Question: Why are public schools so bad now, in terms of both learning and behavior, that we are regularly learning about teachers who are being reported for behavior we find difficult to believe?
Answer: To anyone who thinks they can do the job of most teachers currently dealing with the kinds of students in many schools today, go for it! If they think they can both maintain discipline and keep them interested in learning, be my guest! Good luck!
After 40 years of doing my best to do the same, I speak with experience and authority in saying that over those years, the deterioration of decent social behavior of a growing percentage of students, especially by the time they get to middle school age, has gotten to the point where I can understand why many school districts will do their best to keep teachers, rather than fire them.
And why do I say that? Because those teachers who have attempted to do the job for a reasonable amount of time know from experience that even though they're paid what seems to many as an exorbitant salary for the work they do, leave as soon as they realize they can no longer tolerate the abuse and disrespect they must endure on a regular basis, while also feeling that the district administration's edicts about what they can, and can't do, finally leave for another profession; it's just not worth it! So, many districts do their best to keep who they can.
Until and unless school boards begin to stand behind teachers who are attempting to establish their classroom as one that is oriented toward a learning environment that observes polite, respectful social conduct and treatment by the student of the teacher who's there to help them apply skills to get them prepared for a prosperous future, then public schools will only get worse.
Think about it... why are private, charter, and home schooling growing in popularity and demand by parents across the country? Because they can afford it? No, because they understand that their child's learning, as opposed to a constantly disruptive and anti-social, disrespectful climate which dominates many classrooms in middle and high schools today stunt's their child's experience and, in the long run, their potential for success in the future.
The President of the Washington Education Association testified against state funds being used to support charter schools. Since the teachers’ union does not control charter schools – nor receive dues from the teachers in those schools – the unions are opposed to parents providing their children with an education option that better fits their needs. Charter schools are increasingly more attractive to students from low-income families than their neighborhood public schools. The teachers’ union continues to demonstrate that its greed and political power are more important than parents choosing what is best for their children’s education, especially those from poorer families. (WEA) from ShiftWA.org
The last 10 years were spent substituting in a few different districts. Even through that brief period, I experienced a noticeable deterioration of even elementary students at the upper grades exhibiting what I dealt with at the middle school level years before. Why? Because many children see their older siblings modeling the inappropriate behavior in various settings, or on television.
I know, I've managed to hang in there over the past four decades and it's gotten worse with the type of undisciplined child who comes from a home that has no father figure to provide them the needed guidance and nurturing so critical to a growing child. This is where our society has failed itself.
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