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Children are NOT doing better now than ever before (but that's okay, CAVA, just keep your head in the sand while the rest of us do the heavy lifting to solve the problem). SO much more was expected of us academically than is being expected of kids today.
Link please to any data that remotely supports what you're saying. This is reactionary claptrap. Kids are doing much better today than they ever have. Maybe not as much in the shrinking white trash world that doesn't value education but in the normal suburbs kids are doing great. Just ask any college admissions officer.
there are a lot of excuses in a controversy such as this one. but i am having a hard time following your logic when you label any and all explanations of the phenomenon as an excuse.
since none of them have been acceptable by your standards, why do you think it is that minorities are doing poor in school compared to the white students in the same situations?
Ok, let's call them 'reasons'. Which of the reasons given so far do you think have validity?
This is a stubborn and persistent achievement gap that exists in this country and around the world throughout history right up until today that all efforts to date have failed to reduce. Do you have anything to add as far as what the reason for this may be? Give it some thought and get back to me.
Ok, let's call them 'reasons'. Which of the reasons given so far do you think have validity?
This is a stubborn and persistent achievement gap that exists in this country and around the world throughout history right up until today that all efforts to date have failed to reduce. Do you have anything to add as far as what the reason for this may be? Give it some thought and get back to me.
- Reel
does this mean that you don't have an answer yourself?
it is fine if you do not have any ideas, but i would hope that you could own up and say it rather than deflecting to ask me the very same question that you aren't answering.
i am not trying to argue that you are wrong––i merely think that you aren't analyzing it critically enough if you seem to be merely dismissing all of them into the same bucket of "excuses."
i think that there are many reasons why the op's situations might be happening. mostly, as jet and a few others have opined, i think that it comes down to parenting standards.
when parents are involved in their childrens' education, even the most challenged of students can do well. i should know, because i was one of those students, and i had awesome parents, who, though they were not perfect, tried darn hard to make sure that i was not flunking through life.
the reasons for why parents might be failing? that is another complex issues, with factors and subfactors in and of itself.
i have met some black people that seem to fall into the category of "education is for white people," and other logically fallacious excuses for not pushing themselves. i have also met black people that care nothing for education or career, and only seem to care about acting like hoodlums.
i have also met blacks that are driven individuals (right now i live in utah, where there are not too many blacks to begin with, and a large percentage that are here have come because of educational opportunities. so most of them that i associate with now, i do so through college).
and i have also met whites (and other ethnicities) that have fallen into the same categories of lazy, self-pitying, society-hates-me attitudes of underachievement.
therefore, i will not pretend to know what is causing the issues. i just know that the issues are there, and that we as a society need to stop feeling sorry for people, need to stop expecting less of them, need to stop excusing bad behavior (from the parents in particular), and need to actually work together to make this beast that we call civilization work.
there are other factors that i see and other issues that i have opinions and observations about that are related, but my thoughts are scattered, so i will let them ferment, and hopefully read what you think are acceptable excuses/reasons.
I do not think there is any one answer as to why blacks do not fare as well as European Americans or Asian Americans academically. "Excuses" is an appropriate word if someone brings up factors, which are actually not important reasons, solely for the purpose of saving face or appearing even handed. If we are going to have socialism and state run school systems, then I believe we an obligation to determine what factors are impacting students and groups of students in regards to academic achievement. I also believe we have an obligation to report those findings.
does this mean that you don't have an answer yourself?
it is fine if you do not have any ideas, but i would hope that you could own up and say it rather than deflecting to ask me the very same question that you aren't answering.
i am not trying to argue that you are wrong––i merely think that you aren't analyzing it critically enough if you seem to be merely dismissing all of them into the same bucket of "excuses."
i think that there are many reasons why the op's situations might be happening. mostly, as jet and a few others have opined, i think that it comes down to parenting standards.
I can see you've given this some thought. Parenting can be an important factor in how well their children achieve. The ability to achieve is not a cliff where people on one side achieve well and people on the other side do not achieve at all. Most people are capable of achievement. However, the less ability there is to achieve, the more important parenting becomes.
There are many factors involved in how well one achieves. Such things as initiative, how quickly and easily one learns, inclination, intellectual curiosity, etc. People who do not learn as easily as others or who learn at a slower pace or who have a little less intellectual curiosity can in many instances end up learning just as much as those who have a little more of these traits. However, this will probably take more involvement by folks such as parents and/or teachers.
The bottom line is that not everyone achieves at the same level or at the same pace. It really is as simple as that. Many of the initiatives to reduce the achievement gap assume that all people have an equal, or nearly equal, ability to achieve. This is not correct which is way these efforts fail. The achievement gap could be reduced if we recognize and address the correct issue. So far we seem to be pretty much unwilling to do that.
I do not think there is any one answer as to why blacks do not fare as well as European Americans or Asian Americans academically. "Excuses" is an appropriate word if someone brings up factors, which are actually not important reasons, solely for the purpose of saving face or appearing even handed. If we are going to have socialism and state run school systems, then I believe we an obligation to determine what factors are impacting students and groups of students in regards to academic achievement. I also believe we have an obligation to report those findings.
You are correct. This was actually done but people didn't like the results so the findings were not reported and folks stopped looking. It has become extremely politically incorrect to delve into some of the reasons, excuses, causes for the failure to achieve. That's too bad because that is exactly what needs to be done if we are to do anything about it.
Stop worrying about the black kids and worry about your own. Your concern smacks a bit too much of "our little brown brothers" paternalism. It's not appreciated.
does this mean that you don't have an answer yourself?
it is fine if you do not have any ideas, but i would hope that you could own up and say it rather than deflecting to ask me the very same question that you aren't answering.
i am not trying to argue that you are wrong––i merely think that you aren't analyzing it critically enough if you seem to be merely dismissing all of them into the same bucket of "excuses."
i think that there are many reasons why the op's situations might be happening. mostly, as jet and a few others have opined, i think that it comes down to parenting standards.
when parents are involved in their childrens' education, even the most challenged of students can do well. i should know, because i was one of those students, and i had awesome parents, who, though they were not perfect, tried darn hard to make sure that i was not flunking through life.
the reasons for why parents might be failing? that is another complex issues, with factors and subfactors in and of itself.
i have met some black people that seem to fall into the category of "education is for white people," and other logically fallacious excuses for not pushing themselves. i have also met black people that care nothing for education or career, and only seem to care about acting like hoodlums.
i have also met blacks that are driven individuals (right now i live in utah, where there are not too many blacks to begin with, and a large percentage that are here have come because of educational opportunities. so most of them that i associate with now, i do so through college).
and i have also met whites (and other ethnicities) that have fallen into the same categories of lazy, self-pitying, society-hates-me attitudes of underachievement.
therefore, i will not pretend to know what is causing the issues. i just know that the issues are there, and that we as a society need to stop feeling sorry for people, need to stop expecting less of them, need to stop excusing bad behavior (from the parents in particular), and need to actually work together to make this beast that we call civilization work.
there are other factors that i see and other issues that i have opinions and observations about that are related, but my thoughts are scattered, so i will let them ferment, and hopefully read what you think are acceptable excuses/reasons.
I can see you've given this some thought. Parenting can be an important factor in how well their children achieve. The ability to achieve is not a cliff where people on one side achieve well and people on the other side do not achieve at all. Most people are capable of achievement. However, the less ability there is to achieve, the more important parenting becomes.
There are many factors involved in how well one achieves. Such things as initiative, how quickly and easily one learns, inclination, intellectual curiosity, etc. People who do not learn as easily as others or who learn at a slower pace or who have a little less intellectual curiosity can in many instances end up learning just as much as those who have a little more of these traits. However, this will probably take more involvement by folks such as parents and/or teachers.
The bottom line is that not everyone achieves at the same level or at the same pace. It really is as simple as that. Many of the initiatives to reduce the achievement gap assume that all people have an equal, or nearly equal, ability to achieve. This is not correct which is way these efforts fail. The achievement gap could be reduced if we recognize and address the correct issue. So far we seem to be pretty much unwilling to do that.
- Reel
i agree with all of this; i wasn't trying to say that there are not degrees of academic capability.
further, academic capability is a slippery slope as far as determining someone's mental capacity. this is an entirely separate issue, so i won't get into it here, but the tendency that people have to assume that you are ignorant if you don't hold a high school or college degree is just that, an assumption, which is an unintelligent (indeed, ignorant) way to create an opinion.
anyway, i think that in these and other issues, people are definitely inclined, as the poster after me noted, and you agreed with, to become offended when the data does not support their world views.
it is easy to justify and condemn, and much harder to buck up and make things right, and society in general is guilty of this, though it strikes different cultural and ethnic groups in different ways.
white people certainly aren't immune to this either; it just comes out in usually different ways.
does this mean that you don't have an answer yourself?
it is fine if you do not have any ideas, but i would hope that you could own up and say it rather than deflecting to ask me the very same question that you aren't answering.
i am not trying to argue that you are wrong––i merely think that you aren't analyzing it critically enough if you seem to be merely dismissing all of them into the same bucket of "excuses."
i think that there are many reasons why the op's situations might be happening. mostly, as jet and a few others have opined, i think that it comes down to parenting standards.
when parents are involved in their childrens' education, even the most challenged of students can do well. i should know, because i was one of those students, and i had awesome parents, who, though they were not perfect, tried darn hard to make sure that i was not flunking through life.
the reasons for why parents might be failing? that is another complex issues, with factors and subfactors in and of itself.
i have met some black people that seem to fall into the category of "education is for white people," and other logically fallacious excuses for not pushing themselves. i have also met black people that care nothing for education or career, and only seem to care about acting like hoodlums.
i have also met blacks that are driven individuals (right now i live in utah, where there are not too many blacks to begin with, and a large percentage that are here have come because of educational opportunities. so most of them that i associate with now, i do so through college).
and i have also met whites (and other ethnicities) that have fallen into the same categories of lazy, self-pitying, society-hates-me attitudes of underachievement.
therefore, i will not pretend to know what is causing the issues. i just know that the issues are there, and that we as a society need to stop feeling sorry for people, need to stop expecting less of them, need to stop excusing bad behavior (from the parents in particular), and need to actually work together to make this beast that we call civilization work.
there are other factors that i see and other issues that i have opinions and observations about that are related, but my thoughts are scattered, so i will let them ferment, and hopefully read what you think are acceptable excuses/reasons.
All of those points are true. I sort of think it's a personality issue as much as societal. I'm going to use some of the minority students in my daughters 1st grade class as an example.
One of the girls is bi-racial (mexican mom/black dad). This girl is extremely smart. She reads above grade level, made the district wide student of the month, gets awards for good behavior. I know her parents. Her dad and mom are VERY involved with her. They make her do homework and they do it with her, she has daily chores to do before she's allowed to play. Her mom is a stay at home mom, dad is a game developer.
Another girl...this one has a bit of a tough home life. Her dad was killed in Iraq. Her mom is remarried, but both her mom and step-dad work long hours. I've not met her parents, this is what she tells me. I have met her grandma, who I think does most of the caretaking. But, with that, she's still a well mannered kid and smart. She does well in school but she also tends to say and act like her teenaged siblings and cousins who also do a lions share of watching her while the parents work.
The two boys in her class (unrelated) are both little gentlemen. They treat all their classmates with respect and say "yes ma'am and thank you, etc..." They do well in school and one of them recently won an award for "good citizenship"...which means being kind and helpful to classmates.
Another kid I know (middle schooler, white kid) who used to live 2 houses down from me I've had in a classroom I subbed in and co-taught in:
He used to be a cute little kid (or so I thought). He's terrible in class; Mouthy, disruptive, doesn't do any of the work, interrupts the teacher. His father, I found out, was abusive to his mother (they would get in fights where the cops would be called). His father was like that to the mother, but spoiled the kids rotten...they had no rules and no consequences for any of their bad behavior. One time he and another boy pulled up some of our tomato plants and threw them in the street. The other boys dad found out about it, caught them at it I think, and made his son come to our front door and apologize. The other kids dad did not, didn't even acknowledge it. So, he has a dad who tries to be his buddy and a mom who has to work long hours and isn't home much, and so he has lots of unaccountable free time to do whatever he wants with no guidance from anyone. I worry about him...
I know that's a difficult situation and that there are also parents who may not be causing that much turbulence in their homes, but are just plain lazy and don't make their kids do anything either.
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