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In many ways the magnets are as bad as the charters. They skim off the top of the available students. That makes the regular schools worse. What you end up in the low end public schools are the least motivated, most transient students generally with the least experienced and weakest teachers.
And it is the bottom 25% that damages NV performance. And magnets and charters makes it worse if anything. What we need is some system to deal with schools loaded with English Learners, The Disabled, the Transient and the ill behaved. Tall order.
That's why I suggested specialized schools for those kids. I don't give a flying fig about performance scores. I care about educating children.
I have to disagree with this. The magnates should (I won't say do because there will be exceptions) be pulling the kids who were the top learners or most intelligent. Those kids would often create a problem in regular classrooms where the teacher has to hold back the top kid(s) to teach to the middle. So putting those kids in a setting where they become the norm keeps them more engaged than a classroom where they may simply zone out and grow accustomed to coasting. It also lets them push themselves against kids with similar ability like an all star team would function in sports and it lets the teachers narrow the range of learning abilities they have to accommodate in one classroom.
The big problem with magnates is that it requires a large enough bulk of students to pull from. So unless you have a giant school with an in house magnate program (which can be pretty exclusionary in practice) you need to draw from larger areas which means transportation, parents having flexible schedules and even the size of the population becoming an issue.
Magnets in Las Vegas are entered by lottery with a bias to siblings. They generally attract the well behaved kids not the smart. The also pull the children of interested parents since it takes some actions to get children in.
Magnets are good for the children who attend them and bad for the children who don't.
My granddaughter attends a charter school and is in 2nd grade. For some reason that wasn't made available to parents, the school changed hands and names this year. We also had to buy new uniforms. As for those that say charter schools are for middle class white people's kids, nothing could be further from the truth at my granddaughter's school. The majority of kids are Hispanic and black.
That was a long video that AMSS posted, but I'm wondering if anyone that replied actually watched it. If you did then you would be agreeing with his point. In general charters are not held accountable and the kids are often not getting a much better education than they would if that money had been put to good use in the local public schools.
In my area we do have good schools and the local charters are looking for kids that want a specific education, like an arts or STEM centered school. The problem with this is the tax money goes with the kids to the charter school. Local school boards have very minimal control over the schools even though they are funding them. It's a racket. This article talks more about charters in PA. https://yinzercation.wordpress.com/2...arter-schools/
Thanks for posting the link to the article. The issue is far more complex than what a liberal comedian's TV audience wants to hear about.
The author starts out by admitting there are good charter schools, and for me this sums the issue up: << To me the important question is not, “are there good charter schools?” but rather, “how do we make sure that all students, and not just a select few, are getting these benefits?” >>
The education system is flawed. Perform your own due diligence when it comes to seeking the best education options available to you for your own children. That's pretty much the summary of this report.
I'm happy with our neighborhood charter high school. They are open enrollment with no testing/transcript requirements and 80% minority. The neighborhood high school is overcrowded and the teachers are pretty much hamstrung by the administration to the point they are glorified babysitters.
You're still talking to well-off white people. Inner city Single Moms and inner city grandparents raising at-risk kids while Single Mom is dealing with the legal and/or mental health systems can't "just move", can't "just pay for private", and can't "just homeschool".
I don't think charter schools are a panacea, but I've seen plenty of at-risk poor kids who have stayed in school because of charter schools. They won't go to Harvard but they may take a few courses at community college, and will probably get steady jobs as medical techs or office assistants.
Right, use that money to reach at-risk kids. If it's so easy to do in the traditional public school setting, why didn't they just do it? Why is that only brought up when charter schools present competition?
Philosophically, I am no fan of charter schools, and only slightly more supportive of magnet schools. However, that all falls by the wayside when you start looking at your own kids, or your family members. I have a grand-niece whose mom lives a rather erratic lifestyle, single mom, different boyfriends, frequent moves, etc. She is concerned about her daughter's education, and put her in a magnet (arts) school for K-8. It was good for my grand-niece to have some continuity in school throughout this chaotic life. Denver Public Schools does provide some transportation to these schools. I don't live there (Denver) so I don't know all the details.
Quote:
Originally Posted by Cloudwalker
"While I support our schools, I don't support a blank check. How much more money do you need?"
The state of California is projected to spend around $14,500 per student in 2016 (up from around $10,000 in 2011) and $64,000 per prisoner in 2016 (up from $49,000 in 2011). I imagine it's similar in many other states. That is a ridiculous situation.
Imagine how many of those 112,000 people currently rotting in CA jails could have been healthy citizens if we collectively as a society had been willing to put the money in at the front end, when it really makes a difference, and properly fund and support all of our public schools? It's a tragic waste of people and money.
You know, we will always have people committing crimes and breaking the law, no matter how good our schools are. That's not to say I'm opposed to increased school funding.
Quote:
Originally Posted by mrpeatie
I have to disagree with this. The magnates should (I won't say do because there will be exceptions) be pulling the kids who were the top learners or most intelligent. Those kids would often create a problem in regular classrooms where the teacher has to hold back the top kid(s) to teach to the middle. So putting those kids in a setting where they become the norm keeps them more engaged than a classroom where they may simply zone out and grow accustomed to coasting. It also lets them push themselves against kids with similar ability like an all star team would function in sports and it lets the teachers narrow the range of learning abilities they have to accommodate in one classroom.
The big problem with magnates is that it requires a large enough bulk of students to pull from. So unless you have a giant school with an in house magnate program (which can be pretty exclusionary in practice) you need to draw from larger areas which means transportation, parents having flexible schedules and even the size of the population becoming an issue.
I disagree with the bold. I think the point of the magnet schools is to attract kids with special interests. The one my GN went to was an arts focus, integrating art into the curriculum.
Charter schools generally skim off better than average students.
Those remaining then have schools with lower test scores which are then deemed *bad* which then causes political heat about "fixing the public schools" and can run afoul of NCLB or other testing things.
Saying they are automatically bad or good depends where you sit at the table.
For say....a teachers union it's against their interests.
For the parents of a bright kid stuck in a school with gangs etc. it's a great chance to put their kid in a better environment.
I say let the local voters decide for themselves how they want their educational system to function.
I am however, not falling for propaganda that they all use false advertising...whatever that means.
That was a long video that AMSS posted, but I'm wondering if anyone that replied actually watched it. If you did then you would be agreeing with his point. In general charters are not held accountable and the kids are often not getting a much better education than they would if that money had been put to good use in the local public schools.
In my area we do have good schools and the local charters are looking for kids that want a specific education, like an arts or STEM centered school. The problem with this is the tax money goes with the kids to the charter school. Local school boards have very minimal control over the schools even though they are funding them. It's a racket. This article talks more about charters in PA. https://yinzercation.wordpress.com/2...arter-schools/
That article is a little funny, as the author states in the opening that SPP scores are a poor way to determine school quality then uses SPP scores in their first argument to show that charter schools are low quality.
I did watch the entire video, and while it's entertaining I don't find it particularly persuasive. I'm sure he (or almost certainly his writers) could have cherry picked the best performing charter schools and states in the country and made exactly the opposite argument about how good they were. I'm sure the truth is somewhere in the middle. I doubt there's a single government funded private industry in the country that doesn't have massive corruption and fraud. Private schools are able to outperform public schools with far less expenditures per student because they don't have to take all students. I suspect the primary reason successful charter schools perform so well is exactly the same. Children with supportive parents who want to learn will always do better when segregated from those who disrupt class and can't or don't want to learn.
Well done. It's a shame few journalists do this kind of research.
The real shame is that people confuse comedians and entertainment with journalism and news. (Not necessarily directed at the OP, although the opening statement does imply such confusion).
That's not to say this comedy routine doesn't raise any good points or isn't effective in raising public awareness of an issue. Just that it is an agenda-driven, one-sided COMEDY act and very likely less well researched than a genuine news outlet. The script is written by _comedy_ writers and designed to get a laugh. The bias is certainly very clear - they are not presenting a "news" story; they are presenting information to support a pre-determined position. Any flaws in truth or logic are camouflaged by cute one-liners.
The poor quality of news reporting in recent years is partly at fault. It is still very troubling that most people cannot differentiate between reality and entertainment.
That was a long video that AMSS posted, but I'm wondering if anyone that replied actually watched it. If you did then you would be agreeing with his point. In general charters are not held accountable and the kids are often not getting a much better education than they would if that money had been put to good use in the local public schools.
In my area we do have good schools and the local charters are looking for kids that want a specific education, like an arts or STEM centered school. The problem with this is the tax money goes with the kids to the charter school. Local school boards have very minimal control over the schools even though they are funding them. It's a racket. This article talks more about charters in PA. https://yinzercation.wordpress.com/2...arter-schools/
I never watch John Oliver videos. I always hear leftists bragging about how he ripped this or destroyed that but I figure he's just preaching to the choir anyway and doubtless utilizing the "mock the opposition out of the conversation" approach to debates that made Jon Stewart so popular. More of a peer pressure thing than the "unassailable logic" approach that they'd like to portray.
If I ever find myself in a position where I'm contemplating sending one of my children to a charter school, I'll do my research myself, on the concept of charter schools in general and on the school in question in particular. I don't need this prig trying to cajole me in to getting in line with his way of thinking.
Last edited by Fifty Seven; 08-24-2016 at 11:32 AM..
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