Gifted Issues Discussion homepage Forums Parenting and Advocacy How do you feel about the public school system?

I am sufficiently unimpressed that I'm working outside the existing system to create a private gifted school for my son (now just 2). It's already obvious that his needs will go unmet; I shudder to think of how my son would fare in a mainstream kindergarten given that he already seems to know what most 4-5 y/olds are expected to know curriculum-wise.

My husband and I both had inadequate support in the public school system.

I think the notion of a strong public school system is noble, and necessary for a strong, well-functioning country, but that our educational establishment's concept of "cohort" is what sours the experience for anyone far from the mean. I would love to see ability-based groupings, not age-groups, for all students. That, to me, is the only realistic way to ensure that all students' needs are met, at all points along the ability continuum.

Here, no. You get the odd teacher or principal who is invested in students, but most seem to be paper-pushing automatons who are more concerned with gaining union seniority than teaching.

I don't say this to paint all teachers badly. There are many committed members of the teaching profession who are outstanding at what they do and who make children's lives better every day by their work. However, in my province, the qualified keep getting muzzled by the greedy near-retirees who want to keep new blood and new ideas out of the profession. Cronyism at its worst, from the top down.

Happily, this works in my favour starting a school because it will allow me to attract the most motivated, innovative teachers of the bunch.

ETA: I attended a private high school, and the messaging couldn't have been more different than in the public system. Each student was treated as a valuable legacy. I can only think of one or two teachers who weren't exceptional in their knowledge, commitment to maintaining a high standard, or dedication to students on a personal level. Most of the teaching staff *volunteered* time to run extra-curricular activities. I think that speaks volumes.

I just had a conversation with DD's principal about this. More on the Difficult Teacher thread.

In theory they will all say that they do. I mean people tend to enter teaching with noble intentions. They love children. They want to make a difference. Then they get caught up in minutia and lose sight of their real purpose. Education gets lost and they focus on the rubric, the protocol, the strategies. Unfortunately this approach will only work with kids who have the most basic of needs. A kid from an uneducated household without the supports in place may do ok in this environment. Once again the kids from this forum, no probably not.

Oh and DH is a professor. Over the years many of his colleagues have made clear that education majors are very sincere and they tend to be "nice" kids. However they are also the least bright. In other words the lowest common denominator may also be at work in the selection process concerning who enters the profession to begin with.

Who said that "Education" is about kids? That's like saying that a souffle is about eggs.



(I'd love to put a winking smiley in here, but I'm feeling too enraged and disgusted this morning to do that.)

Extremely negative. My background: I attended public schools K-12. I worked almost 10 years in public schools, about 7 years in private schools (I have worked part time with one foot in each system). Public schools have only gotten worse. I have no hope for public schools. The entire system needs to be obliterated. I am not kidding.

Here are my issues as a former employee:
1. The states in which I worked, I was forced to be a part of the teacher's union. When I first started, I was a huge supporter of the union. Within just a couple of years, I saw the thieving that took place in my particular system, the physical bullying when I attempted to stay beyond my contacted hours to assist students, and the generally us vs. them (union vs. administrators and kids) attitude that was encouraged by union leaders. Save for 1 district that I worked in, the union couldn't have been more unprofessional. And I worked in schools in every imaginable district, rich, poor, homogeneous, etc.

2. Very poor quality teacher training. I went to a "prestigious" college with a teacher certification program. It was touted as being on of the best. The quality was so poor, it was really unbelievable. Since, in my opinion, there are so few good teachers out there (I would give it a ballpark figure of maybe 10%), you can't find any decent mentors for student teachers. The bulk of what was taught was classroom management. This was about 20 years ago and from what I hear it's taken a drastic turn for the worse...because now they focus on classroom management with the goal of getting students to master the standardized tests.

3. Fifty+ years ago, teaching was considered a worthy, honorable profession. (This will be controversial - I know.) When women were not allowed or encouraged to be professionals such as doctors, lawyers, etc., there were many more really bright and capable elementary school female teachers. Talented women were encouraged to be teachers, paralegals and nurses. As these women were able to enter and succeed in more male oriented, lucrative positions, I think there has been a brain drain. And men are just not attracted to elementary school positions - it's never going to happen. (I think if teachers were paid a lot more, then the talented women would come back. But I don't expect it to happen any time soon.)

4. Anti-intellectual attitude found in public schools. Every school that I have worked in (except for 1) has had active disdain for gifted children. Sure you may have a teacher here or there who understands and who is interested in educating gifted children. But since (in my opinion) there are extremely few gifted adults working in public schools, there is no understanding of gifted children's traits or needs. I have heard so many horrible things said about gifted children.

5. Drive to create and implement federal standards. So, IMO, there has been a brain drain among public school teachers. Now when you couple that with a drive to introduce federal standards - the effect being that you are required even LESS to think and be creative about teaching goals - because they've all been laid out for you - you don't even have to look at your children in your class to figure out what they really need.

6. The testing insanity will finally cause the system to implode, hopefully.

Now, from my parental viewpoint - this is how I have come to view and utilize public school for my son. (I need to give credit to my DH, who has always told me that public education is "useless" for any child who is even moderately above average...and I spent so many years wondering why he always said that.) As a parent, we use public school to socialize and for "anthropological" experiences. My son goes in the mornings to see his friends, to have fun riding the bus, to experience group music class, use the art materials, have access to a full size gym and to have lunch around a very big table with lots of friends and laughing. My son also learns about how an institution works at stifling any creativity and how it churns out a product using streamlined methods. He has also learned that at 7 years old, he is far more creative and intelligent than many of his teachers.

We've only got another 1.5 years total in public school. Doubtful we will make it that long.

I can't say I'm disillusioned about the public school system, because that would mean I actually had illusions about it in the first place, and my mother taught me better than that.

For our particular school, I am reasonably positive. They have done many, many things for DS and are doing fine with DD. And we have taxed their ingenuity to great lengths, in some cases. The elementary school staff went out of their way (quite literally, hundreds of miles) to obtain training and knowledge that would help them to help DS in all of his 2E-ness. I don't see that happening with the middle school/high school, but we're still doing ok this year. So far, so good.

For American public schools in general, I don't see it going anywhere but downhill, and steadily. It is only getting worse as each succeeding generation of teachers and administrators comes up, having been educated themselves in the system that is failing. Steadily declining expectations, a society built around the fear of being sued for something, a culture built around the derision of intelligence, all run by increasing quantities of technology that make it unnecessary for anyone to know how anything works or how to do anything without it, these are a prescription for disaster.

Absolutely some of the teachers care. I know some teachers who have actually fostered neglected children. There are some angel teachers out there.

I think schools as an institution don't care one bit about children. They care about jobs and the movement of children along an assembly line.

... and I'm about to.

Now dealing with a dismissive, power-tripping teacher that has less than no interest in her STUDENTS in a class that my daughter MUST have to graduate. An unweighted class in which the grading is so incomprehensible and seemingly capricious that it poses a serious risk to her in terms of scholarship awards this year.

This teacher is wrapping herself in a mantle of professional alphabet soup and titles, and is ignoring the fact that not one, but TWO subject experts that my DD's been consulting with, have declared her grading and commentary to be nonsensical, overly harsh, or even just plain WRONG.



Well, that's the thing, isn't it? I've been horrified by it at this point, and I'm probably the most difficult person on earth to SHOCK about this industry/profession/environment.

It's gotten bad. REALLY bad.

I used to think that people who wanted to Holt the entire system were crazy right-wing wackos. I still think that. But I'm starting to agree that the system that we have NOW, in 2013, is worthy of precisely that sentiment. The corporate players who are calling most of the shots in school C&I need to be nuked, for a start. While Common Core was a great set of ideas, it's never going to work with teachers who are mere automatons, and that's exactly what we have when they are punished for deviations from "the script" (and they are)... and as long as "C&I/assessment specialists" are writing the material for classroom use, rather than people who, you know, actually work every day with STUDENTS who are real human beings, this is going nowhere good.

Many families may be pleased with their children's education and we hear this frequently from families with kids in the middle, athletes, moderately gifted, and hothoused high achieving. They are incredulous that families with HG+ kids are disappointed with the very school system they adore. In summary, schools are built for mass-production but have difficulty with customization.