Education in the US - no wonder we're failing!

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6-year-old suspended for kissing girl, accused of sexual harassment - CNN.com

Six yr old kissed his girlfriend (it's mutual) on the cheek - got in trouble. Later he kissed her on the hand - and the school labeled him for sexual harassment.

The US just placed even lower than previously on a global education list and the response from a teacher union rep on TV was "this is proof we need to pay teachers more".

For this? Really?

In spite of claims by the teacher unions, if US teacher were paid at the same rate as other countries - US teachers would take a 30% pay cut. oops

When social correctness is the primary focus of education - the kids lose. This poor little' boy's mom is at a loss - now he's asking her "what's sex?"
#off topic forum
  • On the news the other night, they reported about a 10 year old girl that was suspended for making believe she had a bow and arrow.
    Unfortunately reports like this are more common then uncommon.
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  • Banned
    They should replace teachers with computers.

    And base the computers on the personality of Ludwig Wittgenstein
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    • Peter Diamandis talks about this briefly. Education looks like it needs an entire revamp, and it's stories like the original poster placed that makes modern day schools look ridiculous.
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  • Well, unfortunately this type of thing is less the teachers fault than skittish school administrators fearful of lawsuits by sue-happy people and attorneys.

    I'm running out of tolerance for zero-tolerance policies
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  • Banned
    I watched that story on the TV news last night, crazy world we live in.

    , will be the new stalking law. :rolleyes:
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  • Hmm. Is that including all countries including third world? If so, I'm not surprised they would get a pay cut, but from what I have read the US teachers' salary doesn't rank very high when compared to developed comparable economies.
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    • The number varies widely depending on the survey, the part of the country the teacher is from and how long they've been teaching, but we are by no means the highest paid teachers. Some have us ranked 22nd out of 27 countries compared.

      Which I find ironic since where I live in NY out of the almost $11,000 per year we pay in taxes, almost $7,000 is the school tax with the rest divvied up between property, town and county taxes.

      Tell me there's no waste spending going on...
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  • What goes on?

    I actually did the above in the first grade - in a remote area of the playground and without any apparent repercussions.

    Myself and another young gent were vying for her favor and I won the sweepstakes with a soft, sweet and gentle kiss on the cheek oh! (I was a gent and asked for permission first)

    R., my worthy adversary was perhaps beaten to the punch and has never lived it down to this day as I would move out of that neighborhood but we would hook up again in high school and beyond.

    Her name started with a J. and it was just that one sweet kiss.

    Did the teacher really say that?

    I'm not sure how teachers are paid verses other nations but teachers do not need to be in the business of buying supplies for their students.

    Funding for education is all over the map but we as a nation can and should find a way to...

    If every child in the USA received early childhood education, it would a great help the bottom line in more ways than one.

    I hear most of the other countries that are kicking our tails these days are doing some type of early childhood education.

    That's one thing we can do as a nation if we're serious about turning the situation around.


    BTW... she really was sweet.


    How would I answer the question? What is sex?


    It's something older people do, it is not for kids.

    And you should not be talking or thinking about it because it's not for you.


    Did the teacher really say that?
  • As long as our education system is run by federal government it will consist of more indoctrination than education. I'm more worried about that than the pay scale. My sister is a teacher - there is so much she is not ALLOWED to teach her students it's just mind boggling. She was also actually fired once for racism when she put a little black boy in the corner for being disruptive....when she pulled out a pic of the man she lived with (he was black) it made not one whit of difference to anyone - she was accused of bigotry and let go.

    People also talk about "early education" as being a key to brighter kids. Not in this fiasco of an indoctrination-disguised-as-educational system it's not. I sure wouldn't want my kids being indoctrinated even early than usual. But then, if I had a kid, it wouldn't be in the public ed system anyway. No way. My dad was a school administrator and I can see the clear cut difference between our schools before the "Department of Ed" took over ruling every damned school in the country and afterwards. It's astounding.
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  • Actually, they passed a law stating that it is ILLEGAL for a minor girl to give her consent! Of course, the law DOES specify that the male has to be considered a NON-MINOR. So a 17yo boy COULD be accused of rape of a 17yo girl. But SIX!?!?!??!?!?!?!?!?!? GIVE ME A BREAK!

    WOW! I guess they are lucky they aren't in germany! Hand-kissing - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

    We pay them PLENTY! And some of the better areas actually pay LESS!!!!!!

    He probably just liked her, and maybe even copied behavior. The teachers may have just inserted THEIR dirty minds and "thoughts" and colored his behavior accordingly. If they had a sleepover or something they would probably attribute a normal action to mean that he was having "dirty" thoughts, etc.... even though he wouldn't be thinking anything of the sort.

    Seriously, I used to wonder if adults were even HUMAN since I saw so many indications that kids decades earlier were the same, and adults never seemed to realize it.

    Steve
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  • Banned
    That's not practical.

    There's counties that only have a single high school (for the entire county).
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    • THAT'S why so many choose a home because of the schools!

      Steve
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    • You are so right.

      There are plenty of public schools across the country and on all levels that have great track records.

      Often, it depends on where the school is located more than anything else.
    • Banned
      You obviously live in a city that has a bunch of school options.

      Sorry, the entire world isn't one big city. There's no private schools in the county I live in, kids traveling 60 miles round trip isn't practical (5 days a week).
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  • I was literally making gunpowder with a chemistry set (illegal for kids nowadays) and made functioning toy cannons when I was around the age of that girl suspended for harmlessly pretending she had a bow and arrow. If it was nowadays, no doubt I'd be locked up and pumped with pharmaceuticals for my recreational activities.
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  • It's one of those WTF stories the media throws out there on a daily basis to get everyone viewing and riled up about the situation. The one today is about the rich 16 year old kid who while drunk driving killed 4 people and his lawyer blamed it on affluenza. The kid got off from doing jail time. It's a big world and there is a lot of injustice out there.
  • a school im involved with sent out a plea to buy 35 ipods

    i sent back 35 writing pads, 35 pencils, 35 pencil sharpeners and 35 rubbers, erasers

    i note i am no longer on their mailing list
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  • 1. I attended both private schools and public schools. While the
    private schools were certainly better on the whole, the absolute
    worst teachers that I ever had were in private institutions, and
    the absolute best teachers that I had were in public schools.
    While I got a much better education in private schools, a couple
    of teachers from public schools were some of the greatest
    positive influences on my life, and I consider them close friends
    even to this day.

    2. Whether or not you send your own children to private schools
    so that they can have every advantage you can afford to give them,
    don't you WANT public schools to improve and be more successful?
    Or do you really think you would prefer to live in a nation of ignorant,
    uneducated people?

    3. Sending kids to public school means that you don't care about them
    and you deserve whatever happens, and shouldn't complain about
    it? Seriously? Give me a break... We all pay taxes-- and that includes
    the parents who enroll their children in public schools, who also have
    a voice in this debate. Now if only they would actually back-up their
    opinions by actually getting out and voting...


    OH, you know what else is great about public school? Young
    people seem to learn social skills quite a bit better when they have
    the opportunity to interact with so many of their peers from
    different backgrounds and positions in life. Not so for those who
    are in private schools, or those who are home-schooled.

    Emotional maturity and social awareness make for a much more rounded,
    well-adjusted young adult.... And older adult, come to think of it.



    EDIT: And no matter what you believe about the public vs private debate,
    the idea of a six-year old being labeled for sexual harassment because
    he gave a peer a kiss-- and it wasn't against her wishes-- That's not
    harassment, that's cute!
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  • I'm not disagreeing that the public schools are inadequate. However, they could be much better without a single change if parents would motivate their own kids to learn.

    Too many parents are satisfied with just getting the kids to school, and are happy to let the all-day babysitters take over from there. Disinterested parents often have disinterested children.
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  • Ken, I think the point some people are trying to make is that out of
    the 330M+ people in the USA for example, many of them don't have a choice.

    It's true that public schools received massive amounts of funding from
    the likes of Carnegie and Ford with the condition that they would produce
    good workers for their factories. It's also true that public education in our
    country is a terrible mess.

    But I reject the idea that we shouldn't try, just because it's really hard.
    And I reject the idea that it cannot be done. Extraordinarily difficult?
    To be sure! But if you can reach your goals within your own lifetime,
    then you're aiming too low!


    The parallels between prisons and schools are fun to make and discuss,
    but ultimately miss the mark. Consider your claim of hierarchical power structure,
    for example. While students may feel like they have no recourse if they
    are being bullied or abused, they can actually reach out to authorities
    within their school or outside of it, and somebody somewhere will do something.
    Not so for prisoners, who don't get to go home at the end of the day,
    and often times really do not have anyone to protect them from the
    tyrants among their peers.
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    • Hmm, my fault... I must have read too much into this:


      Actually, I do agree with you. I would love to abandon the current
      system of education and completely overhaul the way every student
      in the country is taught, using our modern knowledge of the science
      of learning and gear it toward the current and future economy of our
      country.

      But, who else is ready and willing to spend the trillions that it would take
      to actually get that done, here in the real world?
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    • Seems a wee bit extreme to give up on public education, but OK. I'm listening. What are the other avenues once we dump our education system?

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  • Children are hardly horses, lol

    But say we did close the school system "cold". What do you think would happen?
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    • First those that depend on govt. to provide for them would become "outraged", complain, and accomplish nothing.
      Those that are more level headed would band together in their communities and work out a way to educate their children. At first I can see volunteers working with the kids, then parents would chip in and pay for teachers who lost their jobs.
      Ultimately parents who actually cared about their children would find a way to educate them with the skills they needed in life.
      Keep in mind we didn't always have a "school system" like we have today. Those that applied themselves did well those that didn't apply themselves didn't. But it required a person (even as a child) to understand that they were only limited by their desire and drive.
      If you didn't have the desire and drive to learn, you didn't learn and suffered for it. Lincoln had very little formal education and is just one of many examples of what you could achieve without our present day school system.
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    • Homeschoolers already have an extensive network. I think that network would expand rapidly to fill the void. Homeschool franchises would also see accelerated growth.
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  • BTW to all those supporters of the current education claiming it is so great, look at you tube sometime. Watch the TV a bit. HECK, talk to people on the street. Think of the reasoning behind minimum wage, and some of their arguments for it and about the ideas of the cause of poverty. Talk with some of the teachers! It is really surprising to me that ANYONE thinks the population is even keeping up with the previous norms.

    Steve
  • I haven't read the whole thread but I'm sure I saw a News article on this incident that detailed that this boy had been in trouble for other behavioural issues as well. The incident of hand-kissing does seem a bit naff to most, when you consider the punishment, but I'm sure he was only suspended for one day.

    I don't know the child, or the parents, or the school, but something about this whole constructed 'media incident' seems hopelessly skewed and blown out of proportion. Let's not sensationalise an event that grown-ups should be doing something constructive about, by finding solutions in a regional way. Why does the whole world have to know about this!? Will it help the children involved, in stabilising their personal development and progress? The media/wider press should have got the 'suspension' IMO!
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    • Here in New York I had to pay for my kids school supplies and some books. This in a state with if not the highest, close to the highest school taxes in the nation.
      But look at my previous post about the number of administrators in my school district and what they make. That happens to be one of the issues with Common Core. The program is heavy on the administrator side which takes money away from the education side. In turn parents have to pay for things that the schools provided when I was in school. It's also a reason why things like Art, Music, and Athletics, are either gone or going from our schools.
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    • It WAS blown out of proportion - that's the point. It's wrong to apply adult sexual connotations to a young child's behavior.

      Did he misbehave? Yes - it's the second time he's kissed his "girlfriend" in school. So you punish him for not respecting the boundaries of another person - or for inappropriate behavior in school.

      How tightly wound does someone have to be to look at this and call it "sexual harassment"? If that's what you think of when you look at a 6 yr old - maybe you shouldn't be working in a school.
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  • What about making laws that stop the press/media from disseminating these types of stories? The child is 6 - I saw him on TV, and his Mother was speaking angrily about it to the cameras. Surely, this type of attention for a 6 year old cannot be beneficial in any way! The real tragedy here, in my opinion, is that responsible adults couldn't work out a proper solution for this, before someone got incensed by it all and felt motivated to contact media sources. Was anyone really thinking about the child here - privacy issues etc.?
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    • These people know nothing about children. Give the boy a few more years and he won't like girls at all until his teens. At 6 years old, they are still babies and these policies are abusive to children. I think it was my youngest son in preschool who had a girlfriend and her mother told me she said she was going to marry my son. We both just laughed and I don't think they've seen each other in many years now.

      This is just all stupid political correctness and zero tolerance policy taken far beyond anything a reasonable and rational person would do. I see this as a big deal made out of nothing. I really feel for that child's mother, too. Send people through a grinder just because you can.

      And the worst part is our children are suffering from their madness. Schools seem to have become like jails and teachers/administrators like wardens. Everyone march in lockstep, and for what?

      Perhaps if more people were able to homeschool their children and there were less school officials, maybe we'd all be better off. It's possible that a private religious school might be better than public schools.

      Just my two cents worth of opinion. Okay, run-on ranting over now.
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    • The "proper solution" is EASY! If I told you, people would misconstrue, but "proper" is NOT proper, even if it IS the only way. Outside of that, the aggressors WILL continue! The only other way is extreme force or publicity to keep them at bay, and hope it eventually dies down.

      At 6yo, the boy is NOT going to be beating the girl, or get her pregnant, or ANYTHING of that nature. They likely won't even go through that act. Kids may do this sort of thing. If they work with kids, there are two "proper solutions" here! One is to SHUTUP, grin and bare it! The other is to GET A JOB AWAY FROM KIDS! Would they act the same way if a little GIRL kissed her?

      As for child privacy, they USED to have rules against pictures and names, etc..., but privacy is effectively dead ANYWAY!

      Steve
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  • Pretty pathetic, the country that I live in, if you lose your virginity below 18 yrs old, you're called a sl*t, and if you would kiss somebody in school, teachers would probably just smile at you, I think the US is taking the wrong tools to stop young kids becoming parents and so on..
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    • WOW,what country do you live in? The US used to be like that!

      Steve
    • I agree that many countries are taking a terrible approach when dealing
      with the sexuality (or lack thereof, in the case of a 6 year old!) of young people.

      But the slut-shaming isn't any better. This is almost 2015, and "losing virginity"
      is a long outdated concept. Kids are going to kiss, and when they are
      older they are going to have sex.

      Focus should be on teaching young people the cause-and-effect nature of
      the world so that they can make better choices-- just like everything else
      in their lives, from driving to doing homework and managing their money.

      Guilt, shame, fear, delusional hopes-- these are the tools of an old system
      that is no longer valid in our world, and shouldn't be used to manipulate
      children anymore.
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    • I will never be against teaching morality to children no matter how much society walks away from it.

      I think what is missing is good role models pouring into the next generation and the lack of teaching critical thinking skills in our schools. Of course with the government having more and more say in what is allowed and disallowed to be taught in schools, I don't see the return of teaching critical thinking skills returning any time soon. We all know the government is so good at that, themselves. :rolleyes:


      Terra
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  • Mostly I just feel bad for the kids who get lower quality education and then are brainwashed by mainstream television on top of it. It is a sinister cocktail. One the leads to a future that is not so bright, pun intended.. We can't or don't afford to give our kids a proper education anymore.. but at least we can keep bombing other poor countries and everyone seems to think this is acceptable.. Maybe that is really what they are trying to teach the kids to do.. lose your identity and individuality.. collect into the group think mindset "I reference Godin" OBEY!!!!
  • I stumbled upon this...

    High School Graduation Rate Hits 40-Year Peak in the U.S. - Emily Richmond - The Atlantic

    If this report is near truth...

    I would understand the calls to totally scrap public education if the numbers were like 40% - 50% etc.

    But at close to a total of 75%, I find it hard to understand the rational of the scrapers.

    Of course there needs to be much improvement in how, when and what kids are learning today to prepare them for higher ed to keep abreast with a changing society and to improve grad numbers but to scrap seems radical and a bit of an itchy trigger finger to me.
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  • The idea of a school is NOT supposed to be to graduate! It is supposed to be TO LEARN! The whole idea of graduation was supposed to be to indicate that you learned a reasonable amount at that level, and could go to the next level.

    You want the goal to be GRADUATION?

    1. What is 2+2?
    2. What country, or state, do you live in?
    3. Name 1 of the 50 states, or the several possessions, of the US!
    4. Name a cold temperature, in degrees of Fahrenheit(the scale usually used in the US).
    5. Is Plutonium radioactive?

    Get 3 of the questions right and GRADUATE!

    I would rather have schools teach a lot of useful info and have a lower graduation rate, than have them simply teach to a test and pass ALL the students.

    Steve
  • Banned
    Have you ever seen the movie, "Idiocracy"? I really feel like, "not sure", from that movie. And...this meme comes to mind.
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  • I don't know why we don't just go with vouchers. Let parent's decide where their kids should go, and what they should be taught. This would not only be more democratic, but it would eventually cause those schools that are producing the highest wage earners to rise to the top.
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  • Yes, I believe that mandatory education is a good thing.
    This is based on my own experience in places that have it,
    and those that do not.

    I'm well aware of how public schools are funded. But as
    pointed out by you yourself, there are other options, including
    private schools, religious schools, and even homeschooling.



    Allow me to clarify: Public schools would probably not
    be the first choice for my children. However, I would
    certainly appreciate and use public schools for what they
    can offer if I had to.

    Many people could never afford a private school,
    would never put their children in a religious school,
    and are not qualified to homeschool their children.

    Tutors and personal teachers are very expensive, and
    "an hour in the evening" is most certainly not enough
    to teach them everything they need to learn to be
    competitive in modern society!


    Allow me to clarify, that's not what I meant.
    (Also, "trillions and trillions" is a mis-quote. )

    Yes, I would happily spend trillions to fix the system.
    I disagree that the system itself is "the" problem.
    I strongly believe it is an aministrative problem, for
    the most part, and the current education system could
    be very successful with some core structural changes.


    Yes, I'm quite aware of that simple fact, as my previous
    post clearly indicates?

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