly wrong. Can't say the same for "curicullum", though. But here's the point: 150 years ago, people tended to be educated, or not. There were few semi-literate people as there are now. Even those who went to the eighth grade tended to write and speak very well. Their parents were usually fairly affluent and committed to their children's education. Those who were uneducated often had no formal schooling whatever, and were of course doomed to a life of farming, common labor, or the beginning of the industrial production job, which at the time didn't require literacy. When education became a mass undertaking, then even parents who would've preferred their children supplement their own labors began to allow their children to receive an education, if only to avoid the ministrations of truant officers and the like (similar to the current practice in many jurisdictions of restricting or eliminating the driving practices of those who quit school at a age deemed to be "too early"), it opened up great opportunities for some, but also filled the halls of learning with the uninterested, unprepared, and unable. To an extent, the speed with which these children learned tended to dictate the proceedings and hence soon there was little Latin, Greek, or Shakespeare in the lower grades (the term "grammar school" originally referred to the place where one went to learn Latin, not English, grammar). To expect the average child today, used to entertainment, to attain to the level of the mostly-elite of 150 years ago, used to having to "behave" for hours on end at church and taught to be "seen and not heard" probably isn't that realistic.

@Jahmekan

This crap is never going to change,... Parents have to be responsible too.

Ummm, did you read the article or just jump to the comment section? Every time there is an article about education we hear all about how the problem is the result of crappy parents who don't give a sht. Well let me ask you this, do you really believe that parents willing to go to this length don't give a crap? You don't think they are talking responsibility for the education of their children? You think they want to take over the school because the teachers aren't good enough "babysitters for their bad as$ children"?

Cry me a friggin river, obviously these parent do give a crap and obviously they are not the problem here. But by all means, don't let the obvious get in the way of a good rant.

Backcountry164- It only takes one bad parent with one bad child to kill the learning environment of an entire classroom. If a teacher is willing to express a view from the battle front then I think the general in the rear should listen.

@MinerFortyNiner

Backcountry164- It only takes one bad parent with one bad child to kill the learning environment of an entire classroom.

Give me a break, there's one bad apple in every class and there ALWAYS has been. Yet most kids in most school do fine because the good teachers can handle it. One bad teacher can do FAR more harm to good kids than one bad student can do to a good teachers classroom. Trust me, I speak from experience. There was one horrible teacher when I went to school and 22 years later she's still there. She's been demoted as far as she could be, study hall and health class and yet still has the ability to ruin a child's entire day with her BS. How much do you suppose a kid is able to learn when that child feels harassed every day they go to school.

You people need to knock it of with the friggin excuses, there are bad teachers and they deserve to be fired.

SallyAnn-4595694, mainstreaming of special needs children, while it had good intentions, has been a dismal failure. In the process, both types of students miss out. I feel that homogeneous grouping of students is much better than heterogeneous groupings because having all students of the same ability level in a class prevents a teacher having to "teach to the middle". Teaching to the middle does not bring lower ability students up and does not truly allow the higher ability students to "over achieve".

There are many things we don't know about this school: curricula used, quality of teachers, why the turnovers of principals, class size, etc. But if the school is in such bad shape, i would think parents aren't doing all they can to help their students succeed, so I have doubts about the parents taking over.

Sally -

The only time special needs kids are mainstreamed in a working system is when they are able to keep up with everyone else. If they aren't keeping up, then the school system is failing all of the children.

I know, because my grandson is special needs due to severe asthma. He can do the work, but has triggers for the asthma that are unusual.

Additionally, dyslexic children are just as bright, if not brighter, than their classmates. They learn differently and it is a failing of the system that the schools are unable to meet the needs of these students - the teachers are not taught the teaching methods that work. And, before you say no, it has been proven that the methods are even more effective with students than many of the teaching methods used in the classroom today.

unfortunetly dyslexic and asthma special need children arent the only types. what about us ADHD suffers? those of us with aspburgers? even those of us with autisim both high and low functioning? some of us like me even have a combonation of ADHD and aspburgers which make us socialy challanged cause we cant pay attention when distractions are happening and we cant keep our tempers in check. those of us other types of special needs must have help or we will lead drasticly challanged and in some cases miserable lives. i was one of the fortunet ones who maneged to have careing parents who found help for me and never left me now matter how unstable i got but many others are less fortunet and sometimes find themselves in jail cause they cant control themselves. all in all we (special needs people) need help to just make it through childhood or we are toast.

Tammy, possibly children are only mainstreamed when it is appropriate in your district. Many districts have a 100% mainstreaming policy, whether part or full day. You're not really up with what is happening in education nationally. For example, every teacher knows that a key marker of dyslexic and learning disabled kids is that they are very bright. In our school, we have reading specialists working with dyslexic kids 5 days/week. Again, I don't know what happens in your district.

My late cousin, a long-time educator and liberal Democrat, was totally opposed to mainstreaming and had three decades of experience to tell him why. He said that when the special-need kids were grouped separately, they then had something of their own 'bell curve' -- within the group. Some were well above average, some marginally so, some just below, and so on. There was much pride taken in this. When "mainstreamed", however, all were at the bottom. This was disheartening to them, and to him as well.

That having been said, in no way can we allow special needs kids to be 'ghettoized'. It's not only illegal, it's a moral outrage as well. As many as possible need to be given the life skills necessary to live as full of a life as possible. Because of excellent, aggressive parenting and an insistence that the law be followed, a couple of our friends have a Down syndrome son in his 30s who is able to drive himself to his own job. This should be more commonplace than it is.

But it has to be somewhat individualized. This young man's needs are almost altogether different that those of someone with ADHD or dyslexia or a physical handicap. We know another couple whose wheelchair-bound daughter was put into the all-purpose "special ed" class mostly filled with the intellectually-challenged. This was SO unfair to her, but is typical of the one-size-fits-all approach typical especially in smaller, less affluent district with very limited resources. Bottom line: if the answers were all easy ones, the solutions would already have been implemented.

I was in grade school before "mainstreaming," and remember "ability grouping" very well. That is a dirty word now, and I understand your cousin's disappointment when mainstreaming took over. I remember we even had a group called the "slow readers," and when it was time for reading, we all split into our different groups, and the special ed kids went to a different classroom for certain subjects. Politically correct nowadays? No. But guess what? Those "slow readers" learned to read, just at their own pace, and the special ed kids got the help they needed to learn, as well.

This whole "let's not damage Johnny's fragile self-esteem by honestly addressing any challenges he may have" mentality is not working for anyone. The day we dumped ability grouping is the day that failure to meet the needs of students began.

Excellent point. More and more, bureaucracies are assuming they own the world, not we the people. When the schools are failing society, society has the right to fix it. You know things are bad when even liberal CA has this law.

So what school board are you on William? Or you, Phil? You blowhards have every opportunity to get involved instead of just rambling on about how "you" and "society" have rights. Yes, YOU do - YOU are society. So please stop typing and get to work!

Most of us, realistically, do not have the time required to be a school board member, at least to do it right, and not just to ensure that our shiftless nephew or brother-in-law can get near-lifetime employment as a school janitor or school bus driver, which, let's face it, has been a motivator for many over the years. What we can and should do is encourage the qualified to run and then help in their campaigns, either financially or as a volunteer or both. Right now in our district, one-third of the members of the school board are partners in the same law firm. That's too incestous for my taste, even if they are otherwise conscientious and fully-qualified.

Tragically, most people, despite the majority of their property tax and a lot of their other state and local taxes being spent on education, cannot even tell you who their school board member is, and often don't even bother to vote for something so far "down ballot". Until that changes, little else will in the absence of massive parental activism such as we see here.

So please stop typing and get to work!

You first.

Fox is too busy reporting the news ignored elsewhere. That's why their viewership beats the pants off the other cable news networks.

Yes, and the National Enquirer is too busy reporting the news ignored elsewhere, and their sales beats the heck out of other tabloids. (About the only thing that the National Enquirer does better than anyone is catch people in affairs--if they report that so-and-so was caught in an affair, I'd believe them; otherwise, it's hooey.)

Fox reports what a very narrow number of people--a few million--want to hear: that black people are evil, that there are "welfare mothers," that Christians are under attack, etc. We have always had a group of people who are convinced that they are being lied to (John Birchers, anyone?) simply because they are being told that they, themselves, are not the most wonderful people on the face of the planet (Know Nothing Party, anyone?).

Getting your narrow-minded views reinforced by people who are perfectly willing to make stuff up (tell the paid bloggers to make up a story, get your pundits to talk about the bloggers' stories, and then have your news staff report about the hullabaloo online and in the media about the made up story using a question format--"Have we seen Obama's real birth certificate? Is it all a big hoax?) is not the same thing as getting informed. But, yes, the people who like to hear such stuff just eat it up.

Senator McCarthy also pulled huge numbers back in the day--that made him neither right nor worth listening to.

Pathetic liberal lies. One of Fox business channels most respected anchors is black. Fox has been #1 for over a decade now because they don't cater to low IQ people who can easily be manipulated. Juan Williams is a regular on Fox, funny you don't seem to mention that NPR fired him. By your logic that makes NPR racist.

The left wing fascist movement will not silence the opposition no matter how many lies you promulgate. Get over it.

Fox is full of misinformation.

Hey Bean,

Since you're talking about the National Enquirer you remember that it was that tabloid rag that broke the story about Jesse Jackson and John Edwards, right? Yeah, not the rest of the mainstream media, it was the National Enquirer that breaks stories about Liberals because the rest of our media wouldn't think of reporting negatively on a Democrat.

One more thing, Hey Dems, where is your budget plan?! Over 1,000 days with no budget?! Are you serious?!!!!!

Takenaka,

Funny thing about fox, did you know that in the last survey Fox News was rated as the most trusted news outlet? LOL!!! That must just kill you. One more thing, Hillary Clinton has repeatedly said that only Fox News treated her fairly. Man, that has to sting! Take.... take... you still there?

And number one rated cable news network for 11 years running with ratings larger than CNN and MSNBC combined. LMAO.

@iamstopper

So, what, Fox News can't be both rated "most trusted news outlet" and be full of misinformation at the same time? I'm sure Pravda was pretty well trusted in its time, too.

You're confusing high ratings with high factuality, unless your idea of news is whatever the greatest number of people tell you it is.

and dan rather and cbs was telling the truth about George Bush? The Democrats lie far worse than any republican and then cry harder and louder about the republican lie and act like they are the party of truth

"Ban illegals from our schools or charge them, fund US citizens ONLY and require full command of English language prior to entering school."

Wow, ammunition for the Progressives~Liberals who cannot, and will not, survive without the Latino vote and keep giving them social benefits like helping with In-State Tuition fees after their FREE public education.

Yep, I am getting tired of having to "Push 1 for English".

When you see the next Teacher's strike, ask them why they are standing on the corner waving their signs. Their answer: "It is all about the children".

Meanwhile, the High School graduation rates are really something for them to be proud about.

You want to ban the children of "illegal immigrants" from the schools. Okay--are you also going to ban the children of all people who cannot produce a birth certificate (many poor people do not have birth certificates), including people in Appalachia? Are you going to ban all children of people who cannot understand what you are talking about (including Native Americans who do not or refuse to speak English)?

Here is the relevant law:

The Court found that where states limit the rights afforded to people (specifically children) based on their status as immigrants, this limitation must be examined under an intermediate scrutiny standard to determine whether it furthers a substantial goal of the State. The application of Plyler v. Doe has been limited to K-12 schooling. Other court cases and legislation such as Toll v. Moreno 441 U.S. 458 (1979) and the Illegal Immigration Reform and Immigrant Responsibility Act of 1996^[2] have allowed some states to pass statues that deny undocumented students eligibility for in-state tuition, scholarships, or even bar them from enrollment at public colleges and universities.

What this means is that schools can ban the children of illegal immigrants if they can prove that there is a good reason. If there were a "substantial goal of the State," I think that someone would have come up with one in the thirty years since this court judgment.

In any case, while Hispanic women have more children than the average--they have about 2.5. That's hardly a "dozen," and many of the Hispanic children you see just happen to be the children of people who not only are citizens of the US, but whose families have been citizens for many, many years. Only about 1 in 5 Hispanics is illegal--and illegals do not vote--so it really kind of doesn't make a heck of a lot of sense to complain about the illegals voting for liberals.

The Hispanic population is a relatively large voting bloc--that is why Republicans are currently catering to them by being anti-gay. They also cater to them by being anti-woman (particularly birth control). If you haven't figured out yet that the current Republican moves against women's reproductive freedom and homosexuals--which is deeply supported by the Catholic church, which is the church for a big chunk of those Hispanics--then you aren't paying attention.

Democrats might court US citizens who are Hispanic by assuring them that their children will get an education whether or not they can produce a birth certificate and that they won't get treated like Jews in Germany (also "unwanted immigrants" who "weren't German"). Republicans court them by being anti-gay and anti-women's-reproductive-freedom. Have a great day.

That's the same BS we hear when we suggest that voters need to produce an ID. If they can't produce the $30 (more or less) then too damn bad, why'd they have children then? Because THEY certainly aren't able to pay for them.

The 'poor' ....oh my. So sick of it. I live in Los Angeles, our schools, hospitals, welfare and jails are FULL of illegals sucking off the American Taxpayer.

Somehow, I don't see opposition to "gay rights" as being part of a vast right-wing conspiracy to court the Hispanic vote, or the same people who feel that way would mostly be ardent supporters of the "DREAM" Act, and that's hardly the case, as you note. I think that this is just a case of both sides supporting the issues that come naturally to them. And Angela, while "I feel your pain", the Twenty-fourth Amendment says that there shall be no poll tax, and as a supporter of the Constitution, I can only follow it and, if I desire, lead a movement to repeal it. What I cannot do is IGNORE it.

And lastly, bean, I would question the last time that you were in Appalachia. While it is still well behind much of the country after a half-century of Appalachian Regional Commission do-gooderism (some of which, it must be said, actually did some good), it no longer produces a lot of children who are totally undocumented, except for those being born to its growing illegal immigrant population, for this group is pretty much everywhere there is hiring for physical labor at low wages which most Americans, even the most impoverished ones, won't touch.

I have some teacher friends and MSpielman you basically hit every talking point they get frustrated about of their job. Many of them have parents that believe that the teacher is to blame for their child's failure, not their own. They feel since the teachers are with them 5 days a week they are repsonsible. They tend to forget that the time spent with them is with about 100 other students for about 5-6 hours a week.

When I was school, my dad would ask me every night I dad if I had homework. I usually didn't, but he would ask several times to make sure. If one night I did, I would have to show him that the work was completed before I could watch tv or play video games. Sure enough, I graduated with a 3.9 GPA in high school.

I've gotta agree on some of these points. Honestly if it makes the parents feel better then more power to them, but I don't think that will make a difference. Who will the parents blame next when they take over the problem? If the kids are failing maybe just maybe the kids need more help and support. Are the parents doing all they can to advocate for their kids? Ensuring they are getting the extra help in and out of school? Or are they just complaining from the sidelines. Working in a special ed program for behavioral kids I see it all the time. Parents who enable bad behavior, kids who come from dysfunctional homes, kids who are in and out of state custody, kids who are so below grade level it makes me sick to my stomach. Is it the teachers fault, absolutely not. Once the kids leave our doors we have no control of what happens, we assign homework, it never gets done, we call home we get no answer, parents dont care so why should the kids? Unless that is their angel gets suspended or some other consequence then mom and dad show up to raise hell and threaten all who are present in front of their kids. They see this and the kids end up with absolutely no respect for teachers or administration or any sense of responsibility for their actions because they know the parents have their backs. In some cases its a loosing battle.

Then you have the parents and foster parents of these kids who go out of their way to make sure their child is given every opportunity in and out of school to succeed. They take an active role in the school, regularly attend meetings, take and active step in communicating with the school daily sometimes, they have our backs and believe in discipline and responsibility. Those are the kids who down the road will succeed in society, tough love perhaps, but the point is everyone is working towards the same goal, giving these kids the knowledge and skills they need. Heck in some instances we have kids throwing desks, chairs, books, fighting with peers swearing at staff when ever they don't get what they want, and of course some parents coddle them and point the finger at the teachers. *sigh*

The point...sometimes the parents are the root of the problem, enabling and passing the buck means your child will have no sense of responsibility. I believe of they "owned" their behavior more they will be more open to succeed. Parents please do right by your kids, think of your child's future and please don't let your ego blind you of what really matters.

I went on the US Census bureau site and discovered that this town is composed of58.3 % Hispanic residents (please note, I did not say CITIZENS) and the other +/- 40% is pretty evenly divided between whites and Blacks, with a Tiny smattering of Native Americans, Asians, and Pacific Islanders.

the town ALSO has 45.9 % of its residents who do NOT speak English at home. That's nearly HALF folks.

Add to that that the median per capita income is under $10K, and is it any wonder the schools are struggling? NO tax base, and half the students are 'special needs.'

I live in Central MO and my home town has "only" about 20% Hispanic, and our reading specialists are SO overwhelmed that a child who has an ACTUAL reading 'disability' is shuffled aside while the teachers struggle not only to teach the Hispanics ENGLISH, but also, for many, the ALPHABET. NOT just the K-1st graders, either.

Now, I'm not the best mom in the world, but my kids went to PRE- school knowing all the alphabet, numbers, colors and shapes, because the only TV they were allowed to watch was Sesame Street, the Electric Company et al.

And here's the kicker, I LIVED in Nicaragua as a teen ager, and I will FREELY admit that the best 'teacher' of Spanish for me was WATCHING TV in Spanish.

So all the parents in this town of Adelanto (which means going higher in Spanish) who CLAIM to be worried about how poorly their kids are doing, has it OCCURRED to them to TURN OFF the telemundo and other Spanish language TV???? To sit down with their kids and WATCH those PBS shows and help THEMSELVES while they are at it?

Until the parents are willing to do what is BEST for their kids at home, they cannot expect the best FROM their kids at school no matter HOW great the system is or how much money is spent.

And to those of Hispanic background who DO speak English, SHAME on them for not demanding that the others ALSO learn it. Speaking English IS the best hope for those kids EVER getting OUT of a town where the median income is SO low.

And maybe, just maybe, if the Hispanic kids all learn English, there will be more time for the reading specialists to help the Black students, and the white ones, who have ACTUAL reading difficulties such as dislexia.

Hispanics learn English. The first generation speaks it badly; the second generation speaks both Spanish and English; and the third generation speaks English as a first language with a smattering of Spanish.

How many "reading specialists" do you have? One? That's pretty typical for a school. Yes, a "reading specialist" is going to get overwhelmed with second language speakers because reading specialists aren't trained to teach second language speakers. They are trained to help dyslexics and others who have trouble reading.

If you don't have an TESL specialist, then you don't have a person who can teach English. In any case, is there a particular reason why you think that Hispanics aren't going to be citizens? Only about 1 in 5 Hispanics is an illegal immigrant. Once you get it out of your head that every Hispanic you see is an illegal--which is the same attitude that people in Germany had towards the "Jewish invasion"--you might feel a little less attacked.

All that means nothing without knowing the specifics. Again, charter schools consistently outperform public schools, even most home schooled kids outperform public schools.

This may be an isolated school but it is NOT an isolated problem. There is no running away from the fact that despite the highest per capita budgets in the world we are performing worse than many third world countries. There is no running away from the fact that when schools have hire/fire as well as salary authority over teachers, they do significantly better, not marginally, significantly.

You can make excuses all day long but that does not change the facts, good teachers do make a difference, competition does make a difference.

MSpielman thank you 100 times. The media seems very quick to jump on teachers, but you have clearly actually met teachers and listened.

Phil, where are you getting your facts? Because most of the actual studies show that charters DON'T out perform the public schools and we don't have any real facts on homeschooling because there is very little accountability for homeschooling by the states. Even the article said that charters don't out perform the public schools. So, where are you getting your numbers?

There are bad, evil teachers, all right. Now I will list all of the professions and occupations devoid of such persons:

Actually, in my experience, more teachers are good people than in most other walks of life. Most became teachers not because they thought that it would pay more than being an architect or a physician, but because they really wanted to teach children. Some can't, some burn out, and yes, a few lose their moral compass along the way. But the hardest thing they are called to do is to care about a child more than the child's parents do. While it isn't actually a crime, if a parent sends a kid with a normal mentality to kindergarten and has never tried to teach them even to tie their own shoes, learn at least the primary colors, concepts like "up" and "down", etc., they are truly guilty of child neglect. This is more commonplace than the truly horrible teacher is. However, some parents haven't even bothered to provide true toilet training. And this isn't often the hard-working single parent struggling to make ends meet and working two jobs, it's usually the lazy parent who's never grown up themself and is too "busy" video gaming, surfing the 'Net, etc., and living off of TANF, SNAP, and their OWN parents and/or other relatives. These people often come unglued at any attempt to "correct" any of their child's behavior (they almost never do until it becomes extreme, and then use physical violence). They don't know who's vice-president or where Iraq is or in what century the Civil War occurred, but they KNOW their "RIGHTS"! It doesn't take a roomfull of these people's kids to ruin everything -- ten per cent is more than sufficient.

If I'm guilty of stereotyping here, it's certainly of the cultural, rather than racial variety, and it's no less fair than characterizing all or most public school teachers as being a group of lazy union goons who just want to sit on their haunches, complain, and wait for retirement. While there certainly are such people, to imply that they are a majority or even a large minority of public school teachers is simplistic at best, slanderous at worst.

This sounds like a case where Home-Schooling may not be an option. It's not nearly as easy as it sounds; and it takes one parent, at least, completely out of the work force, which may not be financially possible for this group of parents.

oletnhhillbilly is right homeschooling is time consumeing for the parents and exspensive. i know cause im homeschooled and i can see the drain on my parents.

"I can agree with American-American. A very small portion of the fault may fall on the school but 90-95% falls on the parents. "

The very fact that parents care enough to take over the school proves that's a load of crap.

no, val, it's just their way of pointing at the school and saying, "it's them it's their fault!"

dwhat:

Please have them home school you on capitalization at least a little bit.

Somehow, I suspect the parents taking the lead in this for the most part probably can. At least I surely hope so.

Well I for one can't wait to see what these parents come up with that will be so much better than caring, hard-working educational professionals did. Let's track these kids and see how it all turns out. If they can do better, they'll become millionaires by selling ideas that actually work. Why didn't someone else think of that?

Saying the "best PUBLIC schools" isn't saying much. Every professional I knew in CA got their kids out of public schools as soon as they could afford it.

Well, Hal, like you, I remember Walt Kelley, and also learned a little Burns from my mother (a wee bit) and a little more from school, and always thought that Pogo's quote referred back humorously to the ship's captain (wasn't it Stephen Decatur?) who reported, "We have met the enemy, and he is ours."

Pogo 'Possum.

Would it really be so horrible, other than sounding like New Gingrich of course, to have some of the oldest students take responsibility for bathroom cleaning and give them some sort of reward or something for it? Not to exploit them as child labor, but to help them out and help the district save some money on janitorial staff that it could then put back into instruction.

Again, that is irrelevant to the root problem. This is but one failing school, as a whole our entire school system gets an F. You may be able to come up with an excuse for this school, not the entire nation.

Well, VP, the "big picture" is in fact a compendium of all of the little pictures, like this one. Just as some cannot see the forest for all of the trees, sometimes we fail to see the trees for the forest. Let's take this place as a mircocosm of a lot of what's wrong. I'm thrilled that there are parent activists in this place who recognize that it is their children and their problem, not someone else's, and are willing at least to try to step up to the plate and attempt to fix the situation. How can we fail to support these people? I've never been to this part of Southern California, but I've been to remote places in that state and elsewhere, and often, like inner-city areas, everyone's problems are the same ones most places face, only writ larger.

That's the kind of success needed in American schools --- all over America.

But it's because the caring parents (like you, mike) care to put their kids in this type of school, more than any other single factor. Show me a kid who is going to a school that it takes more than the usual effort to get into and stay in, and I'll most likely show you a kid with good parents, or at least a good parent. Who wouldn't want to teach or work otherwise at that school compared to the other one? A school mostly drawing the children of the better parents will then get the better teachers, and the cycle continues. However, I'd rather some of my taxes be well spent rather than that they mostly be wasted.