Here is a debate that is germane to our times.
Recently a video was widely distributed showing a police officer in South Carolina dragging a student out of her chair when she refused to obey orders. This incident, so vividly portrayed, generated much discussion about whether the police officer acted appropriately and whether schools should be patrolled by police.
Then came the heated discussion about suspending kindergarten children for breaking rules. This occurred after John Merrow interviewed charter founder Eva Moskowitz on PBS, and she defended the practice.
Now comes conservative economist Thomas Sowell, who argues in his syndicated column that schools are correct to use whatever discipline is needed to enable other children to learn.
Sowell writes:
“If the critics are right, and getting rid of the influence of uncooperative or disruptive students contributes to better educational results, then the answer is not to prevent charter schools from expelling such students, but to allow other public schools to remove such students, when other students can benefit from getting a better education without them around.
“This is especially important in low-income schools, where education is for many their only chance for a better life.”
Jonathan Pelto takes the opposite view. He argues that it is immoral and unethical for charters to “dump” students who might lower the school’s test scores.
Pelto writes:
“The undeniable truth is that while gobbling up massive amounts of scarce public funds, the vast majority of Charter Schools refuse to accept their fair share of students who need special education services and children who aren’t proficient in the English Language (So-called ELL students.)
“And when “the unwanted” do get into Charter Schools, the companies running the schools use immoral and unethical tactics to push out students that don’t fit their corporate profile.
“No real public school could ever engage in the abusive and unfair dumping practices that have become the norm in the Charter School Industry.
“In Connecticut, a leading example of a push-out strategy was the one utilized by the Achievement First Inc. Charter School chain. (See The “Shocking Numbers Of Kindergarten, First Grade Suspensions” at Achievement First Schools.)”
If charters continue to dump or exclude the students they don’t want, then they should be forbidden from comparing their scores to those of public schools that accept the students they reject.
Diane Ravitch's blog 
I’m sure Sowell would argue with little trouble that if studies showed that overall school performance were improved (measured by test scores, of course) by EXECUTING disruptive students, that would be fine with him and completely philosophically justified.
Who would choose to put their child in a classroom with disruptive children? Nobody really.
Okay, TC. . . so what conclusion do you draw? What happens to “disruptive” children? Does my “execution” suggestion resonate? If not, surely you have a plan for them.
Who would choose to put their house in a neighborhood with disruptive neighbors? Nobody really.
Does that analogy help highlight the problem for you in any way?
Because at some point something has to happen to either the disruptive, the disrupted, or both. And I’m not quite hearing a strategy that goes beyond “get rid of the bums.” I’ve seen plenty of that in various high needs classrooms, schools, and districts, but those who are “gotten rid of” don’t actually vanish from the face of the earth. So what, exactly, DOES happen to them? Sooner or later, they appear SOMEWHERE. Another classroom, school, or district. Maybe a workplace. Maybe a jail cell. What does Mr. Sowell favor? How about you?
Here is what charter schools do NOT want people to look at:
HOW MANY at-risk students do they classify as “disruptive” at age 5?
At Success Academy, where parents are told in no uncertain terms what is expected of them BEFORE they enroll their children, they lose as many as 50% of the starting K cohort. The exact percentage of at-risk Kindergarten children who disappear by 4th or 5th grade is kept a big dark secret I would not be surprised if it is even higher. And I would not be surprised of the % of middle class kids who disappear is a fraction of that.
Remember, when charter school chains lose 50% of their at-risk students, they are losing 50% of the at-risk student with the MOST MOTIVATED AND INVOLVED PARENTS! So if all at-risk students –and not JUST the ones with motivated parents — were in charter schools, no doubt 75% or 90% would be considered “disruptive” and dumped by charters at age 5 or 6.
The myth is that 5% or 10% of the kids “ruin” the learning of other children. But in charter schools, “50% or more” of those at-risk kids supposedly ruin the learning. It is imperative that charter folks are forced to be honest about how common it is to classify a child as disruptive when he is poor, and how unusual it is to classify a child as disruptive when he is white and middle class.
Petrilli is perfectly content if charters only educate 10% of the at-risk kids if that’s alls the charter schools fine are cheap enough to get good scores without needing any extra expense. We need to make sure that the public realizes how many 5 year olds are considered to be unteachable by charter schools and their desire to be special schools for the well-behaved 10% of at-risk kids. Or 20%. Or 1%. or .10%. Charter folks don’t want anyone to look too closely at how many students who are at-risk are not their kind of child.
Wait. Isn’t the purpose of charters supposed to include developing successful strategies that can be scaled up in traditional schools?
So if the student dumping strategy works for charters, …
If certain charter schools were honest about the % of students they dump and replace ONLY with students they “test” before allowing them to join their grade level, no one would support them anymore. Especially when public schools could run those kinds of schools for far less money.
These are excellent points NYCPSP!
One other important point that paints the full picture of discipline in the charter system (especially Success Academies) is the unbelievably intolerant threshold established for “disruptive” behavior. Dropping pencils. Smiling/laughing. Talking. Walking out of a straight line. Blinking. Bad posture.
Multiple layers of selectivity until voila, an elite army of little test taking machines.
Even if it were legal, what professional educator would ever want this for any parent or community?
This is the primary appeal of charter schools.
The reason teachers are often stuck with disruptive students was because of pressure from the media and then legislation and court verdicts that stripped teachers of options to deal with these difficult at risk children.
Restrictions that limited how to deal with these students. Added paperwork to record the student behavior. Not allowed to send these kids to the office to talk to a VP or counselor. Not allowed to punish them in the classroom. Only allowed to call parents and most of the time the parents of these children wee as bad or worse than their kid explaining why the kid was a problem.
And this manipulated and politically correct pressure was around as early as the 1980s—as if were all a part of the plan and agenda to destroy the public schools.
One of the worst autocratic principals I worked with, who was doing what the top down district administration wanted, used a flip chart at a staff meeting that clearly said if kids misbehaved in the classroom disrupting the learning environment, it was ALWAYS the teacher’s fault because it was evidence the teacher could not control the children. He had a closed door policy. Never send those kids to the office. Solve the problems by yourself or you are a failure as a teacher.
For instance, one day while I was taking roll and I was sitting down to record roll on the scan tron and in my roll book, I noticed several girls jerking up in their desks one after another like jujmping jacks and some of them squeaked in a startled way. I had to stand up to see what was going on. One of the 7th grade boys who was 12/13 years old was crawling along the floor out of sight biting the girls ankles. I saw it with my own eyes.
I called the office as I was writing the boy up on a referral. I was told it was my problem. I called the parent and ended up talking to the mother who called me a liar.
The kid had the biggest smile plastered on his face because he was like James Bond, he had a license to misbehave and disrupt the class and get loads of attention without getting in trouble and who was lectured and accused of being incompetent and a failure—the teachers. At the end of that school year, half of the staff retired early, quit and left to work in another profession or found a teaching position in another district.
In my last position, where I had tenure, and was already celebrated in NYC, in order to harass me to quit, the principal used parents… so when I called for a parent conference, he was always present and he interfered and intentionally caused parents to bully me.
Luckily, there were very few troubled kids in this magnet school, where we hand-picked almost every student who applied, after watching them in our class for a week. We took kids with low test scores if they were motivated and interested. We were not an elitist school, but we were a tiny school on the 5th floor of a public school, and had little money, no technology , and no support staff to deal with behavioral or learning disabilities of any kind. We offered a place, within a public school, where neighborhood children could learn from a small but professional staff of great experience and quality. It worked.
It has ALWAYS been my experience that when kids learned and loved the process, it was ALWAYS because of a dedicated and passionate teacher working endless and long hours—not the technology, not the tests, not the glossy new textbooks, and not the top-down forced curriculum that teachers often abhor and protest. I have witnessed many teachers succeeding even with the worst possible autocratic, toxic management runs their schools.
YES! Exactly… but not every teacher has the talent to engage children. I believe that it is a gift. But it is possible to offer teachers a curriculum that does not make learning deadly. When you and I were novices, we still wrote lesson plans that began wit MOTIVATION!.. Motivating children today, is a whole different story… but they are still children, and curious and anxious to learn.
Lloyd, I think today, I would fail, too.
Almost all teachers are failures today because failure has been engineered from the top. The oligarchs decided how many would be failures and made it so with an arbitrary number and tools designed to achieve that agenda called NCLB, RTTT, Common Core Crap and high stakes tests..
Exactly. You and I and Diane , and those who post and read here know it. Millions of teachers and parents know it…
It is no secret. As Lenny Isenberg says to me all the time EVERYBODY KNOWS IT!
But the EIC owns the media, and the people are stressed, busy an totally ignorant, SO THEY BARELY KNOW WHAT I SGOING ON IN THE SCHOOLS down the road, let alone in the other 15,88o districts.
. They are confused by the plethora of noise and opinions on the complex subject of HOW THE HUMAN BRIAN LEARNS and WHAT DOES REAL LEARNING LOOK LIKE.
Most folks, even educated smart ones, are equally confused on the subjects of law, medicine and the sciences, that is why they NEED professionals to explain the truth.
In education the explanations come from the very charlatans and liars whose objective is to end public education. To allude to Orwell’s “Animal Farm,”the pigs are the ones posting all the ‘news’ in the barn, and the animals know only what they want them to.
Sigh.
But the word is getting out and some of the people who were confused are not confused any more. The growth in the Opt Out movement in New York state and other states across the country is proof. From 60k to 220k in New York State in one year is dramatic evidence that the truth is spreading but spreading through 6 degrees of separation, the fringe media that the six corporations don’t control and through social media on the internet.
Lincoln knew what he was talking about when he said “You can’t fool most of the people all of the time.” Only some of them.
The corporate education reform demolition derby movement knew this from day one and that’s why they used stealth and lies to push it through and bypassed the democratic process because they knew there would be only a limited amount of time to destroy the public schools and replace them before a majority of the public woke up. They were counting on winning this war in the shadows and then shrugging and saying, “There’s nothing you can do now to get your old schools back. They are gone. Sorry. Now give us your money.
Imagine where we would be now without Diane’s books, blog and media appearances where she warned us that “The Redcoats are Coming.” I think Diane is the Paul Revere of the 21st century. She rang the bell and the Minutemen came running ready to fight to preserve the U.S. Republic and its democracy. Those Minutemen were the start. Now we have a growing army and if these corporate frauds and their billionaire oligarchs don’t see what’s coming and start to retreat and melt into the background and vanish, that army will become better organized and most of us know what happened to those Redcoats and their oligarch King George.
Of course. That is why we continue to be the greater fools. But it is a slog. I do get people at Oped who thank me for illuminating the destruction, but then I got this one today on the link to Peter Green’s TeachStrong post: http://www.opednews.com/Quicklink/CURMUDGUCATION-Teach-Stro-in-Best_Web_OpEds-Lies-Liars_Peter-Greene_Real-Democracy_Reform-151110-171.html
the commenter wrote:
“I think Congress voted not to close Guantanamo for a reason. There must be a way to deal with teachers who have not met their benchmarks. The point is this, though. The system is overburdened with agendas. The harder it tries to right itself, the more unbalanced it becomes. The problem is that the public education system is part and parcel of a wobbly system. It’s one that has no room for innovation, lest the tottering boat capsizes. But people will keep on trying.”
I
replied with this, which at the post has embedded links to everything http://www.opednews.com/Quicklink/CURMUDGUCATION-Teach-Stro-in-Best_Web_OpEds-Lies-Liars_Peter-Greene_Real-Democracy_Reform-151110-171.html
You are obviously unaware that the failure of the schools was planned.
The agendas came from the Education Industrial Complex which all of us who experienced the destruction knew existed, but now is being uncovered,… except in the media.https://greatschoolwars.files.wordpress.com/2015/10/eic-oct_11.pdf
The problem is that there are 15,880 local districts, and this divisions ripe for those who want the legislatures to take over the schools…https://dianeravitch.net/?s=legislature
with no educators on board.
Go to my series and learn. Educators not business men and politicians need to guide education
Click to access editors_note.pdf
https://dianeravitch.net/?s=legislature
If you wish to acquaint yourself with the 30 year war on public education, and what it takes for kids to learn, and HOW authentic evaluation worked in the schools, then go to the Ravitch blog https://dianeravitch.net/?s=Privitizationor the NPE and learn.
And if you read my links regularly, you know I report on the fraud being perpetrated on our people, as the NCLB act is used to destroy our public schools.
Go to my author’s page, http://www.opednews.com/author/author40790.html and see my resume, and read my articles… learn., because soon, it will be too late, and the agenda of those who know that democracy depends on shared knowledge will win
Click to access hirsch.pdf
Good thought out calm reply. I would have probably been combative and eventually been accused of an ad hominem attack if the commenter was incapable of learning from the facts and evidence.
I have to be civil there; it is not a blog but a news site. Argument is encouraged and links required. Trolls are discouraged, but clueless people abound and are sincerely stupid…if there is such a thing.
I think there is such a thing. These are people who are ruled by the bias they grew up with and they don’t operate through evidence based reason or logic.
This is the century of lies and liars, and evidence-based journalism is a thing of the past.
How is anyone to know what is true>
A good line in Today’s NY Times: ” partisan voices have emerged, injecting rumors and outright lies into the public arena, with no consequence.”
http://www.nytimes.com/2015/11/13/opinion/beat-the-press.html?_r=0
I am going to sleep. I am exhausted by what I see happening.
The best way to live with this is to perceive this insanity, corruption, greed and grab for manipulative power as an observer—as if you were a visitor to the earth from another planet, a celestial being.
For in the end, we are all just visitors here for a limited length of time and then gone. There is nothing we can do to alter the past and eventually we won’t be here for the future. Live life a day at a time and if the day goes well, then count your blessing for that day well lived and the next day starts when you awake.
I have come to the same conclusion. Otherwise the chaos will overwhelm me. I am off to photograph the Everglades, and to celebrate Thanksgiving under the sky. It is a great privilege to have a wise friend in cyberspace. Thank you.
If the student sincerely wants to learn and is not ROBBING another student’s rights to an education, then by all means keep ’em in school…but if he/she is an asshole…kick ’em out …. schools are a place of learning, NOT PARENTING….if the parents don’t do their job then some other entity needs to step up, NOT THE SCHOOL…why should students who want to learn be hostages of the few assholes that bring teaching to a HALT and steal teaching time from a teacher’s timetable?
This is to Lloyd, there is a special place in hell for Admins, principals especially, who turn their back on teachers who have continually disruptive students…I blame the Principals, Admins for the decline of the American Public school system !!!
True, but those admins aren’t alone. There are also teachers who fall into line because they too fear the end of a regular pay check. Fear is a big motivator. When I was still teaching, school site admins pulled me aside more than once with no witnesses around and warned me that the district admins were out to get me because I was too outspoken and critical of the way they ran the district. They knew that the orders they were getting from the top were wrong and some of them agreed to implement the orders and then didn’t (but some did against their own conscience)—and eventually those site admins who didn’t axe outspoken teachers like me lost their jobs causing a big impact on the others so they would fall into line with the authoritarian autocrats workign out of the district office. Fear is a big motivator when you have a family to house and feed.
With the extreme right—fed endless hate mongering media propagandist funded by a few nut-case billionaires like the Koch brothers Eli Broad and the Waltons—attacking the social safety net to dismantle it, how many Americans live one pay check away from poverty and possible homelessness?
According to Market Watch.com, 62% of Americans have no emergency savings. That is almost 200 million people. For instance, after the theft of billions that caused the 2007-08 global financial crises, nine million Americans lost their jobs and from January 2007 to December 2011 there were more than four million completed foreclosures and more than 8.2 million foreclosure starts ….
And NBC News reported in 2013:
Already some 5 million homes have been lost to foreclosure; estimates of future foreclosures range widely. [Moody’s Analytics chief economist Mark Zandi], who has followed the mortgage mess since the housing market began to crack in 2006, figures foreclosures will strike another three million homes in the next three or four years.
Follow the money. Billionaire oligarchs like Eli Broad are funding candidates for local school board elections to gain control of elected school boards. Those school board members, when they become the majority, then hire administrator like Broad Academy graduates to run the districts and schools.
To stop this reign of fear, local voters have to be educated when a Broadie, for instance, ends up being considered to run a district or a school and the parents and teachers must then protest every way possible to stop that Broadie from being hired. All the oligarchs need is a one vote majority on a school board to destroy that public school district from within, and fear is their best weapon once they get started.
Of course it is the sociopath at the bottom who gets to rule over teachers, but the civil rights abuse that was the process that took out oer a hundred thousand teachers in the nineties, is what allows them to do that today… you just don’t know that this happened http://www.perdaily.com/2011/01/lausd-et-al-a-national-scandal-of-enormous-proportions-by-susan-lee-schwartz-part-1.html
to teachers like me
http://www.opednews.com/author/author40790.html and her
https://lornastremcha.wordpress.com/2016/03/21/what-people-need-to-understand-about-workplace-abuse-bullying/
IN America, in the educational workplace, there is no accountability for a principal, so setting up a teacher to be assaulted is fine!
READ HER BOOK.https://www.linkedin.com/pulse/background-information-bravery-bullies-blowhards-lorna-stremcha
This goes to an entire argument about heterogeneous grouping vs. homogenous grouping of students. As I learned in university, the big issue is when you put students that have had success in school (doing their assignments and completing the tests basically) with students that have trouble (low attendance, disruptive/behavioral issues) – both groups benefit from the former (that is, good students benefit more from being with good students, but, poor students do better with good students in the room – lots of theories on culture of learning etc).
So the question is, knowing this, do we throw the academically successful kids in with less successful ones (where they still do succeed generally), or, separate them and let them have the maximum advantage of being with high performing peers.
It isn’t easy because it comes down to whether you favor bringing up everyone including the lowest, or, letting individuals take maximum advantage of their gifts in comprehending information (there is little room for a hybrid of something like homogenous grouping but the high kids tutor the lower ones – just too inconsistent).
What we do know, is that when you group a lot of low performing kids together, changing the culture they build together is extremely difficult (some take pride in not doing well – no role model for doing well, sometimes parents had bad experiences in schools and impress that on children, other reasons).
That was why when I was coming up through the ranks heterogeneous grouping was the thing. It seems like homogeneous is making a comeback.
“It isn’t easy because it comes down to whether you favor bringing up everyone including the lowest…”
“The lowest.” The lowest what, exactly? And who is to judge?
Blind obedience is not always smart–this philosophy is how bad people come into and stay in power just because they have the “resources” to make the rules.
I say, whoever’s child is without sin, cast the first stone. What’s that? All children challenge from time to time? No kidding?
Lowest meaning lowest ability – homogeneous vs. heterogeneous grouping is on the presumption of grouping kids of similar ability together to concentrate resources efficiently, or, diversifying the kids so you have a mix of abilities so they have the experience of working with people of higher and lower levels.
What this often turns into, is the kids who are behavior problems often have academic problems so you concentrate kids who are having chronic behavior issues.
You also draw an extreme with “blind obedience” – it’s not about blind obedience – there’s a difference between a student who disagrees with a teacher and one that acts out chronically to disrupt learning – there are numerous examples (refusing to engage in work of any kind, socializing inappropriately, outbursts, violence) and those are hard to ignore. There may be numerous reasons why students have those issues, but at the end of the day as a teacher you need to work with them.
It also isn’t about “being without sin” – a child who has a bad day is different from a child that never gives an inch to helping themselves grasp material or concepts. We have students who are high school seniors but with the credits of a freshmen – it happens and it’s real. Those students didn’t help themselves, because I’d be hard pressed to believe that every teacher they have gave up on them. Those students often either don’t show up, or refuse to do anything when they get there, and sometimes do things that are counterproductive for themselves and others.
There is research supporting both approaches, but, generally, a student that works hard to learn material (even if they have problems with the teacher but still do the work and show up to school), perform better than those that can’t find their way to be successful in pretty much any classroom. And those students that learn the material (even if they have behavior issues but still develop the ability to work with others, and succeed in academic environments), help those who don’t do that.
Filling a classroom with students that underachieve and have experienced chronic failure takes a different approach and different resources. Public schools have a large mix, and often not the resources to cope with the differences (put it on the teacher with differentiated instruction is the usual response).
I dunno, I believe that both groups benefit equally from each other, although it’s a hard argument to make, especially when academic success is the only definition of success. My older daughter has been in a class this year and last with several boys who have various diagnosed and undiagnosed issues. I’ll admit I was pretty unhappy about the situation last year as it didn’t seem like she was learning anything. But then they got a classroom aide to help with the behavior issues, and then this year the teacher is much stronger in dealing with those kids, plus we have a part-time social worker who also serves as an aide in the class for small periods every day. Her academic work this year is right back where it should be, perhaps even ahead, so she wasn’t negatively affected by last year’s disruption.
But more important is the person I’ve seen her becoming. She still gets annoyed with the boys a lot, but she also now sees them as fellow human beings with strengths in their own right and she appreciates them in their own way. She has become very compassionate and she’ll be the first to stand up for them if need be. She’s also learned that her education is hers, regardless of what the other kids are doing (or not doing). She’s able to deal with the distraction but still focus on what she wants to get out of each day.
Now, granted, this is a small progressive school and there’s only 14 kids in the class. The kids aren’t necessarily doing the same things at the same time, so she’s not missing out on a lesson while the teacher is dealing with the boys. I understand the predicament that public school teachers and students are in when there’s 30+ kids in the class with little or no outside support, so if a few kids disrupt the class for significant periods, the others really are losing out. But, in my opinion, the solution isn’t to get rid of the “bad” kids, but to make all schools more like my daughters’ school. Sure, it would be difficult and expensive, but it’s difficult to invade and occupy foreign countries too and we seem to have no problem doing that.
Incidentally, I should add that most of these boys are, academically speaking, extremely bright. Our school doesn’t do standardized testing, but I imagine most of these boys would score very well. So would charters throw them out for their disruptions, or let their disruptions slide because of their high test scores?
The public schools will suggest they get on Ritalin. At least that’s what ours does.
The charter schools would put up with them if they could score high on state tests. They would suspend them over and over again until their parent got the message if they would score low on state tests. Sometimes charter schools mis-judge a 1st grader but the one thing “successful” charter schools put plenty of resources into is to identify the top scoring students on state tests at a young age. If you are an upper middle class parent whose gifted boy acts out a little bit, the charter school teacher happily ignores it. Or if it really gets bad, one parent used to post on boards that she was allowed to choose the day of her child’s suspension so it was convenient for her work schedule! But if you are an African-American child struggling to learn and your parents didn’t attend fancy colleges, or perhaps any college, every time you don’t track the teacher with your eyes is punished until you are so miserable you leave. Charter schools don’t believe you are gifted (although your gifts may emerge later), and you aren’t worth their time.
When someone finally compares the number of white middle class children labeled “disruptive” and the number of low-income African-American children labeled “disruptive” at some of the highest scoring charter schools, it will be clear the biases that are there.
Reblogged this on David R. Taylor-Thoughts on Education.
I still remember the time when I had an uncontrollable child in my first grade class. He was placed with a foster parent and assigned to my school. On the first day he told me that his grandmother had thrown his pet cat out of the fifth floor window and the child watched it hit the ground.
This child was extremely disruptive. He screamed, hit and hid under the desk. He could not concentrate on his work but would not “allow” others to do so either. While he was in my class I was working with his social worker to have him evaluated for a school for the severely emotionally disturbed. Soon, though, his foster mother decided she couldn’t handle him either so she gave him up. I never saw the child again but I’ve never forgotten him. He would be in his thirties now. Is he living a normal life?
To me the answer is obvious: Yes, every child has a right to an orderly classroom so disruptive students should be removed. On the other hand, those disruptive children are often children in deep pain who deserve our help. The solution is to provide orderly classrooms for ALL children with special therapeutic learning environments for those who need it.
Again, we need to look closely at HOW MANY children are labeled as unteachable or disruptive at age 5. The charter schools with the top scores aren’t getting rid of 1 or 2 disruptive kids. They are getting rid of large cohorts of low-income children with the most motivated parents.
There is no way that 20% or 25% of the 5 year old children whose parents were motivated enough to seek out another school for them are violent. But that is what we are all supposed to believe. And that even more of them are “unteachable” as they continue to 4th grade and disappear.
Disruptive students sometimes need to go to an alternative or more restrictive setting, but this should only be done only when a school has exhausted other tactics such as behavioral plans, meetings with parents, and other punitive actions. If students are hurting others, then they must go to another setting sooner rather than later, in my opinion. We have an obligation to make sure all students are kept safe.
The behavior of some of my Pre-K and Kindergarten students has many times been so out of control that it would have traumatized me when I was young. The other students are clearly upset by these students and either sit there stunned or try to “fix” it.
Identification of students with severe issues should take place early and they should be placed in classrooms that are less upsetting to them, where suppot and structure are available and where the student who works through his or her difficulties can reenter a less restrictve setting. I have seen this done successfully with ongoing support for the student but of course it takes money and some years there isn’t any.
I teach Pre-K – 5th and it is really scary and sad to see the young ones coming into to school so distraught.
Schools have to be given resources, including staff, to deal with students who disrupt the learning of peers. Teachers, unsupported, cannot be all things to all students.
Programs like “restorative justice” are viable only if supported with whatever it takes to make it work.
“Programs like “restorative justice” are viable only if supported with whatever it takes to make it work.”
I agree. Without real support it’s just “advice” from lawmakers as far as I’m concerned. If they prioritize it they’ll fund it. If they don’t, they won’t.
Or maybe public schools could reach some kind of middle ground that everyone can live with? There is a huge space between throwing people to the ground and expelling anyone who ever disrupts a class and sane mechanisms to keep order that consider the needs of all the students. Like every public entity, public schools are a balancing act- everyone doesn’t get exactly what they want. I’m not at all surprised that they’re moving away from zero tolerance- it was way too extreme and had unintended consequences as far as bias against certain students.
If charter schools want to carve out some space where they aren’t really public but aren’t really private- if they want to be selective publicly-funded schools- then argue that honestly, but pretending that the vast majority of public schools have that luxury just isn’t true. We have a vocal minority of parents who want expulsions. We also have a larger group who worry about unintended consequences. Both of those groups have to be heard.
Does one student have the right to keep 29 others from learning? In short, NO. But does removing that student from school completely do anything to help that student.
The end goal of discipline is to improve the behavior and the academic success of all students. In most cases students that are discipline problems have an underlying reason for their behavior, most have academic deficiencies they are trying to hide. There are a few that just don’t fit in the normal school setting and need an alternative setting.
In most poor school, the classes are larger which creates more discipline problems. To improve overall discipline problems, begin by reducing the class sizes to 25 or smaller. In my district in Texas, my classes average 38, which is too many.
I would also say that for relatively minor disruptions it’s an important thing for students to learn- everyone isn’t exactly like them and dealing with distractions or different people is just a part of life.
My eldest son was a very good student and he complained about disruptive students but honestly he is too rigid, which he admits now that he’s an adult. I think he benefited from having to learn to deal with other people. It isn’t all about him, and his “optimum learning environment”. There are other people who have to be considered.
Agreed. It seems that there are two different conversation that should take place. One regarding disruptive students and another about unsuccessful students. Charter schools are attempting to control their population in order to skew results. This is causing a problem in their communities because students are being dismissed from charter schools because of their inability to pass standardized tests. Others are being dismissed for relatively minor infractions.
I agree that class size is a key element to having a positive classroom environment. Poor students that often have layers of problems usually get quite the opposite. This is counterproductive.
If I ever get to a point of finishing my PhD, then I think that this will be my research project; Compare classroom size to the level of socioeconomic status. It will most likely be a just a confirmation of what we all believe to be the reality.
Here’s a start. Here in the Show Me State the Clayton school district (one of the richest if not the richest) spends about $20,000/student and has a ratio of 1/11. Our rural district spends about $8,000/student and has a 1/22 ratio.
Yep. You’re making this easy. Where are you in MO?
In the beautiful Missouri River Hill Country of Southern Warren County (basically about an hour west of St. Louis out Interstate 70) on the north side of the Missouri River.
Are you familiar with Missouri?
Yes. Grew up in Kansas. My brother lives outside KC in Lees Summit. Traveled a lot of miles on I-70
Got a few stories about hitchhiking along I-70. Ah, the “Goodle days”!
I for one welcome the rheephormsters actually saying what they really think.
I don’t think they always realize that they are confirming every harsh criticism made of the entire rheephorm movement’s words and deeds.
For example, that they are wedded to a perverse form of educational triage: determine who can be the most successful [by narrow and misleading metrics] with the least expense and throw out the rest of those young human beings like so much garbage.
Or how about “it’s all for the kids” and “no excuses” and “grit” and “rigor”? No, it’s really about excusing rheephormsters from the “grit” and “rigor” of dealing with the most (or any) problematic students in order to excuse themselves from doing the hard work and providing the necessary resources that genuine learning and teaching entails.
Charters and other rheephorm gimmicks are the “rising tide that lifts all boats.” Sure, after swamping so many students that are contemptuously dismissed with labels like “non-strivers” (Michael J Petrilli) and “uneducables” (Rahm Emanuel) with the tsunami of rheephorm, the lucky few will benefit from not being entirely beaten down. Not that that’s any great improvement: they will be taught low-level skills and obedience training—as if they were animals.
I could go on but I think folks get my drift…
And I must conclude with the following: this sort of self-wounding honesty comes just at the time that the heavyweights of the self-styled “education reform” movement are trying to charterize half of LAUSD. You know, by putting a happy face on the wonders and marvels of rheephorm…
😏
Talk about about bad timing for them to actually start speaking their minds!
Apparently fans of John Steinbeck:
“Man is the only kind of varmint sets his own trap, baits it, then steps in it.”
The irony, in this case, is delicious.
😎
I haven’t read all of this yet, but my experience on the discipline front is that public schools find plenty of ways to “kick kids out” without actually using those words. Classrooms filled with “In School Suspension” kids learning nothing, for example. –peter meyer
Just not true. We are talking children who are 5, 6 and 7 years old. And it isn’t getting rid of one or two — charter schools are claiming that 20% or more of these low-income kids with the most motivated, involved parents are all unteachable and disruptive. And it’s not just the 20% of 5 year olds suspended — it is that by the time they get to 4th or 5th grade, half of those Kindergarten kids or more may be MIA. I have great sympathy for teachers who want to have someone else deal with the kids with the real behavioral problems. But when huge cohorts of your school has those kids, despite having the advantage of 100% of them having involved and motivated parents, then there is something wrong with your school.
With the federal government cracking down on out of school suspensions, a lot of schools are severely limiting the amount of in school suspensions, too. It takes an act of Congress to send a student to ISS in my district.
The number of seriously misbehaved, chronically disruptive students in most schools is relatively small. When a child is so damaged that no reasonable behavior plan can keep them under control. then the public school mainstream classroom is simply an unsuitable placement. In-house or off campus alternate learning (ALP) programs are a viable alternative to expulsion or repeated suspension. The small city school district I teach in has worked with a few near by districts to create a successful, off campus, shared services, ALP program for high school students.
Yes!
At least in my state, it’s nearly impossible to do this. My school has two very disruptive, violent students. They are both on IEPs. But my state has drastically cut the amount of money spent on special education, so these students are mainstreamed for a lot of classes. I had both of them together in my general education class last year, and it was awful. I sometimes had another teacher there, but not always, and I felt terrible for the general education students. But there was not a lot that I could do. I could not get rid of the two students.
If Charter Schools receive public money, then their discipline procedures should, must, be the same as public schools. The same Student Code of Conduct that guides Miami-Dade Public Schools should/must be the same guideline for all CS in MD county.
We, as a society and as educators, need to ensure all students are treated the same in schools that are funded with public monies. To let some schools exclude and kick out students, forcing them back to their home public schools is unjust (and then to boast about better test scores, when the sample is now skewed right, is a wicked and sinful use of statistics).
That being said, after teaching 25 years and seeing more and more irresponsible behavior and an “I don’t care attitude”, makes me (as a tax payer) wonder, “where does one draw the line and kick out students who waste tax monies because they don’t even try or care?”
Education is a privilege, not a right; and though one is taxed for it I believe if a student does not maintain a basic standard of responsibility, then they are “abusing tax payers, spitting in their faces”, and should lose their “right” to their education.
I don’t want to be vindictive or judgmental, but without some minimum standard of conduct to continue to “waste” money on a chronically-insubordinate student is a loss of tax payer investment, a travesty of funds, and it teaches the student that there is no minimum standard (that they can expect to act that way in a job, one day, and not get fired?)
If we are training them to be responsible, then maybe “firing” a few recalcitrant-types would send the message to the public and families that we expect them to do their part; otherwise, they have broken social-contract with the public schools and have lost the privilege of those schools, and must go out now and pay for a private education.
Now, creating a board or committee to decide such things is opening “Pandora’s Box”.
Rick,
“Education is a privilege, not a right. . . ”
That is 100% wrong. Education as provided for by each state’s constitution is a constitutionally guaranteed right, not a privilege. Go through your state’s constitution, read the wording. Education is a right!
and:
“. . . and should lose their “right” to their education. . . . they have broken social-contract with the public schools and have lost the privilege of those schools,”
No, they haven’t lost “the privilege”, they still have the right. Even incarcerated students have the right to an education provided they are of the right age as defined in the state’s constitution.
It is the state’s responsibility to each child to provide the education. Your “recalcitrant-types” cannot be denied their constitutional rights. We-the state-need to supply that appropriate education. The supposed extra costs produce benefits that far outweigh not providing those rights (not that that utilitarian argument holds much sway in my mind) and dealing with the aftermath of uneducated citizens. Hell, you might as just declare that they are now considered to be slaves and auction them off to the highest bidder.
Ageed Duane, good points. I know I was “going out on a limb” and making erroneous conclusions; but I did so just to illustrate a problem (the lack of accountability for families benefiting from a free public education). I know education is a “right” but to what degree can that right get abused and yet still provided? Can, and when, could an individual be told, “sorry, tax-payers (the collective) expect and demand more responsible behavior, and you have failed too often, so go and pay your own way”. Is that even an option? Are we encouraging irresponsible behavior in some, because the “return, open door” is not the “punishment they need”. I agree the State is obliged to educate, but without any minimum criteria? And then, even after taxpayers money is spent trying to educate, some end up in jail anyways? We’ll never solve these issues, but having a dialogue like this may help provide better results for some.
Maybe, if some knew they might/could lose their right to a free education they would act more responsibly?
“Is that even an option?”
Constitutionally speaking NO! Logically speaking, again, NO!
This country has more than enough wealth to provide for all the types of services, whether health, mental, social, etc. . . that a person may need. It is our ethical, moral and constitutional obligation to do so. Now after the age, as defined in each state’s constitution, then “all bets are off” and the person can choose what path they do with the resulting consequences as defined by law if their actions are egregious enough. We will still be paying for it but that is part of the price of living in society unless we wish to unleash the barbarian in us (and we’ve seen that before: Pol Pot, Mao, Stalin, Hitler, and many other regimes throughout time and space).
As to your last question, no I don’t think that would have any effect on anyone as irrational behavior doesn’t seek guidance in rational thought.
Thanks again, Duane. My knowledge of legal and contractual/constitutional obligations the State has to educate is limited, and I’m appreciative of your input and correction. Yes, “it takes a village to raise a child”, and until adulthood the village is obligated toward the child.
I’ve got to go back and redo all my work on each state’s constitution mandates for public education as I lost the work I had done in putting all the constitutional wording together when my last computer bit the dust. I’ve been lax at that, it was probably at least an eight hour day’s worth of work. One of these days this ol hard head will learn to back up his work in multiple locations.
As difficult as they are, children who are disruptive have the same civil right as their more-typical peers to receive a free and appropriate public education in the least restrictive environment. It is that simple.
When charters refuse to recognize this right, it is just one more piece of evidence (along with their lack of transparency, etc.) that they are not in any way, shape or form, PUBLIC institutions.
Let’s not confuse the fact that these children and their teachers are all too often not provided with the supports they need for a successful school experience with anything else.
Whatever methods to enable teachers to teach? Not in LA,! You must read this. by LennY isenberg in LA, about SPOTLIGHT!
http://www.perdaily.com/2015/11/reporters-at-la-times-find-it-hard-to-report-when-truth-is-not-an-option.html
molestation scandal that was allowed to run rampant for far too long because of the power of the Catholic Church, it actually has a much more insightful message. This message is about how power functions in the absence of any accountability. And this seems to be a lesson that has not been learned yet when one sees how the Los Angeles Times and other commercial and public media nationwide still continue to systematically ignore, twist, or downright censor the relevant facts necessary for the citizens of this country to meaningfully understand the stories in the news. In order words, 1st Amendment be damned, if telling a complete and controversial true piece of news would lead to real public accountability for those running mega-corrupt organizations, it will not be told. So, the only problem I have with an incredibly well done movie like Spotlight is that it still maintains the illusion that truth will out, which is clearly no longer the case in this country.
The most recent example of distorted news comes from Los Angeles Times reporters Teresa Watanabe and Howard Blum’s Sunday, November 8th front page article entitled “Disorder In The Classroom,” where they write a whole article about an increasingly serious epidemic of willful student increased violence and defiance of school authority in light of a counterintuitive LAUSD decision to eliminate student suspensions or pretty much anything else as a consequence.
While something referred to in the article as “restorative justice” is mentioned as the panacea replacing suspension and any other forms of consequences for what is becoming more and more outrageous student defiant behavior, other than saying restorative justice “seeks to resolve conflicts through talking circles and other methods to build trust,” the article in no way goes into any depth as to how this is actually going to work and succeed.
In fact, the article even attempts to unjustifiably tout restorative justice with no evidence by citing lessening suspension statistics in the front of the article as if to imply that restorative justice is already a successfully implemented policy, when the only reason suspensions are down is because Beaudry administrators have eliminated them as an option. The article then goes on to downplay the unacceptable costs that teachers and administrators now have to pay subsidizing this ill-conceived program with continuing and worsening student behavior that the restorative justice improvement program has not effectively addressed and might actual increase, when the students figure out there are no consequences for their actions.
The question that is never addressed in any way, shape, or form is why are these disruptive students acting up more now than they have ever in the past? Could it be the humiliation and objective verifiable impossibility of engaging students that are profoundly behind grade-level and have been socially promoted years beyond their actual ability without the prior grade-level mastery that would allow them to be productively engaged in the classroom in a positive manner?
Although I have spent the last 5 years writing article after article describing how this policy of social promotion leads to exactly the kind of disruption LAUSD now seeks to address with a vacuous and undefined bit of nice sounding magical thinking called restorative justice, reporters like Watanabe and Blum who clearly know much more than what they are allowed to write by their editors have never been able to even mention this as a possibly relevant factor, even if only to disagree with the argument I posit. These omissions permeate everything they and their fearful colleagues now write throughout our corporate owned, controlled, and terrorized media.
There is also the tacit racist assumption that is never questioned that outrageous behavior from predominantly Black and Latino students is the unquestioned norm, which no one in government or the press bothers to question.
In Spotlight, this is exactly the kind of shabby reporting of the past Boston Globe reporters that the good reporters in the film initially uncover. As they belatedly go after the priest child molestation scandal, it becomes increasingly clear to them that this early cover up at the Boston Globe in fact made the child molestation scandal continue for many decades, after it was initially uncovered and casually passed over by their predecessors. Like the present day L.A. Times reporters Watanabe and Blum, their self-blinded colleagues at the Boston Globe seemed to remain more concerned about keeping their jobs and not offending the powers that keep incompetence the norm at the Boston Globe, L.A. Times, or LAUSD.
While Spotlight is a story about great investigative journalism in the spirit of Woodword and Bernstein and All The President’s Men, it is also regrettably the story of how our presently morally challenged news sources in both commercial and public media have been consciously subverted by the financial pressure and political interests of their limited corporate overlords. This kind of behavior has now been the norm for so long now that an awareness of another kind of real investigative journalism seems only capable of finding life in the movies.
“The question that is never addressed in any way, shape, or form is why are these disruptive students acting up more now than they have ever in the past?”
I think that question gets addressed a lot. I think there’s two major factors involved. First, the effects of education rephorm itself. Kids are spending more time in their seats with less time for so-called “extras” like music, art, PE and recess. They’re learning less and less interesting content in fewer and fewer subjects. They’re subjected to more and more standardized testing, much of which is high-stakes either for themselves or their teacher/school (or both). We’re hearing more and more about formerly bright, eager, engaged kids coming home from school saying they “hate” school, crying, throwing tantrums, etc.
Second is the economy. Young adults are finding it harder and harder to find good paying jobs, even with college or graduate degrees. They’re graduating college with tons of student loan debt which is all but non-dischargeable (or else they don’t even graduate and still have tons of debt).
Given those two factors, why wouldn’t students be acting out more and more in school? What do they have to gain from jumping through the increasingly unpleasant hoops being put in their way? In fact, why aren’t even more kids acting out? Just how passive have we conditioned these kids to be?
You make excellent points…. as always.
Exactly. In the video of the girl being assaulted by the police officer, the young woman was being defiant to the teacher not disruptive to the class. Teenagers push back against authority; it’s part of their development. Teenagers also know when something unjust is happening and will stand against it. Perhaps the male teacher’s ego was injured, but that’s about it.
Ferguson all over! People are jumping to conclusions again. The information available is it enough to make any statement about what really happened.
Cameras were seemingly not turned on until after the officer started his interaction with the student
Rudy, how would you feel if that student was your daughter?
Rudy,
It doesn’t matter what the girl said to the officer, he should have never viciously grabbed her, yanked her out of the desk like he did, slammed her to the floor, and then dragged her across the carpet like she was an animal being dragged to the slaughter.
Yes, she had to be removed from the classroom, that is obvious, but that could have been achieved by waiting a few minutes for three other men to arrive and then lift her while she stays in her desk and carry and her desk outside and to the office.
Once that girl did what she did with her defiance over the phone, as long as she was there, the odds were against that teacher gaining order in that class that day and actually teaching again where some or all of the children in that class might have learned something.
All that officer did was guarantee that there would be no more teaching or learning in that class that day. If it had been done peacefully without physical violence, the teacher might have settled the class down in about fifteen minutes and continued with teaching and learning.
Another option might have been for the officer and one or two administrators (hopefully one being a counselor) to stay in the room with the girl while the teacher led her class out of that classroom to another room or the library to continued the teaching and learning there.
C’Mon, Rudy, what could this girl possibly have done to justify what happened to her? And the video isn’t the only evidence we have. Kids from the class say that she had the phone out for a brief time, then put it away and apologized. It was the teacher who escalated the situation by demanding that she turn over the phone and then that she leave the class. If this teacher couldn’t handle such a basic discipline problem, then maybe teaching isn’t the career for him. What’s so hard about saying “see me after class”? And why the hell did the admin get involved and why did the cop? The cop should have told both the teacher and the admin, “call me when there’s an actual law enforcement issue. Have a nice day.”
Is there any evidence that students are “acting out more and more in school” in the first place? That’s not a narrative I’m familiar with today.
I agree on your points. The school environment has become a stale forced labor camp to appease the Supreme Test. The economy is a major factor leading to family stress, instability, crime, and health issues. Witness the recent report the poor white Americans are now dying sooner. All of this leads to anger. What is outside the classroom leaches in.
“The question that is never addressed in any way, shape, or form is why are these disruptive students acting up more now than they have ever in the past?”
They are?
YES!
But what do you mean, and how do you know?
I think that’s a good question and I wonder about it myself. All I’ve seen is anecdotal information, but we’ve been hearing the “kids these days!” line for thousands of years.
The only way I can imagine measuring it is survey data over time. School violence would be easier to chart because there’s probably a much tighter correlation between acts of violence that occur and acts of violence that are logged and reported. Probably not much of an objective historical record of “acts of sass,” even in recent history. Sass is very impressionistic.
Is society more crude? The kids just bring in what they learn outside into the classroom.
“Kids! I don’t know what’s wrong with these kids today,
Kids! Who can understand anything they say?
Kids. They are disobedient, disrespectful oafs.
Noisy, crazy, sloppy, lazy loafers, and while we’re on the subject,
Kids! You can talk and talk til your face is blue,
Kids! But they still do just what they want to do!
Why can’t they be like we were, perfect in every way?
What’s the matter with kids today?
The musical “Bye, Bye, Birdie,” which this song comes from, was written in the late 1950’s.
And let’s not forget this gem:
““The children now love luxury. They have bad manners, contempt for authority; they show disrespect for elders and love chatter in place of exercise.”
Our old friend Socrates, of course.
I don’t think that things are really as bad with kids than they are often made out to be. Yes, I see more students with major behavior struggles than I used to, but I also see far more kids that are light years ahead than I used to, as well.
An interesting “jump” from a disruptive student to special needs students. “Pelto writes:
“The undeniable truth is that while gobbling up massive amounts of scarce public funds, the vast majority of Charter Schools refuse to accept their fair share of students who need special education services and children who aren’t proficient in the English Language (So-called ELL students.)…”
We went from, “… police officer in South Carolina dragging a student out of her chair when she refused to obey orders…” to special needs. Why was that? Because it helps the other author bash Charter Schools?
We just had four students moved from one school to another because of their violent behavior towards teachers. Just because kids have behavior issues does not mean they are the case of “lower scores…” in a given setting!
“We just had four students moved from one school to another. . . ”
What kind of schools are involved?
You know you’re getting old when you remember an LAUSD of the 1950s and 1960s without a school police force. We have become so accustomed to dysfunctional public education with underachieving minority populations that we can no longer image Black and Latino students finally being educated to their potential and not a stereotype sustained by social promotion to ensured failure. It’s a bad mechanic that blames his tools.
Exactly Lenny but the corrupt critters that run the show, don’t care about the kids or the teaches, as we both know. Money is the key as YOU wrote in this terrific essay
http://www.perdaily.com/2014/06/lausds-treacherous-road-from-reed-to-vergara–its-never-been-about-students-just-money.html
It’s also really telling to me that this issue only became important when it became an issue for charter schools.
Once again, the whole discussion is controlled by the ed reform “movement”, and it focuses almost exclusively on charter schools. Public schools are an afterthought, or “the schools that exist to be compared unfavorably to charter schools”.
That is not “people working to improve public schools”. It’s “people promoting their preferred sector”. That so many of them are in government should be a cause for real concern, because obviously the vast majority of children are in public schools.
Children, who do not cooperate in the classroom and disrupt the learning environment, should not be tossed out in the streets to find for themselves, because most of them are probably suffering from a form of PTSD caused by the environment they live in outside of the schools—anger issues and rebelliousness is a result of PTSD, and this PTSD could lead to learning disabilities making it even more difficult for the child to learn causing frustration that triggers the anger that is a symptom of PTSD.
Instead of getting rid of these children, ALL of the schools MUST offer remedial services and counseling to deal with the cause of this behavior so the children learn what it is that triggers their unacceptable behavior in the classroom and how to manage it.
That’s what the Veterans Administration in the U.S. is doing for combat vets who come home from one of America’s BUSH wars with the trauma of PTSD.
But PTSD is not just caused by the trauma of combat in a war zone. It can be caused by rape. It can be caused by abusive parents/guardians and teachers who scream at their children and demean them and/or beat them using corporal punishment.
The VA’s mental health care counselors in the United States do not scream at and threaten or demean combat vets with PTSD. They also don’t use corporal punishment. In some cases they use drugs but as a last resort, and the VA doesn’t throw those combat vets into the streets when they have a relapse and the program isn’t working perfectly.
Peer counseling is one method the VA uses where combat vets with PTSD help other combat vets learn how to manage their PTSD.
I think this could work with children too. But what is happening in many corporate Charter schools is the exact opposite and it is only going to make the childhood trauma of PTSD worse. Maybe this explains the increase in school shootings. The fact that instead of treating the PTSD, they are making it worse with their autocratic, no-nonsense gulag charter schools.
By the way, the VA has also been targeted by the corporate reform demolition derby that wants to take over the public sector, and the VA is now being starved of the funds necessary to provide all of the services that have been promised to our combat veterans.
For instance, I had my overdue annual physical at the VA yesterday and my primary care doctor told me that each VA primary care doctor has a caseload of more than 1,000 vets, because the VA is having its funding slashed by the GOP dominated Congress (my words now: “that wants to turn the public sector over to corporations and strip the power of the government to implement to Constitution and its Bill of Rights that protects the people from the abuse and corruption of power.”)
The same thing they are doing to the public schools.
What you illuminate are examples of Rethuglican Grover Norquist’s “I’m not in favor of abolishing the government. I just want to shrink it down to the size where we can drown it in the bathtub.”
Unfortunately the vast majority of Dimocraps believe the same thing.
The neo-cons and/or neo-libs infiltrated the Republican Party staring in the Reagan administration and then they slithered into the Democrat party and like a terminal cancer spread and are still spreading with the fungus like funding support of a small number of billionaires: for instance, the Koch brothers, Eli Broad, the Walton family and the Bill Gates billionaire cabal.
I know that the neo-cons think it is okay to lie to the public to achieve their goals. The neo-con leadership has claimed they don’t lie anymore but that was also a lie. They call this lie the “noble lie”.
“This idea is not itself all that mysterious. Many people familiar with Plato’s dialogues know of the idea of the ‘Noble Lie’. A somewhat reasonable version of this idea – as distinct from the plainly unreasonable one which requires governments to deceive the public – is that philosophers who are enmeshed in rather complicated and at times disturbing truths need to withhold what they know from the general public, and give support instead to various conventions people need in order to get on with their lives.”
https://philosophynow.org/issues/59/Leo_Strauss_Neoconservative
The nasty truth about the noble lie
Even “Mild-mannered liberals may kill, lie and follow absolute leaders when threatened. The question is: how far this should go? Plato despised democracy, and he expected leaders to weave noble lies for the greater good.”
https://www.opendemocracy.net/media-journalismwar/article_1549.jsp
The fundamentalist religious right and fundamentalist “free” marketeers joined in an unholy alliance back in the ’70s and started a slow process to “retake” or “remake” America into a fundamentalist xtian “free” market. If that seems oxymoronic, it is because it is. But both groups have benefited much to the detriment of the rest of us.
The Reagan administration created this alliance — he manipulated these groups to get elected—the far right religious fanatics were the ones who were used and didn’t get much for their votes.
The religious right pretty much has never gotten what they wanted in their bargain with the ne0-liberal devils. Been used and now it’s time for the glue factory for them. (Although I must admit the Tea Partiers aren’t going down without a fight-ha ha, they’ll still end up as glue)
I think all the lies and manipulation to gain votes and win elections over the decades explains why the largest block of voters are now independent and are not registered as Republican or Democrats or with any political party. The trust factor is almost nonexistent but the biggest most outrageous liars keep fooling enough voters to keep winning elections. The latest school board election in Denver is a perfect example.
Student dumping is just another inequitable factor in charter v public school allowances. Charters are allowed to do basically anything they please with public monies but public schools are scrutinized and punished for the same behaviors. Dual system exists in which public schools lose all around. Please don’t parrot that assisine mantra of charters being public when we know the difference.
remember that the massive layoffs of classified employees–whom we should be hiring, if only to promote more workingclass jobs–forces the teacher to deal alone with disruptive students. if there are no consequences for disruption, the classroom is demoralized, the teacher rendered powerless, and bad consequences all around. the answer of course is more staff, to begin with. and as teachers we need to bring up this issue.
I have been a teacher for many years and I am disgusted with the kids coming into my first grade year after year. Many seem to have psychological disorders rather than what most people would believe. They are not only disruptive to the educational process, they are also very dangerous to the other children. Administration have limited success in terms of help. These parents are impaired themselves for many reasons and they are giving birth to children who are impaired! Enough already! Get rid of them or put them on meds to control them or homeschool them. These are the future criminals.
It really frightens me that someone who has been a teacher for many years thinks that she can identify future criminals among her first graders.
Karen, in case you do not recall, the original purpose of charters as envisioned by Al Shanker was that these schools would offer unique strategies for these hard-to-teach students. Instead, now those who love charters are saying that certain students are expendable. The real solution is for public schools to be given the resources to create those unique programs that will help such children. For example, in NYC, we have the NEST program for high functioning, but attention impaired students who are on the spectrum. The problem is that there are not enough funds for every student to get into the program. Therefore, they are placed in inappropriate settings, or if the parent is sophisticated, they get into a good special education nonpublic school (and even here, there are not enough seats). I believe that charters either return to their ORIGINAL PURPOSE of creating unique programs for difficult students or lose all state and local funding. I, for one, will only now support candidates willing to do this. If a school only wants to choose wonderful students, then they should be totally private. if the billionaire want such schools to be free to docile striving high need students, they are free to contribute to such schools. But they won’t because the money cow will be closed.
Liberalteacher, that may have been Al Shanker’s original interpretation of what charters were supposed to be (and I highly encourage everyone to read Al Shanker’s thoughts on school discipline; Eva Moskowitz seemingly has), but the person who actually invented the charter school concept, Ray Budde, envisioned them simply as an alternative to district schools and for students of all types. He did not see them as being something that existed purely for the benefit of the district, whether it was to take the kids that the distrit couldn’t handle or serve as a sandbox for new ideas or methods.
I will also point out that children are frequently counseled out of traditional district schools in New York City, or are never allowed to get into the school in the first place, even if it is the school for which they are zoned. A student who requires a self-contained environment is out of luck if they live in the zone for PS 321, PS 107, PS 29, PS 234, PS 41, PS 290, etc. Those schools do not accept kids with significant disabilities.
Tim
Ray Budde was one person with an idea—-that doesn’t make him God or right.
In addition where are your links to the evidence for this claim of yours: “I will also point out that children are frequently counseled out of traditional district schools in New York City, or are never allowed to get into the school in the first place, even if it is the school for which they are zoned.”
I think it is more complicated and detailed than that one allegation.
For instance, in California where I taught for thirty years, children/teens who are expelled from one school then must find another school in a legislated time period or else face the legal consequences. That means the parent/guardian must find Tehran public school that will accept that student who was kicked out of another school or district and that other school is allowed to look at their student record for the details.
Often this type of student is on probation from day one and might end up facing expulsion again in the news school if their behavior doesn’t change. The new school might also provide counseling or recommend it.
My hope and dream: The more fascist our society becomes, the more disruptive all citizens will be. Folks, the big $$$$$ folks and our policians are MEAN, plus they lie and cheat at our expense.
Of course, there are disruptive kids. There are READINS why kids are disruptive just as reasons why adults can be disruptive. Maybe kids are disruptive because of the behaviors we model as adults. Look at Congress. Expect me to respect Congress? And many of us are being disruptive because of piss poor, harmful, theoretically and pedagogically unsound policies from yahoos.
Remember WHO the real enemy is (quote from The Hunger Games).
There is a distinction between disruptive behavior due to conditions such as autism and ADHD/ADD and students that choose to act out negatively towards others.
Public education advocates need to admit there are students who want to disrupt the education of others. Including habitually disruptive students in with families who do want an education makes no sense. Acceptable behavior should not include drug dealing, weapons, assaults, bullying, fighting, disrespect towards teachers, sexual harassment, racial or homophobic taunts, shouting in the classroom to interrupt lessons.
If you talk to parents leaving public schools, you will find a common thread of fleeing poor behavior of other students and concerns about their own child’s safety. If we try to force parents to sacrifice their children on an alter of full inclusion, public schools will no longer be seen as worthy of support. Public school advocates should take note.
Disruptive behavior in children becomes anti-social behavior in adults. Already we have governors and presidential candidates that shout insults rather than policy. Road ragers shoot innocent 5 year olds because of some perceived traffic slight. On and on. It seems if you value respect, civility, and treating people fairly, you are a new pariah.
Actually, is talking about charters with parents around here, most of the kids have never even BEEN in public schools. It’s the PERCEPTION of all of this bad behavior, much of which is mythical. At least in my area, going to charters is a form of white flight: get away from “those” children (generally Hispanic in my area), and flee the supposed “epidemic” of bad behavior.
Could be some of that, certainly. With charters already in areas with mostly black and Hispanic populations, the white fight seems not the issue. In talking to those parents, I find fear of gang influence and bullying again.
Maybe there is a survey done to tell the answer. In Ohio, the Dispatch ran an editorial about online charters. With 40,000 Ohio students enrolled in virtual schools, there is a voice not being heard. Why are families leaving public schools? What surprised me was the comments to the article overwhelmingly listing poor, disruptive, and violent behavior from other students left unaddressed as a major reason to leave public schools.
There is more than a perception. I cannot list one school shooting in my state growing up. Now we have several a year. Marijuana was a minor problem isolated to a few. Now we have full fledged dealing in heroin, designer drugs, and cocaine. Bullying might have once been confined to school. Now tormentors target 24/7 through media into the student’s home. An occasional knife in the past. Today guns and bomb threats.
Why are people STAYING if the disruptive students are allowed to ruin the educational opportunities for others?
Reblogged this on Politicians Are Poody Heads and commented:
Well, I wonder if Sowell would be satisfied if all schools would just dump any and all problem students.
It seems to me that he would be.
So, where will these kids go, who would help them?
These kids will grow up. Will they be prepared for further education or technical training? Will they be able to have decent lives?
Or does Sowell think that they are trash, only to wind up in the criminal justice system or homeless?
Every child deserves the best education that this country can (more like “should”) provide.
Good discussion. I agree with Sowell: give public schools the right to remove the chronic and severe disruptors. Don’t take away this ability from charters; instead give it to ALL schools. Lloyd is right: the same policymakers who laud charters are the ones who stripped public schools of the power to do what the charters are doing. Babysit/treat the disruptors until they’re ready to behave civilly, or put them in a non-traditional academic setting where they can begin to learn. But they’re not learning now, they’re not about to start learning barring some blackbelt ninja level psychological stunt jui-jitusu that only Dienne is capable of, they’re keeping others from learning, and they’re traumatizing teachers (does anyone care about that? I know veteran inner city teachers who are truly PTSD victims). Only doctrinaire (and truly misguided) child-centrism would lead one to support keeping them in class; it’s against all reason.
This top-down abuse will not end unless the public school get the support that WANT and the solutions are decided by the stakeholders in those schools: the teachers, concerned students and parents. Forget about most administrators. They can watch and keep their mouths shut. Administrators, at best, should be office managers who order paper clips and support the educations system built through consensus by teachers on a school-by-school basis with input from concerned students and parents who really care about education and learning.
I think the biggest question is whether the “chronic and severe disruptor” is a teen, is 11 years old, or is a 5 year old starting in Kindergarten.
It’s ironic that charters are allowed to suspend extremely high numbers of 5 year old children and label them “violent”, while public middle and high schools suspend lower numbers of teens.
And when people like Sowell talk about those charters being given free reign to use “whatever discipline is necessary” for those disruptive students, I would bet that most Americans don’t realize he is talking about huge numbers of 5 and 6 year old children who can’t sit still. Not teenagers.
No, ponderosa, I’m not the only one capable of “some blackbelt ninja level psychological stunt jui-jitusu”. In fact, it’s really not all that complicated – it’s done by people who care about kids every day in schools across the country. Read about the Algebra Project as just one example. Read Jose Luis Vilson. The fact is that when you treat kids like human beings (including teens, including the “bad” ones in the “ghetto”), you get much better results. This zero tolerance, “no excuses” stuff is just making the situation so much worse. Yes, sometimes there are going to be extreme examples and probably no teacher can reach every kid. But removing a kid should be a very rare exception (especially if we’re talking about young kids), and when it is necessary there should be therapeutic facilities available that serve severely traumatized, troubled kids.
Dienne, I also think that there is a vast difference between kinds of disruptions. The description of the supposedly “violent” young child that one “respected” charter school made public in order to justify the fact that over 20% of the Kindergarten children were suspended because they were “violent” was NOT of a child who was looking to hurt another child or another teacher. It was a child made so anxious by not knowing the answers on a test he was supposed to be taking that he crawled underneath the desk and tried to hug the floor while being forcibly dragged out by a security guard. It is not all that hard to provoke a 5 year old — any 5 year old — into acting out. Ask their older sisters and brothers. When you make young children feel absolute misery over and over again because they can’t sit still, or can’t understand the math concept, and it is always made clear to the child that HE is the one who just isn’t working hard enough — it’s all his fault — the fact hat one out of every four 5 year old children act out says more about the school than the children.
Pretending that all schools should be free to get rid of those young disruptors whenever they want is appalling.
Dienne, I meant that “stunt jiu-jitsu” playfully, hyperbolically and respectfully, because I can tell from your writing that you probably have a very high emotional intelligence. But I will respectfully submit to you that it is more complicated than you make it out to be. Demonstrating concern for kids does not make bad behaviors melt away. It is much more complicated than that. I speak from twenty years’ experience in the classroom.
It’s a bad mechanic who blame his tools. Student disruption is not normal behavior. Rather it is a symptom in the majority of cases of students who have continued to be social promoted without prior grade level standards mastery. So by the time they get to middle school with single subject credentialed teachers whose subject presupposes such mastery, the very act of education becomes humiliation to adolescence going through puberty and not wanting to be humiliated in front of their peers. Instead of dealing with these deficits in a timely fashion, we accommodate to them with school police, something we didn’t have in the ’50s or ’60s when there was no social promotion. If you educate Latinos, you loose your cheap labor force and their now majority would win elections. If you educate Blacks to do something more than fulfill stereotypes, we would have to finally look at 400 plus years of their systematic destruction, which continues unabated in our DE facto segregated public schools 61 years after Brown said it was illegal.
Wow… That is an observation that is scary. I don’t know where you work, but where I work major attention is given to making sure that the “minorities” are given all the help and attention to make sure they are as educated as the rest of the population…
What has been done over the past decades is that several generations of entitled people were raised, with the help from the educational system.
Someone decided that being left behind educationally was less of a problem then being left behind socially. So we ended up with too many ways where students are no longer expected to meet high standards, and it became acceptable that students graduated with less than a 12th grade education.
Leonard,
What you say about unprepared teens trying to deflect humiliation by acting out is very insightful. I do see this a lot. I think social promotion is one culprit, but another is the bankrupt educational philosophy that undergirds our elementary schools. Elementary schools need to lay a foundation of world knowledge. Instead they try to teach chimerical skills. Well-off kids get the requisite world knowledge from home, so they can understand my (very simplified) history talks. I manage to reach many of the underprepared with strenuous efforts to make things ultra-lucid. But the most underprepared are simply lost. They are at sea. And these are often the most chronic behavior problems.
Of course the schools are this way, but it isn’t the fault of the teachers. It’s the fault of top down management meddling in how and what teachers teach. If teachers were free to plan an implemented curriculum like most teachers are in many other countries, like in Finland, we wouldn’t see the mess you described.
Top down control and meddling is not new in the United States. It didn’t arrive with NCLB, RTTT, and the Common Core Crap. Those programs just made it worse.
“Well-off kids get the requisite world knowledge from home, so they can understand my (very simplified) history talks.” Let’s think this through.
Who is this? The son of Jamaican immigrants
Who is this? Though both his parents were most likely illiterate
Who is this? …leaving him in the care of his mother
Who is this? His mother, though under-educated herself
Now, when you see the answers to those questions, you may be able to see how strange your statement came across.
My parents had 8 kids, and not a lot of money. But they cared enough about their kids to make sure their homework was done, and that they respected their teachers. Many famous people are from non-well-off families, and became famous for good things they accomplished in many different areas.
The most common thing they had in common? Parents cared enough!
And you have a lot of well-off kids that end up being good-for-nothings, addicted to drugs, in jail for embezzlement, white collar crime – because they were brought up to think the world owed THEM.
If this is the way you “divide” your students… Seems like you have them painted in a corner before they even have a chance!