Thanks to David B., Mike Atherton, Kathy Kosnoff and Patrick Peterson
for the conversation on school issues that's been going on these past few
days on the list. It's helped me clarify my mind on who I want to support
in this race as opposed to having to pick people to vote against.
The entire issue of "segregation" is a red herring fueled by a misuse of
the word. We do not have segregation in this city, since the MPS does
not bus children from neighborhood to neighborhood in pursuit of some
goal of ethnic purity. Instead of wasting millions of dollars on busing
kids around to satisfy some policy wonk's dream of integration, we
should be keeping those children in their neighborhoods - which I
can't help think would increase parental involvement.
Kathy has suggested maintaining IEPs on every MPS student, and while
this is a good idea in theory it has the potential to create a paper swamp
iof extraordinary magnitude. Better to set goals for *all* students and
make them clear to everyone involved so that we don't have constant
arguments over what the goals are. I do understand that some children
learn better in less structured environments, but at a time when we are
losing 50% of the students in the system, we need to stop experimenting
and go back to teaching basic skills. The experiments haven't worked.
Kevin Trainor
6-10, East Phillips
Last of the Southern Catholic Black Irish Redneck Jews
