You're right and you're wrong. Schools do dread parental involvment. But that's because parent's get involved in the wrong things. Parents didn't get involved in teaching their children the requisite discipline that is required to focus learning. Parents didn't get involved in supporting the curriculum and the teacher's role. But parents DID get involved in blaming the school and teachers when their undisciplined child was failing, and instead of hearing that their child needed to be a better student they instead blame the teacher as failing in their role. But when a teacher tried in any way to actually make the students sit down, shut up, pay attention and actually learn, well by golly that was seen as abusive and mean and then the parents get involved again saying the school has no right to try and teach their kids discipline.
So now we end up with exactly the system you hate. A system hobbled by the very parents who complain that their kids don't learn anything. And then many of those parents send their kids to expensive private schools where the school does have the authority to instill discipline. And because the school has the right to kick the kid out if they feel their authority is undermined, and because the education is finally hitting the parents in the pocketbook, the parents finally now support the teachers and the authority that previously they undermined. And then there's the parents with the near hubris to think that as a single individual they have breadth and depth of knowledge to teach the same thing that takes the combined knowledge resources of 20-30 or more teachers for a given student. And of course, those homeschoolers end up needing to instill the same discipline for education that they refused the public schools. And no, the above isn't speculation. I saw it first hand with a parent who was a public educator. Feh! On 10/27/05, Dana <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote: > > The schools constantly whine about parental involvement. They are > affronted > when it materializes. They don't *want* involved parents... they want > guilty > parents. I am sure that offended a lot of people out there, but I get the > impression that not a lot of your have personal experience with the issue, > and that's mine. This was true of both good and bad schools in several > states. > Bottom line, schools are fiefdoms that have managed to convince the > general > public that giving them money will be good for children. > > Dana ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~| Discover CFTicket - The leading ColdFusion Help Desk and Trouble Ticket application http://www.houseoffusion.com/banners/view.cfm?bannerid=48 Message: http://www.houseoffusion.com/lists.cfm/link=i:5:178544 Archives: http://www.houseoffusion.com/cf_lists/threads.cfm/5 Subscription: http://www.houseoffusion.com/lists.cfm/link=s:5 Unsubscribe: http://www.houseoffusion.com/cf_lists/unsubscribe.cfm?user=89.70.5 Donations & Support: http://www.houseoffusion.com/tiny.cfm/54
