Re: PHYS-L Digest - 28 Feb 2000 to 29 Feb 2000 (#2000-68)

[Herbert H Gottlieb <herbgottlieb@JUNO.COM>]

Richard
You have expressed the problems of the public school very well and I
fully agree with everthing that you write.  Now let's take it a step
further and come up with some long term, as well as short term, solutions
to educating the "disadvantaged" students in the inner cities.  Now that
there are fewer and fewer jobs available for school dropouts, what type
of education  (if any) should be initiated for this growing number of
children?   Should "vocational" schools be resurrected?
Or can you and others come up with other solutions that are more
practical?

Herb Gottlieb from New York City
(Where the problem of educating our "non-academic" high school students
increases every day)

On Tue, 29 Feb 2000 11:27:48 -0500 "Richard W. Tarara"
<rtarara@SAINTMARYS.EDU> writes:
> ----- Original Message -----
> From: "David Ward" <dward@BUSTER.UU.EDU>
> To: <PHYS-L@lists.nau.edu>
> > 2) I confess that my child is enrolled in private school. With far
> fewer
> > funds and facilities
> > than the local public schools, the standardized test scores at my
> son's
> > school are far beyond
> > the public school's scores.
>
> > Why hasn't Federal largesse resulted in better public school
> > performance?
>
>
> > (BTW, I am adamantly opposed to school vouchers- I fervently
> > believe the government
> > ultimately will ruin many fine private schools- not to mention
> their
> > pricing!- should the government
> > get involved. As a rule, the government- particularly the Federal
> > government- ruins any social
> > institution it touches.) As fast as a new private school opens
> here it
> > fills up, as parents willingly
> > sacrifice financially in order to flee the failing governmental
> education
> > system.
>
> I think you answer your own question here.  As more and more parents
> who
> really care about and participate in their children's education
> remove their
> children from public education, then what is left for the teachers
> and
> administrators to work with?  The kids with little or no parental
> support!
> Couple this with other factors like:
>
> a) very inhomogeneous populations both social/economic and ethnic in
> the
> public schools (much more homogenous in the private)
> b) classrooms that include both EH and MH students who often end up
> disruptive since they cannot properly participate in the work.
> c)  the PC reluctance to track students hence having classrooms with
> the
> broadest ranges of abilities.
> d)  the 'legal' restrictions that tie the hands of teachers and
> administrator in terms of getting disruptive children out of the
> classrooms
> where they are preventing the others from learning.
>
> etc., etc., etc.  (I have lots of stories--my wife is a public
> school,
> elementary principal.)
>
> Considering all this, there is little mystery as to why the public
> schools
> are unable to match private school performance.
>
> Rick
>
> *********************************************
> Richard W. Tarara
> Associate Professor of Physics
> Department of Chemistry & Physics
> Saint Mary's College
> Notre Dame, IN 46556
> 219-284-4664
> rtarara@saintmarys.edu
>
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