Eyes Wide Shut

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Students and parents, and most teachers are aware of the crisis in American schools today.

It’s fair to say that elements of all of them are part of the problem. But wait…that doesn’t mean that they are the problem.

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Important: This post and these observations do not deal with the problem of crime in schools and neighborhoods. If your school is in a high-crime area, your administrators may have their hands full with problems I am in no way capable of addressing. My heart goes out to them and you, and I hope you will support anything they do to protect you and your schools.

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Although some students are spoiled little snots, most are good kids with the pie-eyed Idea that they can get a decent education at their school. They are curious and eager enough to try hard. Some of them have been beaten down by the injustice of a “one-size-fits-all” testing system, and a “this-size-doesn’t-fit-anyone” curriculum, but most still show up to class, pay attention, and do the homework.

Some parents discourage their children every step of the way, and take no positive interest in their children’s education, except as a baby-sitting service, or when it’s time to complain about some issue that has nothing to do with learning. But most send their precious children off to school, with the expectation (or at least hope) that they will be educated, kept safe, and helped to become better people. Most take an interest in their children’s education despite the other demands on their time by modern society. Most support their school, and appreciate the teachers. And they pay for all of it with their taxes. By the way, so do people who have no children in the schools. They have a right to expect good schools in their neighborhoods, as well.

Although there are some teachers who just don’t have the talent or inclination to teach, most are dedicated and trained to do a good job. Some of them have had the will to do it beaten out of them by a broken system, but most still are trying to do the best job they are allowed to. They are in the “trenches” all day, having to be nurses, lawyers, social-workers and psychologists as well as teachers. Their workload increases each year with more paperwork and larger class sizes, as their benefits are cut more and more. These people, just like nurses and firefighters, are doing amazing work, at unbelievably stressful jobs.

So where’s the problem?

I’m going to go out on a limb here, and say it’s everyone above the teaching level. That starts with administrators. If you’re not in the trenches, and don’t support the people who are fighting the good fight, you are the problem.

Look, to be fair, I have to say that there might be a principal or a superintendent who isn’t a political, self-important glorified bean-counter. To be realistic, I have to say I haven’t met one. And I have met dozens and dozens (and dozens) of them.

How can I say that? I’ve been doing math programs in schools from Europe to California for years. Lately I have been doing the after-school programs in a few dozen schools around my state. They are paid for by arts councils as part of the “Arts-in-Education” programs, which are run by county arts councils (more about these valuable and endangered programs in a future post). The students and teachers who attend them get psyched, and eat the stuff like candy. They want more. But every time I approach an administrator to offer a school-day workshop, they usually have had no time for me. They are busy at “meetings.”

Those people love their board meetings; apparently more than they care about students. It makes me want to strangle them. When I call to to try to make appointments, my calls generally aren’t returned. When I do get to meet with them, they almost invariably tell me how good their school is with math, and how well their kids do on the standardized tests, and how they don’t need some outside help. (That reminds me of Lake Woebegon, where, “… all of the students are above average”.)

(Un?)Fortunately, I usually come armed with the school’s actual scores, which I glean from the internet. When I take them out to show the offending administrator, they never want to know about it. They won’t look at it. They live in denial, eyes wide shut, because, “our school is doing a fine job, we have pride, we’re doing our best… blah, blah, blah.”

STFU. I’m so not interested in some bean-counter covering his or her heinie. I care about kids getting a good education.

They love to complain that there are no funds. The arts councils in our area still have some funds left (until next year, when the “No Child Left Unstressed” act will decimate them) which they can apply to my program. I have also offered to cut my fee until their budget can easily handle it. I’ve also offered to do fundraisers for them so they can actually make money, and they can keep whatever they make. I’ve occasionally offered to do the program for free (which I’ll never do again).

It is a pathetic sight to see the “deer-in-the-headlights” look that these grown adults give me when they hear this. “What do you mean by this?” it’s like they were saying. “We don’t do things like that around here.” The fear of trying something new makes big men small and mighty women whimper.

Could it be that they don’t like my attitude? I think it might. I can understand that. It is threatening to an ineffective person to have the teachers, parents and students benefit from something that does not fit their paradigm. Should I change my attitude and be like them? Maybe then I could get a sinecure, too.

Nahhhh.

This is causing me to leave the “Twilight Zone” of public education. I’m tired of driving sometimes over a hundred miles to do after-school gigs that barely cover the gas it takes to get there. I’d rather do my work on the web, or give public seminars, and help home- and unschool groups. But my complaint isn’t about how I’m being treated. It’s about education and politics, and how children are being cheated.

It’s about the kids, parents and teachers that are getting shafted by these bloated apologists for a defective system. And by bloated, I mean check out an administrator’s salary compared to a teacher’s, who actually does something positive for children.

Kids, parents and teachers are generally stuck in the public school system. Their administrators should be their to facilititate their education, not funding new air-conditioning for the principal’s office.

Thought for the day: You can usually do twice the job with half the money. Focus on the job.

Until the system is completely overhauled (which will be around the same time Venus collides with the moon), the people affected by that system should organize to change their schools. They should also look to outside sources, like the net, public libraries (the best, under-utilized resource I know of), and home- and unschool groups.

“But…but we administrators have a hard job! You don’t know what we go through…”

That’s why you get paid more. That’s why you get the good parking spaces. Put a little more effort into fighting the idiots who make policy in your state and federal capitols, and less time defending your ineffectiveness.

I sincerely apologize to the (very few) administrators who do not fit the description I have painted here. There must be some good, dedicated principals and superintendents out there. But if your first inclination is to defend yourself against these accusations, instead of getting inspired to fight the goons above you who put you in this position, and help the people you’re hired to help, you’re not one of them.

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Ah, that was fun. Was it good for you, too?

Now, after the venting, what do we do about it?

You can start by paying a visit to your local library, and supporting it.

Please send in your constructive, evidence-based observations or possible solutions. As I am neither a public school teacher, student nor parent of a student, so I don’t have as much insight as you might. Do you know of a way Mathmojo can be of help?

In one of the next posts we’ll get to another of the needless failings of the public school system - CCD (Curriculum Dysfunction Disorder).

Hotcha!


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