Arkansas Blog

"KIPP doesn't count . . ."

Go over to Helena and ask the kids there. Listen to they proudly tell you of their plans for the future. Honestly ask yourself if they would have those plans without KIPP.

ARK. BLOG: The point is not that KIPP isn't a good school. The point is that the student body is self-selected by parents who commit to a set of expectations -- including longer days and weeks -- and their kids will no longer attend there if they do not meet them. That is an invaluable head start for any school. But I know you are a shill for the view that if it's named charter it must be good (no matter the contrary national evidence) because, hey, the Waltons say so and gold equates with wisdom in certain circles, particularly if one is on the payroll. Would but we could require such commitments of all parents that are demonstrated by KIPP parents (and students).

You forgot to add you 1) can't mow the grass, paint the walls or exterminate vermine2) can't use Charter in the name 3) can't work extra with any student 4) may not serve any food that tastes better than cardboard and 5) can't use the word Charter in a positive manner.

THEN you have the test and results you demand.

The kids in the program aren't the point, Doc. It's the kids who aren't in the program, who are suffering in part because resources have been devoted to KIPP and away from them.

If the real argument is, "We can't afford to give a decent education to all children," then charter schools are an answer. I wonder why their proponents aren't making that argument? It's the best one they've got.

Max said - "You must choose a school with an overwhelming majority of poor black kids, preferably with parents from single-parent homes and no parent who is a college graduate. There's yet to be a proposal like this in Arkansas."

Do you ever listen to the things that come out of your mouth? Put the bong down or at least change the water. That is discrimination. I thought you bleeding hearts were against that.

How would you react if you heard the same statement and someone replaced "poor black kids" with "rich white kids"? I tend to think that would be offensive.

ARK. BLOG: Open your eyes and ears. There are schools like these in Little Rock. They would provide a more meaningful test of the supposed wonders of charter school educators than a student body comprised of students who, statistics say, are more likely to achieve because they come from homes with higher incomes, come from racial groups that tend to score better on standardized tests and come from families with better education. Will a group full of rich white kids do well on standardized tests. They'd defy all available statistics if they did not. We don't need to try new options for them.

"You must choose a school with an overwhelming majority of poor black kids, preferably with parents from single-parent homes and no parent who is a college graduate. There's yet to be a proposal like this in Arkansas."

How about poor hispanic kids who can't speak English and are constantly afraid their parents are going to be deported.

If you wanted to pick schools, the 11th grade literacy exam should give you some targets that need help. How about Fair and McClellan which each have 28% and 22% respectively students who score "below basic." I'm would imagine you could trace those students back to middle and elementary schools that allowed them to progress to that point.

I don't know what the LRSD "accelerated learning program" is but I would guess it masks additional failures in the system since almost 56% of the students in that program scored "below basic."

ARK. BLOG: That's another good strategy. Accelerated learning is an alternative school. tough cases.

So, low income kids with parents who are committed to their education and improvement should be stuck in crappy public schools because it's fairer that way?

Look, regardless of resources, there's no school in the world that can take kids from families who are indifferent or even hostile to the notion of education and do much with them. Until parents and students realize that they are the critical variable in their own education, nothing will change.

So, in the name of some fantasy of fairness, you'd be willing to deny poor kids from the delta a chance. It's logic like that that makes me ashamed to be liberal.

ARK. BLOG: I'm not talking about taking anything away from anyone. I'm talking about a fair test of the charter advocates. We know what works. Committed parents in a reasonably decent school, something with many definitions. We know that masses of children are dumped in schools across America without that advantage. Do the charter schoolers really possess a key to reaching kids that others do not? Or are they merely succeeding with kids with the tools to succeed most places? Let's try some further experimenting to find out.

Arizona's long term experience with charter schools is more relevant than the Ohio experience. By the way, have you been to Cleveland lately? Makes Helena look bustling.

I get a kick from the thought of a NEA beholding Dems "cracking down" on charter shcools. As you well know, charters are designed to fail and then closed if the don't meet their charter requirements. When has a tradtional public school been closed for failure to perform? The Little Rock School District has a long history of declining test scores while spending more money. I predict if something isn't done soon to reverse this trend, Little Rock will model Pine Bluff in ten years, despite what Mr. (I made a good deal for the LRSD in 1989) Rutherford says.

ARK. BLOG: You jest, right? Arizona has been beset with scandal over its charter schools. More of them, worse results. Here's one recent story on financial problems.
http://www.azcentral.com/arizonarepublic/news/articles/0902charterfinance0902.html

Max said "Will a group full of rich white kids do well on standardized tests. They'd defy all available statistics if they did not. We don't need to try new options for them."

Again, why do we need to treat a group a people different because of their race and economic status? That is discrimination. How about we expect more from all students, all parents and all schools and reward excellence and not make excuses for failure? That would be fair across the board. What you are suggesting is giving preferential treatment to a group of people and that is discrimination. Why can you not admit that?

Until you treat everyone equal, charter schools will be a viable option for parents and children.

Jake, how do you answer Arkie Exile's question about kids trapped in failing schools. The implication is that they will achieve if put in the right school environment.

I don't have a lot of information to give a thorough response to ArkieExile's point, Stump. I can speak from experience, from observation, and from reasonable assumptions. Here goes:

Failing schools mostly are in poverty areas and the children come from disadvantaged homes. That's one factor to put into the equation. Failing schools basically means that the students are failing to learn. Whether this is due to teachers failing to teach (not likely from by observation) or from the high rate of absenteeism among at-risk students or a poor home environment for study, all probably add to the mixture to some degree or another.

Since the problems of the community usually reach into the schools and rules require most children to attend schools within their zones, the problem seems inescapable. On a closer look however, one will find that there are successes and high achievement at these schools which are overlooked because of the bigger, more brutal picture.

Poverty is the main culprit. It is the underlying factor in other problems that beset school children, their homes, and their community.

In one of the toughest schools I ever worked in, I had the privilege of teaching and watching the most mature and dedicated student I ever worked with. When complimenting her father and mother about this, they both saidthey were not doing anything special that they knew about. They were just doing what they thought ought to be done and nothing more. Their daughter learned as much as anyone else from other schools, won a scholarship upon completion of high school (she didn't go to Central BTW), and is a successful person in her own right.

If I might rephrase Exile's point: how can children escape a failing home?

Just ask the Mesa Co. School district what charters meant to them. They took out full page ads when the kids went to charters, proclaiming their conversion to phonics and no fuzzy math. Competition improved public education in Arizona. With re: to financial problems, all charters have had to do more with less, but if you think that a monumental fraud hasn't been committed by tradtional public schools engaged in social promotion and grade inflation, then my next comment has even more relevance.

Charters don't promise human perfection which seems to be your argument against them. What gets me is that your monopoly union driven system doesn't have a chance to self correct and remains, thru appologists like the AT, obstinate and impervious to accountability and positive change..

You're just one sandwich shy of a picnic on your understanding of the isuues here, CP. Your last line that says "obstinate and impervious to accountability and positive change" has no basis in reality.

Accountability: nothing is more public than the scrutiny of schools through various mandated testing programs (NAEP, ESL, ACTAAP, NCLB, to name a few) and through reports issued by various agencies from local thru state and all the way to federal. The most difficult task facing the teacher is not the teaching of the material itself but it is in motivating students to want to learn. As I've argued quite vociferously over the past 24 hours, the home is the key partner in this endeavor. The root cause of our current educational difficulties lie in the community and our society. Poverty is the main culprit.

Positive change: teachers have been the guinea pigs for many programs and it has been for a lack of trying that some of these failed. Too often, teachers were rushed through a two-day course on how to implement a plan that took years to build and develop. There is no practice for those two days other than some brief role-playing with other teachers; no one behaves like a student would during those times. These trainers leave town with their consultant fees in their pockets and have left you several order forms for the books and tapes in their series that "explain" how to do it. Might as well sing "Kumbayah" for two days. You'd get the same results.
Change is usually chosen by administrators and school boards. Teachers will check the research and reports to see if ideas being presented truly are "positive" It is a tactic of the DOG to berate teachers for not liking Merit Pay. They likewise say teachers don't want positive change. What they ignore and refuse to tell you is that research of over 3000 merit pay/performance pay plans revealed that only 3% showed signs of success.

The key to a successful teacher lies primarily in two areas: their knowledge base of the subject and their ability to motivate students to learn. The key to a successful student lies with mainly with parents who support and instill good learning skills early in life; and, with a teacher who provides them with the necessary knowledge and desire to put those skills to use.

Whether the schools are public, private, charter, or whatever....the formula for success remains the same. Both parents and teachers must lead.

oops...typo time...

"Positive change: teachers have been the guinea pigs for many programs and it has been for a lack of trying that some of these failed." should be changed to:

Positive change: teachers have been the guinea pigs for many programs and it has been for a lack of training that some of these failed.

That's what happens when you change thoughts in the middle of typing a sentence. Had originally wanted to put "has not been for a lack of trying...."

Try not to give me too much grief over it. The revised version better states the position and problem.

Ideally, the principal of a school sets the tenor and delivers a cirriculum that works. However, if a good leader is hamstrung by the bureaucratic maze or bad governance, the school fails (but doesn't close) and that's why charter schools are popular. Take a hard look at Thaddeus Lott's schools in Houston. At risk kids improve in their scores, then high demand develops from parent(s) who get it.

Jake, I criticize the public school monopoly system as being impervious to positive change and obstinate. That along with higher prices and inferior results are inherent in all monopolies.

Arkansawyer says: "It's the kids who aren't in the program, who are suffering in part because resources have been devoted to KIPP and away from them." I say a big AMEN.

This is just a way to get a private school education with our tax money and without using the word voucher. Jake is absolutely right about the importance of instilling good learning skills early in life. Some students are fortunate enough to have parents who do this; some have parents who are unable or unwilling to give their children this critical foundation for succeeding in school and probably in life. Why can't we, instead of using this money to provide what is being billed as a superior education for a few, take it and figure out a way to help those students who need the extra attention. Find them early, work with them until they get it, and don't pass them on until they are going to be able to do the work. I don't care how great the teacher, he or she can't teach history, computer skills or math to a student who can't even read.

beefmon,

You ask, "Again, why do we need to treat a group a people different because of their race and economic status? That is discrimination."

I answer, "For the same reason doctors treat patients differently because of the varying conditions in which patients arrive."

I used to think the answer was to move from race-based criteria to class-based criteria, thus eliminating the overt racial content while still providing benefits to the kids who needed them most. I'm less optimistic about this approach now.

Why? Two reasons.

First, classical white racists in the antebellum South generally opposed social benefits for all people, regardless of race.

Second, the meanness of modern right-wing radicalism descends directly from that inhumane tradition.

What's the answer then, Max?

I've subbed in a majority black school with attendees who are living a poor lifestyle (or in poverty) in Ouachita County. I've seen how the two students in a class of 28 suffer. I don't want the two to suffer because 26 don't want to learn and are too busy attempting to have sex with each other in the bathroom or are throwing desks around because they've been raped/molested, prostituted out for drugs by the parent, or in some shitty foster home. I would never send my child to a school like that. I seriously doubt you'd send yours.

I don't care how much you pay teachers or how good they are or how much money is involved, the students still go home to whatever their home is. It's from their environment that the desire to learn comes from. Schools are never going to change that until they take the kids away from the parent/parents and start raising the kids themselves.

Annoyedwoman, could you provide a little more information about "the two" students in your post? Do you mean the only two students in the class who are not poor, the only two students who are white, the only two students who are interested in learning, or what?

Obviously no one would want to send children to a class in which 26 out of 28 students are behaving as you describe, but could you possibly be guilty of a little stereotyping and a lot of exaggeration? Even if you are not, the solution is not to throw away the 26 who are having problems.

Every time a juvenile commits some heinous crime, somebody on here will post "don't tell me about their troubled childhood;" but the truth is that often the root cause of the problem IS a troubled childhood. Instead of engaging in the usual holier-than-thou "it's the parents' fault" litany, perhaps it would be more constructive to identify at a very early age students who are in a bad situation and try to remedy it then, rather than putting them in juvie after they pull a knife on someone in the Wal-Mart parking lot.

If the parents are just unskilled at parenting, help them. If they just don't care or are abusing the child, place the child in a better situation.

And yes, all that would cost money. But I know just where you can get it -- take all the money being spent on competitive sports and direct it toward early childhood education. If Podunk or Metropolis High wants to have a football team, let the town have bake sales or bingo games to pay for it. I'm sick of so much tax money going toward something that is basically a farm system for big-time college football, which is just a farm system for pro football.

Children are not helped when all we do is blame parents. Some of us had parents who cared if we did the right thing, and some did not; but one thing we can all say is that we did not get to choose our parents, so we should be a little less smug about our good fortune and a little less harsh toward those who were not so lucky.

And while a caring teacher can make a difference in a child's life, this can't overcome serious home problems and a basic lack of skills exacerbated by passing a child along to a higher grade before he is ready.

If you just really don't care about the children (except to keep them out of any home that includes a gay person), here's what's in it for you: (1) a child that is educated and is able to secure gainful employment after graduating from school is less likely to rob or mug you; and (2) it takes less tax money to properly educate and care for a young person so that they develop into a contributing member of society than it does to incarcerate them for long periods of time or the duration of his or her life.

Vegan, they can be black, they can be white, or they can be both, but there are, typically, a few that want to learn out of the majority that don't. Now, where you got the idea that I think this doesn't stem from their environment I don't know. Of course it does. But "help them" is a pretty broad answer. You can help the symptoms of the underlying problem all you want but that won't cure the problem. You can bend over backwards, have afterschool activities, study help, community help, any kind of help, but if the parents/parent are unwilling to take their child to it or do their part then you have limited success.

Better situation? Have you looked at the foster home system lately? Ever been a foster kid? Let's take, for example, a foster kid that goes to a crappy school. He's got a miserable life. But for some reason, he wants to learn, but finds it hard to do that with all of the teacher disinterest and focus toward disciplining other students who are running havoc in the classroom (remember all those things i listed that can typically happen in the demographic we're talking about? Yea. those types of things.) I want that kid pulled out. I want that kid in a school where he can learn. The ones who are running havoc will laugh at you. The kid sent to a charter and away from that environment will thank you. I want the poor family's kid that is poor yet brought up respectable manner not to have to learn about sex by walking into the middle of his classmates doing it in elementary school. I want him to have the option to go somewhere else.

I have no use for sports programs. And where is that "you" directed in the "if you just dont' care about children (except to keep them out of any home that includes a gay person)?" I hope that's a generic "you", otherwise those are some awful big words you're putting in this gay-supporting Liberal's mouth.

You contradict yourself nicely when you say at one point "we can't blame parents" then turn around and blame the child's "environment." I stand firm in that I believe a child that wants to learn and be productive should have the option to get out of a bad school environment if he/she needs to. I advocate appropriate spending and resources for the schools in the "bad" areas, but it's naive to think that that will solve all of the problems.

I would agree with Jake da Snake. His words were pretty spot-on. Poverty has tons to do with this.