How sad for all concerned. Given: One of the poorest communities in Rhode Island and the rigors of No Child Left Behind (which is what is behind all this educational crisis.) Depending on who you talk to, there are lots of fingers being pointed. Faulty statistics are being bandied about. Administration is drawing its line in the sand. Teachers have refused to take on extra burdens without compensation. The teachers’ union doesn’t seem to be supporting the teachers. Somewhere out there, there is the truth. I expect it is in the middle.
The one missing part of the puzzle seems to be what the students are doing. What is the community doing? How fast can attitudes in poor, immigrant communities be turned around? Should teachers of students in low achieving communities be compared to teachers in wealthier areas?
Who will be willing to go in and replace all those teachers? The nation will need a million new teachers by 2014. Where will they all come from? When will communities, parents and students start to assume responsibility for their own learning? You can lead a horse to water but you cannot make him drink. After all, its all about accountability.
The Rhode Island teachers will have the last laugh, in all probability. The data-driven replacement crowd will come in all full of themselves and will soon find out that perhaps the job isn’t so easy. The newcomers will probably not do much better, they will burn out and move on. And one day very soon, there will be no one to teach the children. Younger people simply will not want to put up with the insult and there are lots of easier ways to earn $75,000. (that amount was NOT starting pay, btw)
You know, there is at least one instance every year in the state of VA of corporal punishment being used.
I think there was one a few years ago where a child was duct taped to their seat because he wouldn’t sit still.
My college roommate remembers spankings being used in her school (in rural VA – Prince Edward County). Once, a student claimed that someone had stolen an apple from her lunch. The teacher then took each child up to the front of the room, asked them if they had the apple (of course they said no) and would then spank each child. As Shannon went up, the student suddenly “found” her apple in her bag and then the student got spanked for causing a problem!
This was in 1981 or 1982. Scary.
I graduated from HS in 1992 – FCPS grad.
Remember this little ditty from 1996?
“The White kindergarten teacher in Charleston, SC, who used a marker to write “Where are my glasses?” on a Black student,s face recently resigned.
The first-year Pepperhill Elementary School teacher, Phyllis Adelsflugel, wrote on 5-year-old Nina Campbell’s face to remind her mother to send the child’s glasses to school (Jet, Dec. 2). She originally was suspended with pay pending an investigation.
The student’s mother, Teresa Campbell, said doctors told her it would take several weeks for the ink to wear off.”
Prince Edward County seems to have had its very own set of unique problems.
I don’t remember hearing about that teacher writing on the kid’s face. Dumb thing to do. I remember reading in the paper about the well respected teacher taking the kid’s sunglasses off and the kid lying on her.