From: elg@elgamy.jpunix.com (Eric Lee Green)
Date: 18 Dec 92 21:03:07 CDT
Newsgroups: misc.education
Subject: Re: education (was: Re: DOES AMERICA SAY YES TO JAPAN?)
Distribution: world
Organization: Eric's Amiga 2000 @ Home

From article <HARKCOM.92Dec17093334@spinach.pa.yokogawa.co.jp>, by harkcom@spinach.pa.yokogawa.co.jp (Alton Harkcom):
> In article <BzD34B.I8E@news.cso.uiuc.edu> irvine@uxh.cso.uiuc.edu
>  =}[it is viewed as an easy way out of poverty].
>
>    Nothing easy about getting out of poverty...
>
>    By the poor, school is normally viewed as financial interference as
> it costs money without providing benefits (only apparently) and deprives
> the family of one more full time worker...  Very few poor people see it
> as a means of escape.

I can verify this. I work at an inner-city school as a teacher. The kids
come to school ready to learn, but the school isn't good at teaching them.
For one thing, the curriculum we use assumes that the parents can read and
can help their child with homework. For another thing, the curriculum we
use assumes background experience that our children do not have -- for
example, the experience of being read to as small children.

I can see the results now. The parents and children I deal with view
education as being a route out of poverty -- but they do not view what we
give as education.

>    But please don't confuse this with education in general.  Poor people
> see education as a means of improving oneself and opening up new
> opportunities (possibly financial ones).  What they don't see as such is
> the current US educational system...

Exactly!

>  =}>   Suspension also varies from system to system.  Suspensions of up to
>  =}>one year are not uncommon in some cases.  A student who is suspended
>  =}        ^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
>  =}Bzzt.  Suspensions of any kind are fairly UNCOMMON, but are the punishment
>  =}for some 'crimes.'
>
>    At schools in poorer areas, suspensions are fairly COMMON. (do all-
> caps make it easier to understand? :)

A statistic: at middle schools in Houston Independent School District, 51%
of all students were suspended at least once during the school year.

Our suspensions, however, are regulated to one week in length. However,
once the student has been suspended four times -- EXPULSION. The student is
excluded from school for the rest of the school year, and made to repeat
the grade next year.

>  =}I would like to hear an example of someone that was
>  =}suspended for the school year!  The parents would sue the district if a
>  =}misguided principal tried to do that!
>
>    My younger brother was suspended for the remainder (nearly half) of the
> school year during junior high school.  It is not uncommon or illegal...

Indeed. Neither uncommon nor illegal. The most common cause of such
long-term suspension is repeated incidences of fighting. Fights are common
at inner-city middle schools. Fights are common because the students are
suddenly being given unprecedented freedoms and responsibilities, freedoms
and responsibilities that they are not given at home and thus cannot
handle. Inner-city elementary schools here in Houston get around that by
imposing extreme structure, but at a cost in terms of learning and
enthusiasm. Structure takes time. I know that for a fact. For example, it
takes fifteen minutes for my students to use the restroom in the morning --
the basic problem is that I can only send them in one or two at a time,
else they get into a fight. In middle school, they don't bother with such
structure -- the kids are dumped out into the halls between classes to go
to the next class (or not) and use the restroom whenever they feel like it.
Since I am aware of this problem, I attempt to put a few minutes of
unstructured time into my schedule here and there to let the kids gradually
get used to a little bit of responsibility and freedom. Unfortunately, a
little bit is all they can handle.

>  =}> =} Expulsion
>
>    Assault is another one.   This one occurs rather frequently.
>
>    To head off another needless tangent:  yes I know that assaults usually
> end up as 'suspension until meeting with parent' or some such, but
> occaisionally they can end up as expulsion...

Usually they end up as expulsion when the offense is repeated.

>    And there are others...  Malicious damage to school property...
> Drug possesion...  Weapons possesion... Sexual activity...

Drug possession or weapons possession is an automatic one-year expulsion in
both the state of Louisiana and the state of Texas. Both are VERY common in
inner-city schools. Friends of mine managed to make it through school with
their concealed switchblades undetected. Others were not so lucky.

--
 Eric Lee Green  elg@elgamy.jpunix.com   Dodson Elementary
 (713) 664-6446                             Houston, TX
                "Kids are kids, no matter what"
Newsgroups: misc.education