I keep hearing that if we keep the "best teachers" our children will succeed academically. Of course, nobody cannot explain who are the "best teachers". If you ask Mayor4Life Michael Bloomberg and his puppet, the unqualified Chancellor, Cathie Black, the "best teachers" are cheap, young, and not vested. If you ask educators, especially the educators in the trenches they will tell you it is class size, adequate resources, and teaching experience. Obviously, it is the latter that is true. However, what is left unsaid is the social-economic issues that affect students even before they show up at the school. The revision of the New York State cut scores showed a glaring academic achievement gap between income levels and racial composition. This academic achievement gap is greatest in families where there is no father.
In particular, it is the child's family unit that is probably the single most important criteria to measure a child's academic success. Studies have shown that a fatherless family leads to an increase in dropout rates for the children of the family. Worse was the academic and economic damage done to children who grow up without a father. Some of the statistics are chilling and can be found Here. For example here are some of these statistics.
- Fatherless children are twice as likely to dropout. One in three teen mothers dropout.
- Fatherless children are twice as likely to be incarcerated.
- Fatherless children do less well in school.
- Fatherless children are on the average have more behavioral disorders.
- Fatherless children tend to be poorer compared to their peers.
Keep the family unit intact and you will see real academic improvement and a closing of the academic achievement gap.
11 comments:
The black students, which is most of the city come from broken homes. These students are now having children which will be permanent welfare cases. This is a never ending cycle. Destroys the economy and school system, with no end in sight. The females then complain that they want free grades because they had to stay home to take care of the baby.
I know it may not sound right, but as a teacher, that makes a lot of sense. This is where the low performance comes from. This is also where the threats come from. "Pass me or else." Most students don't do an ounce of work. 38 credits at 20 years old, with 80 credits attempted, show up last 2 weeks of term and expect to get a 65. All they care about is having sex and drinking.
Toilet paper has more value than their so called high school diplomas. What an unfortunate situation. You'd think that all the (perceived) gains of the '60's and '70's would have had some lasting positive effects on that welfare subculture.
And of course, Michael El Duce's love of his unmitigated "Sanctuary City" policy of illegal, undocumented aliens GREATLY hurts the economic situation of ALL male blacks in this city, both young and old. AND he lies about it regularly on the J.Gambling show, stating that "the vast majority of the undocumented live alone, have no children, and don't use city services"...huh? In this day of fiscal emergency, how is it that there is no public accounting or estimate of the city expenditures spent on undocumented/illegals? They have high schools all over the city whose mission is solely to cater to new immigrants, ALL of whom are illegal. How can El Duce say that they don't use services?
Chaz:
Who in their right minds want to deal with the family units? What financial or political incentives are there to do so? If a principal has plenty of troubles controlling the kids, he or she , at least, has the control over teachers and the days get by. Very strange idea, wake up, it is a blame game.
Racism, political correctness, multiculturalism, a country with two "official" languages, politicians want the quick fix, saving families takes too long to get them reelected in a 2-4 year cycle, no incentives not to have children, social promotion, lying about test scores, oh, and can anyone write, yes they can cut, click and paste, it's the teacher's fault, the child is always right and so are the parents.
Politicians owned by the corporations and blind faith in the marketplace. No child left behind...sold a lot of textbooks.
What I find astonishing,most of the comments here show, if simple common sense were applied much could be accomplished. Firstly, an english only mandate for all would help give some communication for the hundreds of thousands of immigrants the ability to communicate and help their kids with school issues.
Secondly,a scale for all to be charged for education instead of freebies so parents would have an interest in their kids education.
The idea of free education for all in this society of mostly welfare, immigrants and illegals only proliferates the failing (failed)system.
The idea is you need to fix the family before you will see success in student achievement.
No politician is going out on a limb to fix the family? Now you sound naive.
I may be naive but it still is the truth.
Absolutely, but we should be making noise on this front as educators. Why are teachers vilified as a group but not politicians? Yes, we do vote...
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