From: wayman@lamar.ColoState.EDU (Jeffrey Wayman)
Subject: Re: Dumb school administrators and parents
Date: Tue, 12 Jan 1993 23:59:54 GMT
Organization: Colorado State University, Fort Collins, CO  80523

In article <C0rGps.to@gpu.utcs.utoronto.ca> lamoran@gpu.utcs.utoronto.ca (L.A. Moran) writes:
>In an earlier posting I mentioned that my two children were in high school
>and that they were involved in sports and music. I pointed out that is
>was probably not worthwhile for them to drop these activities in order
>to spend more time on traditional academic subjects.
>
>Herman Rubin writes;
>
>     "FORGET THE GRADES. Unless the school is very unusual, they are 
>      getting a garbage education. Even somewhat bright children are 
>      being totally shortchanged by the imbecilic curriculum now being 
>      taught.
>
>      But do they have any idea of the intellectual content they are 
>      missing? A reasonably good student is capable of learning many 
>      times what is now being taught in the schools without working 
>      very hard. Especially the basic conceptual material, which is 
>      even more submerged under memorization than in the past."
>
>My children attend a public high school in a suburb of Toronto. They are
>getting an excellent education - I am very impressed. Both of them are
>being challenged in school by teachers who have expanded on the basic
>curriculum for bright students. In addition their learning is not confined
>to school - they have intellectual interests that they pursue outside of
>the class room. 
>
>Herman Rubin continues,
>
>     "But they are being deprived of the pleasure of learning! Has it 
>      already gone to the point where they are no longer capable of the 
>      mental processes which they could do easily as small children? This
>      is not facetious; the ability to think in terms of structure, 
>      almost totally absent in the current excuse for an educational 
>      system, and only recently "objectively" demonstrated as being 
>      present in the very young, IS beyond the capability of the great 
>      bulk of present school teachers."
>
>Your experience is obviously very different from mine. My children's teachers
>have been excellent. They are well paid professionals who take their jobs
>seriously. While I can't claim that they are perfect, they are at least as
>good as any other group of professionals that I have been in contact with.
>This includes University teachers, such as myself, and business types in the 
>private sector. 
>
>Herman, I know that you have a very low opinion of the educational system
>in the United States but I am aware of many excellent public school systems
>scattered across the country. It is not fair to criticize all teachers on the
>basis of your own experience and prejudices against publically funded
>institutions.
>
>Larry Moran


I was very glad to see the positive nature of Larry's post.  
I'm sure we all agree that the educational system isn't perfect,
but we are never going to get anywhere by screaming about how awful
it is, then never doing anything.  That's lazy and hurts the
true teachers.  We can, however, make positive changes by noting
the good things and changing the bad for the better.

Jeff           wayman@lamar.colostate.edu
Newsgroups: sci.edu,misc.education