I was watching the news this morning when I saw on the ticker tape that the grades for the schools in my state are being released. The school leaders were calling it: "punitive and arbitrary" so I decided to ask the question: Do you believe schools should be graded on the quality of education they offer and how they run the schools and for what? In my opinion, yes they should. Mostly because having gotten the education I have got in one of the "finer" schools in the state, it was great in several fields, but a lot of places it showed it could use massive improvement. One of it was one of the most important subjects that needed to be learned: Math. My teachers for the most part in math were so bad I was confused and lost most of the time in Junior High and part of high school before I found a few good teachers. Every single year I ended up with a teacher who allowed the class to run out of control. I would go for classroom size, quality of teaching, control of classroom, conditions of building/equipment, and bullying issues. These issues are the biggest concern for me especially conditions of building/equipment where my high school's roof was caving in, the heater clanged and banged all day, and the desks were falling apart. As a person bullied, I would want to see that the issue is being handled effectively so it stops and there's less problems cropping up.
Do you believe schools should be graded on the quality of education they offer and how they run the schools and for what? I don't think schools should be graded on the quality of education because two totally different schools could teach their students differently, but as long as the students are getting the right information and learning something, then it shouldn't matter what quality the information is. Now, some schools go deeper into the meaning behind, let's say Romeo and Juliet, while other schools read the play and get the overall general idea of it. Now, does this mean that more "advanced" schools should get graded higher because they offer more "in depth" information on things that might not be needed to know for the future? That would be taking up time in which can be in place to learn things that you will need for later on in life. Sometimes you get the most out of basic schools, at least in my eyes. Schools that go out of their way to keep adding on extra information generally make students feel "over whelmed" with knowledge on things they don't feel is necessary for their lives. Some of the information could be forgotten and out of mind the day after the test. Then what good came out of that? Now, "grading" schools on how they choose to run? I disagree with this. Schools with do anything in their power to run their schools in which they feel would keep students out of trouble and into books. Most schools are easy-going with rules because they feel that their students are more "advanced" and "mature" enough to handle the low rule system while other school pile on the rules because their students need a guide. Let's take two schools, for instance, that are in my area. East Detroit High School is one. Sure, they have some great programs and what not, but the behavioral actions in that school are just not tolerable. The students are way out of line half of the time and there are constant fights throughout the whole school year over stupid little things. They pile on the rules and have strict security because they feel the need that if they have this going on, then their students will learn to stay in check. As for my current school, International Academy of Macomb, most of our rules are real easy-going because we are an IB school and we know right from wrong. That doesn't mean we get away with everything, we know what we are expected to do and we do it. If schools need to be hard on their students to get them on the right track, then they sure as heck will in order to get them in the right educational and life direction for their lives. I hope I answered the question with my views on things. If anything seems confusing or jumbled, please, don't hesitate to ask.
I guess they aren' t grading their students then, that would be "punitive and arbitrary". Sure, grading tests aren' t fair, but then so is life, the sooner we get students used to it the better. It' s not about the quantity of information they give you, it' s about teaching you what to make of it. The goal is to become wise (able to gather knowledge on your own), not cultivated (able to mindlessly regurgitate whatever you were spoon-fed). Being cultivated doesn' t hurt but it' s a mean, not an end. Although grading schools would be subjective to some degree surely you can see how useful it would be to know which school teaches bogus science and which teaches actual science, or which proportion of their students successfully pass their exams. Besides, schools always have and will be judged by word of mouth, whether "official" grading systems are implemented or not. That being said, it' s more about the teachers you end up with than about schools per say ...
Ironically enough, I got both of those sides. My school drilled us constantly on public speaking, group projects and other things that is associated with life outside of school which comes in big this time in age. I see a lot of ads demanding that you know this stuff inside out before going for their job. They did loosen up a bit when it came to some students, one of my classmates fainted when in a presentation and they stopped letting her present. At the same time, we had to break down Shakesphere, poetry, etc... I made the comment about quality of education because my brother came out of high school with a half of a year of math. He had three teachers in that time period that he never really got to understand math with. The last one humiliated him so badly in front of his friends he quit math completely. Granted, he had a learning disability that wasn't diagnosed, but me with no learning disability passed by a prayer and a miracle with math, struggled with science and my grammar is still terrible to this day through the same school system. These things are needed this day and age, yes, you need finance and other things. My school offered these things, but math is something that is needed in EVERY job that's offered now, if you work at most places, you NEED to know how to do grammar, science is more flexible, but without a strong background and good teachers, you're setting up kids to fail. When I finally understood algebra, which I needed for my college degree, it took me two classes, two tutors and hours of struggling to get through it. I spent an hour with a tutor at least every weekday if not meeting them both. It was sheer dumb luck that I found the tutor that I did and another miracle he managed to not only help me understand it, but to get me to actually enjoy math. My brother never had that chance, I still am very bad with grammar and science I'm on and off. I'm not saying every kid should be a master at all studies, but they should at least have enough of a educational background to do what they want with life. There are some teachers that I've seen that I hate to say it: They shouldn't be teaching. They are the ones who cause these problems like my brother had, my first algebra teacher was so bad I had to quit in a month within his class because he explained things so vaguely and approved work that was so bad that it would never work, that it was impossible to learn. Then he came in and yelled at you for not doing the work. As for discipline, I disagree. I was horrendously bullied throughout my high school times. My brother had cigarette butts burned onto him. Kids walked down the hallway and smacked him over the head. No one did anything to stop it. A kid in one of my classes shouted insults and basically called me a whore to the whole class from across the room and the teacher who I liked and respected did nothing, when I finally stood up for myself, he threatened me with suspension. That summer I had to go for a restraining order because the kid covered my mom's windshield with spit and was driving up and shouting insults to me when I was walking down the street. We called the school on him three times during that summer and they refused to do anything including giving us information on the kid until we called the cops and reported it. And that is one of THREE bullies that harassed me in school. On the flip side, when I was in elementary school during the summer time, one of the bullies that was tormenting me was harassing me and a friend of mine. We were at a playground and decided to leave. When I was leaving, the bully deliberately stuck a stick in my spokes of the bike and caused me to go flying over the handlebars and smash into gravel tearing myself up, I wasn't wearing a helmet at the time and thankfully didn't bust my head open though I did black out. Nearby neighbors came out and hit the roof, they told my parents and the bullies parents exactly what happened. My mom ripped the bully a new one and threatened to call the police the next time anything else happened, school or otherwise. They left me alone after that and it was the only time other than the time I wrote to a state representative asking for help from my bullies who drove me to the breaking point that actual action happened other than the story above. The high school at least around here and countless other schools, they don't try to help kids being bullied. They shove it aside and hope it goes away. Some of them pick the most scariest parents and take their side. The first bullies mom was clinically insane, the second one I never knew the parents, and the third had a stepfather who scared me to the depths of my core. These kids depend on authorities to help them, they don't want the police, they don't want the press, they don't want anyone helping them, but when it comes down to it, they are responsible for these kids and if they can't handle it, hand it to someone else, your school is going to get a worse reputation if there's bad press. Stop it before it becomes something worse. Kids don't "grow up" in high school. It is a known fact that most kids don't even reach full ADULTHOOD until the age of 25 when their brain fully develops. In my college you're on probation your first year because of how many kids fail classes due to the fact that they're on their own. There needs to be something stopping them from bullying others. They will keep on pushing and pushing and pushing... As much as they can to see how far they can go. Because after living in the real world, and my mom told me this when I was going through the hell of my high school: The real life is NOTHING like it is in high school. The bullying ends, but it shouldn't happen in the first place. Sorry for the rant, sore subject for me.
I believe so long as you're given enough information for you to move on after school, that's good enough. You can only give someone the pieces of the puzzle, you can't always be there to put it together for them. A lot of these kids will eventually learn that high school and the real world are opposites. You don't see your friends every day. You don't sit around. You don't have field trips (are there even still field trips anymore?). And you don't have that much fun. That's the only thing I could say about high school is it didn't prepare me for the real world at all. Information about physics, and biology isn't going to help me start my life. They should be teaching classes that are more related to real life situations. Classes like: common sense, job hunting, money handling. Classes so that when they walk out of that graduation ceremony, they'll already be on the right track. They'll have everything they need, and there won't be as much of an impact when they hit the real world. But that's just my personal opinion, based on past experience. Schools should be graded on the rate of which how many become "successful", and I use the term lightly, in the real world. If a school put out a ratio of 1 to 99, 1 being the unsuccessful graduate and the 99 being the successful graduates, I'd say they're doing pretty good.
