Education Reform Part 5

According to an article in the Free Press, it seems that fewer than 10% of students graduating this spring are college ready.  Maybe they are not college ready because they come to school in their pajamas, listening to their ipods and texting on their iphones totally oblivious to the world around them.  Makes me sound like an old fogey doesn't it?  Well I guess I am.  I don't get the lax rules in schools today.  It isn't the curriculum that needs to be more rigorous, it is the expectations that we have for students' appearance and behavior that need to be raised.  Let's raise that bar and see what happens.  If schools could take control back from students who think no rules apply to them, we might be able to graduate kids who are ready for the challenges that face them after high school.  A citizen in Detroit was quoted as saying "If they can't control 30 students in the classroom, how are they going to control 60?"  Why is it so difficult to control the behavior of students in many public schools today?  Maybe because today's students have no idea that there are rules to be obeyed as they see the adults around them breaking them everyday.  Maybe because today's students have mommy and daddy swooping in the minute the student has the slightest problem with anyone in the school, screaming that it isn't their kid's fault.  Our leaders might tell us that in Japan classrooms have 60 students, so what's the problem?  Well, in Japan the students enter the classroom and bow to the teacher, and apologize if they were absent the day before, or are arriving late!  Picture that in an American classroom full of students who are reading about how horrible their educational system is, and are listening to everyone and his brother bash the teacher.  We have good kids, we have respectful, thoughtful, and motivated kids, and we have kids who are graduating with the skills necessary to succeed in college.  Let's start hearing about them and the good teaching it took to make it happen.

Rosemary