When I was in school I had every tool I needed to be successful, be it pencils, paper, or books. Today's kids come on from the first day of school with a massive list of items that unless the parent provides them, the teacher will not be able to. Teachers will now be required to teach larger classes which will ultimately create the potential for some students to be "lost in the shuffle". Regardless of what political association any of us have we all can agree that education in today's world is paramount to a child's success later in life. Today's job market is becoming more and more technical and when the position can not be filled here, it ultimately gets shipped out overseas. As a parent of a student, I am faced with helping him with the tools he needs and tapping into my own limited resources.
Across the country there are more and more schools being closed, factories shutting down, homes being foreclosed on.There are already several schools closed in Tucson and they stand empty as a reminder that the system failed the children. How the hell do we as parents look into the eyes of our students and tell them what a great country this is, when all around them is chaos? How do we assure them education is important when they maybe faced with dropping out just to help support the family by getting a job---which may not be waiting for them? I don't have all the answers and I am beyond frustrated with the increasingly irresponsible spending, the poor planning and lack of judgement on the part of the district. We need better teachers who can excite his/her students imaginations, who can keep them fired up about the learning process. Not all teachers are good teachers. I think the school districts need to weed out the bad apples and make room for the one's who do care and are excited to teach.
I leave you with this......
I believe that this country, as with war veterans, owes a great deal of respect and gratitude to those teachers who really have a passion for learning and teaching. I think that the so called "powers that be" within any school district should first examine their own pay stub and look for ways to cut their pay. No one can argue that clearly these decision makers are not in the trenches and do not deserve the privilege of triple figure salaries, especially in light of the fact that so many of the good teachers need so much more help. If, after all considerations have been made and it still means schools will be closed, then the next step should be how to turn an empty building into something that can give back to the community. Empty buildings eventually cost tax payers more--why not provide an Emergency shelter and preparedness facility, temporary housing for domestic abuse victims, continuing education for teen moms, training centers for improving teacher quality, or after school programs just to name a few. The point is that education is essential and goes way beyond reading, writing and arithmetic. We cannot, as a country, afford to fail our children and extinguish their hopes, dreams, and goal before they've had a chance. We can no longer expect excellence from teachers who are simply going through the motions while ignoring the excellence other teachers. We can no longer afford to allow ourselves to be "hoodwinked" by people who have zero knowledge of how hard it is to make ends meet. As parents, we can no longer afford the "do as I say not do as I do" mentality by accepting second best logic from the educational system we send our children to every day. Excellence begins at home, with us, and if our children see us moaning and complaining but doing little in the way of problem solving, well.... then so will our children. In the end we"ll have only ourselves to blame.
No comments:
Post a Comment