Quote:
Originally Posted by Normal
Is it the teachers, or is it bad parenting? My belief is the later is the problem. Teachers interact with students for 50 minute classes after age 12. Parents need to be the backbone, many don’t even have one anymore. The better performing schools have parental involvement. That may come from the personal investments as parents.
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I'm confident its the parenting. I have 3 straight A students, if it weren't for the support and push from home I think they'd have all been average at best. I didn't accept poor grades and my kids knew it, they also were not afraid to come to me and say they weren't getting it and we'd work through it together. All of them graduated with honors.
I spent a considerable about of time as a loaned executive for The United Way and several of their programs are built around getting kids ready to learn or getting them to grade level math and reading. I was blown away at the poor parent / student relationship and how it impacted the school. We could literally see the impact progress through the years as we put the different programs in place. So many kids enter kindergarten not ready to learn, most 2nd graders couldn't or wouldn't read, many 3rd graders are not at grade level in reading or math. I cant recall the statistics exactly but it is something like 20% of 3rd graders not at grade level won't finish high school, 60% of 6th graders not at grade level will not graduate high school. Many of those go on to get a GED but that's just not the same as a successful lower education. All this was from midwest schools in the 80s and 90s, I don't think things have improved much.