19 year olds in high school? do you agree with this policy? (Chicago: neighborhood, public school)
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But as to the rest, you must be daft. If a kid hasn't accomplished what they are supposed to by 18 (much less 19), I am strongly of the opinion they are wasting their time in a regular high school and we are wasting our time as a society trying to make round pegs fit in square holes.
If you are graudating aged 18 you are on time--not early. At 19, you might have flunked 4th grade. Summer school might fix it if you are failing a class or two but you can not fit and entire grade worth of material into a summer break. I think you are just burnt out from a tough job.
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Educating kids isn't cheap. AFAIC, once you're legally an adult, there are GED programs that are more appropriate - good grief, at 19 I was a college sophomore, and I was a good 50% bigger in terms of weight than I was my freshman year of high school.
GED is an option, but frankly the GED lacks a lot of the material you learn in high school. Things like arts and the humanties. Things like reading famous authors in lit class. I think it is good for people whom high school is not working but being 19 in highschool alone does not prove that high school isn't working(I knew a kid who was in my grade school class who fell 1 year behind in 4th grade. He started Highschool 1 year later than me. ) nor does having a true learning disability.
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It has to do with using Special Education designation to deal with kids that don't have learning disorders. They have behavior disorders. And in places like LPHS, which is fed by some very troubled areas, you have bona fide thugs who are ranking gangbangers who are using their status as high school students to push drugs. It has to do with kids in their early teens who are highly suggestible to the "big men on campus" who have cars, expensive clothes and other symbols of wealth.
This sounds like a classification problem and drug pushing also happens in non special ed classes. In addition teens are always highly suggestable.
This is why we need to legalize drugs. Right now we have gangs that are 40+ years old and 4 or 5 generations deep who use the kids to sell in elementary (and of course high schools) schools. A kid smoking dope doesn't bother me. A kid who has been raised to believe that dealing drugs is a viable career choice and that public schools are "sales territory" is a HUGE problem.
I have lived in a drug infested area. A kid smoking dope does bother me big time. It is not healthy for the brain and addition is not a good thing at all. Most of the addicts I know would have trouble holding a job because the moment you pay them they will do drugs and will not come back till out of drugs.
As for viable career choice selling drugs can bring in more money than a kid working at a fast food place. That kind of profitability is hard to stop.
Once you hit 18...if you are not about to graduate at the end of that school year; no more time in the High School and go get your GED.
I flunked kindergarten. True story. I didn't start speaking English until I entered school and wasn't much of a talker, so I didn't meet any of the language goals of that class. The only reason I graduated at age 18 was because I skipped the 2nd grade. Almost got held back again b/c I missed two months of the 6th grade after my mother died, but I was allowed to take accelerated classes after school to catch up (this was a small private school, so more flexibility). Students get sick, miss chunks of school for variety of reasons, start late, or just plain have a bad year. Going by your silly rule, if a 13 year old isn't in line to graduate HS by 18, for whatever reason, why should that child bother? I guarantee you that such a rule will create more drop outs, which will affect the school system as a whole b/c families don't want to buy homes in areas w/ poor school systems that show high rates of drop outs.
Frankly, depending on the high school, graduating high school is harder than taking the GED and I've tutored GED students who were severely lacking in many skills b/c they dropped out of HS.
I still think 19 is too old for high school, but if you didn't catch my repeated clarifications about the special ed loophole your reading comprehension is lacking.
So now that we've established the context:
You can't edit a thread title once you've posted it.
But as to the rest, you must be daft. If a kid hasn't accomplished what they are supposed to by 18 (much less 19), I am strongly of the opinion they are wasting their time in a regular high school and we are wasting our time as a society trying to make round pegs fit in square holes.
Educating kids isn't cheap. AFAIC, once you're legally an adult, there are GED programs that are more appropriate - good grief, at 19 I was a college sophomore, and I was a good 50% bigger in terms of weight than I was my freshman year of high school.
"This doesn't sound like a problem having to do w/ the age of the students and more to do w/ the structure of the classes and the type of students being placed in these classes."
It has to do with using Special Education designation to deal with kids that don't have learning disorders. They have behavior disorders. And in places like LPHS, which is fed by some very troubled areas, you have bona fide thugs who are ranking gangbangers who are using their status as high school students to push drugs. It has to do with kids in their early teens who are highly suggestible to the "big men on campus" who have cars, expensive clothes and other symbols of wealth.
Or perhaps at Clemente you work in a gang and drug free bubble?
Read this all the way through:
Top cop
Asked if he thinks the police will let up, the gang member acknowledged, “Stopping the violence is the only way. They know we’ll always be selling drugs. The cops will tell you, ‘I won’t trip out about you having weed in your pocket to feed your kids.’ But when you start shooting across schoolyards and shooting little innocent kids and s--- like that, they’re not going to tolerate that. I get mad. I’ve told the mother-f------ shorties in our mob to stop doing that f------ b-------. How do you think the parents feel? That’s our neighborhood.”
This is why we need to legalize drugs. Right now we have gangs that are 40+ years old and 4 or 5 generations deep who use the kids to sell in elementary (and of course high schools) schools. A kid smoking dope doesn't bother me. A kid who has been raised to believe that dealing drugs is a viable career choice and that public schools are "sales territory" is a HUGE problem.
And you better believe that some of these folks know how to use every loophole in the system to keep pushers in the schools. You can continue to dance around the subject, you can rightly point out I could have better clarified in my first post, but you aren't going to tell me you've offered anything of substance to the conversation.
I still have zero clue what drugs have to do w/ 9 year olds in high schools or why physical mass should determine until what age someone can stay in HS.
Fact of the matter is not every 19 year old in HS are "the dregs of society". To think otherwise would be HIGHLY foolish and honestly, if this is what you thought of your students, the educational system need LESS teachers like you. If you haven't already, I'd consider a different line of work...
I was Held back my junior year due to injury and a lack of the HS accepting educational courses that I took while In Hospital. I graduated 4 months before my 19th Birthday as a result of a Private Schools Principal being a jackhole.
I still stand by what I said.
Depends on when you started school(the date of which isn't universal across the 50 states). If like me you were a 17 year old at the end of school then I would have had a little more than 6 months before I turned 18(i.e. almost half a school year). i.e. I could have screwed up a year and not been in any danger of being out by 18. Most people I went to school with were 18 well before the end of school year and would not have had a 2nd chance(i.e. their 18th birthday fell in the middle of the school year).
If on the other hand if you got held back 1 year in grade school and meet that jerk of a principal, you would never have had a diploma or if that injury happened Senior year.
Anyway the old cut off for ILL used to be in December. I was born before the cut off and started K at age 4 instead of 5.(Thank God they changed that law!) and parents had the option of either starting then or holding back a year(if not 5). The current school system just isn't set up to guarantee out by 18. Now if we had a system like the UK where they finish at 16, then I could see your point.
I don't think you are giving younger teenagers enoough credit - especially 15 year old girls who are MUCH more likely to label these guys on campus as "creepy". When I went to high school, it was a school that fed into a troubled subdivision in Chicago Heights. And we didn't view super seniors as big men on campus. If anything, we made fun of them. And come on, man. Most 15 year old girls don't lose control at the sight of a 19 year old guy.. Like I said, if anythig he's a total creeper.
This topic reminds me of Charles De Mar's line in the film Better off Dead -- "I've been going to this high school for seven and a half years. I'm no dummy!"
I still have zero clue what drugs have to do w/ 9 year olds in high schools or why physical mass should determine until what age someone can stay in HS.
Fact of the matter is not every 19 year old in HS are "the dregs of society". To think otherwise would be HIGHLY foolish and honestly, if this is what you thought of your students, the educational system need LESS teachers like you. If you haven't already, I'd consider a different line of work...
I thought very highly of many of my students, and didn't have any particular hatred of the troublemaking alpha dogs, outside of the fact they were a major disruption to the education of countless other students.
I guess you've never seen kids hauled off the jail for assaulting each other and teachers. Or "boys" harassing female students by grabbing their breasts in the hallways. That was LPHS in the 90s, and the truly sad part is it was seen as normal. I saw plenty of girls in the 15 - 16 yo range who were clearly smitten with the gangbanger type and did not need any coercion, even though they often didn't know what they are getting into.
And no, of course not every 19 year old is a problem - a kid who is 19 and working hard in school who started late or was held back years ago is a different subject altogether. But I'll wager an organ the 19 year old who is accused of assaulting this girl at LPHS was no honor student.
You are still dancing around the subject of young adults in high school until the day before they can legally drink, who have no intention of doing any classwork. I didn't say they are the dregs of society, but I saw enough cleverness (and they bragged about it) to know they were using the system.
Special ed designation should not be a license to stick around high school if there's no improvement. People 19 and older not taking schooling seriously need to be shown the door.
btw, I was 17 when I graduated high school. I turned 18 the fall of my freshman year at college.
I do think CPS has since shifted the birthday later in a year regarding what class a kid starts in.
I do think CPS has since shifted the birthday later in a year regarding what class a kid starts in.
The state did in the 90ies. It was found that 4 year old K students were having a little trouble keeping up with the 5 year olds.Now it is 5 by Sep. 1(or within 30 days of the start of the K class). Where as before it was 5 by some date in December(and if you were not five your parent could hold you a year). In other words there will be a lot fewer 17 year old high school grads today(you would have had to skip a grade).
^But this isn't, in any way, CPS specific. There are 'super seniors' everywhere. One of my closest friends in my suburban high school, who still easily ranks as one of the smartest (but also laziest) people of my acquaintance, came around for a victory lap.
Also vote and can serve in the military? Yeah, 18 year olds can do that and my brothers were 18 the day they started their senior year because of their late July birthdays. Your arguments are not well thought out.
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