Vouchers

[fd ski]

Fatty, i fail to see how having kids travel to the next county will help anything..
More hustle for the kids, more kids in good schools... parents of kids in good schools get pissed of because of overcrowding and that countny "stops" accepting more kids... so on...

It will lead to teh total cluster diddly and millions of tax payer dollars going into hands of "build overnight" education institutions. System that sucks now, instead of getting a helping hand - will get a knife though the heart....

Oh, and on the subject of private schools... how much money you wanna bet that most of them will raise tuition exacly the ammount of the voucher ? Just to avoid overflow of unwanted kids ?


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Bartlomiej Rajewski
aka. Wing Commander fd-ski
Northolt Wing
1st Polish Fighter Wing
303 (Polish) Squadron "Kosciuszko" RAF
308 (Polish) Squadron "City of Cracow" RAF
315 (Polish) Squadron "City of Deblin" RAF

Turning 109s and 190s into scrap metal since 1998

Northolt Wing Headquarters

[Fatty]

Somewhere in the middle of all that chaos is more kids in better schools and less kids in crappy schools.  Is that not the ultimate goal?  I could care less the complaints resultant.

Btw, rarely is it necessary to go to the next county for a quality school.  Normally within 20 miles of a terrible school, there is a completely adequate one complete with AP and college classes.

Take my home county into account.  1 school with 10% high school graduation rate (I was zoned there.  Was able to go to private school, but most there cannot).  College rate approximately 1%.  10 miles away, another public school graduated 90%.  Shared resources with the local university resulted in higher education interest and much higher than 50% college attendence rate.

If it means harm to the succesful institutions, frankly, I don't care, if it means the kids that have no hope could possibly get an education.  PTA mothers be damned.

As far as tuition, most have access to public schools that are successful, which would disregard the vouchers completely.  The private schools, well, they are private.  If they raise their rates they do so in a free market hoping they can still maintain their income.  If state matching funds and poverty level qualifications go through on the vouchers though, most private schools will not be able to price themselves outside voucher values and still maintain functional profitability.

[Toad]

The reason there is opposition to the "voucher system" is that it is a challenge to the status quo. It's as simple as that.

The education of our youth, good, bad or indifferent, is no longer the issue. The side that opposes vouchers is afraid to experiment in search of a better solution because it might mean the dreaded "change".

Our education system needs serious improvement. To unilaterally rule out experiments that might radically alter the way we do it pretty much guarantees that the present system will continue ad infinitum with its typically poor results.

Why not take a few cities and fund a good trial of the idea? Are we afraid it might work?

If we are going to improve the schools, we are going to have to change something; that's just a simple, obvious fact.

At the same time, we can address other issues. Teacher pay, teacher competency, higher pay for higher competency  , curriculum issues (hey, let's teach reading and writing and arithmetic for a change instead of "i'm ok, you're ok"), parental involvement, school discipline and the rest. We can experiment in all these areas.

The one thing we shouldn't do, IMHO, is rule out experimenting to make things better.

By the way, FD... is the use of four letter expletives in your arguments supposed to sway me to your viewpoint? Convince me of your sincerity? Impress me with your command of the language? Just wondering.

[Jimdandy]

Vouchers are excellent excuses for bad citizenship and poor parenting in my opinion. There are so many reasons not to do vouchers if you can't see them I don't know what to say. The reasons our school system is failing are the same ones that will make the voucher system fail. I replied on another page with all my arguments about a week ago. What it comes down to is THEIR YOUR PUBLIC SCHOOLS IN YOUR TOWN THAT YOUR ASKED TO PAY FOR THAT YOU WONT PAY ANY MORE FOR THAT YOU ASKED FOR YOU SHOULD GET OFF YOUR bellybutton AND CORRECT IT! When the private schools have problems (and bet your bellybutton they will as someone has shown above) what are you going to do, create public schools? You think that paying for a private school will get you off your butt and down to the school to correct problems as they occur? Your paying for the public school now and your not doing it. What is going to change here? I want to make it clear that the YOU I'm referring to is ALL of us! We are ALL in the damn boat together! People complain that they just don't have enough time in the day to do all of these things. Is the day going to get longer with vouchers. Do you think that competition in the school system for your dollar will foster anything but looking for ways to cut cost and increase profit well you got another thing coming. It will be just like the states that require car insurance. They know you have to carry it so they are not to worried about lowering the price.  If you think you are going to home school your kid and you don't think you have time in the day now! Get out from in front of this computer and the TV and go handle your kids education and your communities problems! Do you think that those private school teachers are going to come cheaper than your public school teachers that you don't want to pay for now. Do you think discipline in the private sector will be any better if you wont let them discipline your child now? What's going to happen when that strict private school starts cracking the ruler over little Johnny's knuckles to keep him in line. Exactly how in the hell are these vouchers going to cure the fact that it's your country, your school system, and your problem? "Honey there's a proposal to rise taxes for schools. They already get enough damn money! Lets get down there and vote no!" And your parents said the same thing and their parents... Exactly when do we pay for education?

[This message has been edited by Jimdandy (edited 01-26-2001).]

[fd ski]

Originally posted by Toad:

Impress me with your command of the language? Just wondering.


I'd love to, but you prabably wouldn't understand, considering that its unlikely that you read Polish. English is my second language, and as such i feel under no obligation to write like Shakespeare.


The reason there is opposition to the "voucher system" is that it is a challenge to the status quo. It's as simple as that.

The education of our youth, good, bad or indifferent, is no longer the issue. The side that opposes vouchers is afraid to experiment in search of a better solution because it might mean the dreaded "change".


From Webster:
Entry Word: conservative
Function: adjective
Text: 1 tending to resist or oppose change

Quite amazing that its liberals that oppose it, isn't it ?


Our education system needs serious improvement. To unilaterally rule out experiments that might radically alter the way we do it pretty much guarantees that the present system will continue ad infinitum with its typically poor results.


Actually, i would argue that an education system that works already exists in other places of the world. Problem is that in US its been "improved" upon so much, that it lost its initial purpose.

Point in case - i came here when i was 17, from a country under communist "mind control", poor and "without freedom". Even though i was a C student in Poland, when it came to picking out classes in US for my Senior year in HS, it turned out that college level math classes covered things i've done 3 years earlier.

Then, geography !!! It isn't anywhere on corriciulum for elementary school or high school ! No wonder that in my college "Intro to Geography" ( oh! Humanity ! ) class - someone thought portugal was in South America.

As it currently stands, level of education of High School graduate in United States is on average comarable of education of a middleschool graduate in europe. This is made up by high emphasis on specialization in college, but still doesn't produce a well rounded person - just a highly specialized simpleton.

Why not take a few cities and fund a good trial of the idea? Are we afraid it might work?


First of all, "good ideas" in this case is nothing more then an assumption. As far as i'm conserned - this is another step, yet farther away from the goal that american educational system long lost.

If we are going to improve the schools, we are going to have to change something; that's just a simple, obvious fact.


Oh yes, we definately do !!! But, putting taxpayers money into private school owner's hands isn't the answer.

We need to change the attitude in the society, where everyone's ultimate goal is to be an NFL player. Where people educated as stereotyped as "geeks" and "uncool". Today, 24 hour catroon networks play film after the film where heros don't win with their smarts but with their "super human" powers or "gigant" lasers.

Schools provide NO incentives to learn. Anyone who chooses not to bother learning can attend summer school and make up. You can float though school without one ounch of effort and no punishment is waiting for you.

Is this a fault of the educational system ? It's not. It's a fault of all the changes implemented over last 30 years to accomodate for those who can't keep the page.

Standard is set by lazy and unwilling and everyone in school suffers. College classes provided are fine - but what motivation does the "average" student have to get to those ? To be "uncool" and radiculed by his peers ?

Answer ? Let's go to basics - the schooling that worked for great many centuries.
Education is not supposed to be fun. Child given a choice would rather go outside and play. So let's stay pretending that school should be enjoyable ...

Corriculum should be one and the same for everyone. No general or college classes. One corriculum and a demanded one at that.
Those who fail ANY ONE of the classes in the
semester - have to repeat whole year ( aka - all the same classes they already attened ). Thust me - this provides a great motivation to study  

No more "how to cook" classes in High School - while subjects like Geography or Biology are skipped or skimmed over. There is a clearly defined list of classical subject that young mind should learn. Any monkey can cook given one week's instruction.

And most of all... hold the parents responsible for the behaviour of the child, especially in school.
It is unacceptable for a child to cuss or disresepct the teacher. Such a distruptive child should be expelled from school to the "special" schools with discipline close to that of the military.

At the same time, we can address other issues. Teacher pay, teacher competency, higher pay for higher competency   , curriculum issues (hey, let's teach reading and writing and arithmetic for a change instead of "i'm ok, you're ok"), parental involvement, school discipline and the rest. We can experiment in all these areas.


It will be hard to give teachers a meaningful raise if we're sending all the cash to private school owners.

As far as i'm conserned, teachers starting salary where i live ( Connecticut ) should stand at 45K/year. Right now, good luck getting 25K. And people wonder why they get poor teachers... anyone with any education will go for a job in industry for 60K+.
Standards for teachers should be much higher, but also their compensation should be appropriety raised. In them lays a responsibility for a future of this nation, for it's greatness or continued demise. Why do we choose to insult those people with their wages ?

The one thing we shouldn't do, IMHO, is rule out experimenting to make things better.


Actually, let's STEP BACK to what worked before. It just might have a healthy effect on the rest of the society.

Right now schools are nothing more then social clubs and breeding grounds.
Quite pathetic really. Moving them to fancier buildings won't help.
It's a mentality that has to change.

<rant mode off>



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Bartlomiej Rajewski
aka. Wing Commander fd-ski
Northolt Wing
1st Polish Fighter Wing
303 (Polish) Squadron "Kosciuszko" RAF
308 (Polish) Squadron "City of Cracow" RAF
315 (Polish) Squadron "City of Deblin" RAF

Turning 109s and 190s into scrap metal since 1998

Northolt Wing Headquarters

[Gunthr]

There would be less need for vouchers if school uniforms were mandatory in our public schools, in my opinion. If the fashion parade were ended, think of all the energy that would be freed up for learning...
.02
Gunthr

[leonid]

My fear of vouchers has to do with the possible long term effects.  Say vouchers are passed, and put into use.  That means even less money going into the public school system, resulting in further deterioration of public schools.  Vouchers will create a greater influx of financially eligible children into private schools, resulting in more children than available private schools.  This, in turn will increase tuition costs (supply & demand), at least until the private school sector can grow to meet the need.  However, as the private school sector grows, what's to stop them from maintaining a higher average cost, which 'cheapens' the value of vouchers, and forces many parents to send their kids to an even further degraded level of public education?  

You see, by using vouchers you expose our childrens' education to the volatile nature of the market.  Sure, the possibility of having your kid in a private school may increase with vouchers, but so will the possibility of lowering the standard of education for most American children.  The way I see it, vouchers will put our childrens' education on the free market, which has its own set of values and interests, and endorsements, and marketing campaigns, and advertisements, and shareholders...

Why do we Americans always go for the quick-fix, shangri-la solutions?  What's wrong with getting dirty, and trying to fix a basically good system from the ground up?

[mrfish]

wow....what fatty said

[Toad]

Well, FD, I salute your multi-lingual abilities. At one time I was somewhat competent in French and Spanish, however I've lost it through disuse over the decades.

I have had the pleasure of corresponding and talking to other multi-lingual folks quite a bit. None of them seemed to find gratuitous vulgarity a key to successful communication. Perhaps it works for you.

That's why I asked you what your liberal use of the "F-word" added to your argument. I find it particularly interesting given the topic of the discussion. However, it's your argument. Choose the words you like.

As for the problems in schools, I'd like to see us go "back to basics". I'd like to see major emphasis on Reading, Writing and Math. I'd like to see discipline that meant something. I'd like to see grade standards that actually meant something.

However, I doubt it will happen. The "movers and shakers" in Education are predominantly liberal. They have set the agenda for the last 30+ years in US Public Schools. They are the ones that have drifted away from "the basics". They have given us the "Pass/Fail" concept. They have implemented the "I'm OK, you're OK" touchy-feely course schedules that decrease the time available to educate children in "the basics".

You expect these people to repudiate what they have created over the last three decades? It's simply not going to happen. They will never admit they went down the wrong path. They created and will maintain the status quo.

"From Webster:
Entry Word: conservative
Function: adjective
Text: 1 tending to resist or oppose change

Quite amazing that its liberals that oppose it, isn't it ?"

I find this ironic, not amazing. The liberals control the school systems in the US. Vouchers are a definite change. Who opposes change again?   A bureaucracy will always strive to protect itself and they're striving hard now, aren't they.

Those that are sick and tired of this failed philosophy of education are simply asking for a chance to use less than their fair share of the money to search for a better way to educate their children.

My sons have never been in private school. I did go to Catholic schools through High School. The quality of their education has been simply abysmal compared to what I participated in. The result has been an incredible amount of tutoring by myself, my wife and other privately hired educators to get them up to what I consider an acceptable level.

I don't see where it's asking too much to give vouchers a limited try, perhaps in the very worst of the school districts. There's not much to lose.