What funding sanctions?

I think you’ve been listening to misinformed people.

This is ashame! This is just not the High Schools problem it started in Kidergarten. How can you expect high test scores when children are entering school 2-3 years behind. You can’t make 2-3 year gain in one year. If the state takes over what do they think they can do better??? Get rid of the staff. Who do they think they will get to replace them? They will have to pay 6 figure salaries and we all know teachers don’t make what they are worth. I feel the educators and administrators have established programs to help. However, they too have families and resposibilites. I am glad this documentary was created it shows how NO Child Left Behind is not working! However,it is at a cost.Closing this historical High School is not the answer! Some suggestions to help improve learning: uniforms, pay high 6 figure salaries to teachers who work at low performing schools to attract seasoned teachers, mandate parental involvement( offer tax brakes to students who attend school regular and parents that are involved, give government incentives to students who academicly excel), establish a trade school to allow students to be trained to do a life skill( nurse ,beautcian, electrician, etc. along with a strong academic program) Take fincial support from parents who don’t get involved. Remove disruptive kids!

schools shouldn’t let the kids know how important education is? shit like that is just one of the reasons why things go sour the way they do…people would rather kiss up to the government and say how well they’re doin their job instead of bein real about what’s goin on….u don’t know what goes on in the houses of the students so who are u to say that they don’t learn how important an education is? parents can stress it nonstop 24/7 but it doesn’t mean anything if u get to school and the staff doesn’t care and just want their check…schools are supposed to get u ready for what’s ahead not just throw u a bunch of “facts” 4 u to remember for the moment…i guess u don’t wanna take into consideration the nonsense that are in the history books….do u think readin lies and learning about everyone’s history but ur own will encourage u to do ur best in school? how about the fact that so many schools don’t have enough books 4 all the students? how can someone learn without the books? would u say the same if the issue was on a white school that was sufferin and didn’t have books or staff 4 the students? Douglas relied on substitutes and just anybody they could get to fill in spots to teach the students and u think that’s gonna make the students sit back and say “i see the value” or will it just show what so many kids already think…”there’s no hope”…if ur precious government spread money equally and treated all it’s citizens equally thing’s would change 4 the better….u talk about don’t blame the bush administration but shit why the hell not? isn’t the president supposed to do what’s best 4 it’s citizens? maybe u really believe the people who put their kids through private schools should have a say so in what goes on in public schools despite the fact that it doesn’t really matter to them what the outcome is…yeah…let’s put our faith in the same people who allowed US citizens to drown, starve, walk around with dead bodies, and just sit in the worst conditions possible 4 no reason while calling them refugees for days….yeah…..

How many of you are actual teachers who work in Title 1 schools with large minority populations? How easy it is to point the finger and blame the parents, schools, teachers, students, adminstrators, etc. When in fact due to the NCLB sanction our schools sole focus is on passing tests. I teach in a Title 1 school whose funding has been cut due to inadaquate test scores. I teach in a classroom where I don’t have enough books to send home to students. I teach in a school where 80% of our teachers are highly qualified by the NCLB requirements. I teach in a school where he have had double digit gains in reading and test scores (unless the students passed the test it doesn’t matter how much they improved). I teach in a school where 76% of the teachers have their masters degree. I teach in a school where we have a computer lab with 50 computers that are used year round for testing and testing ONLY! I teach in a school that 83% of the population lives in poverty. I teach in a school where students worry where they will sleep that night and if they will eat dinner. Our community is overwhelmed by day to day life and as teachers we do the best that we can with the limited resources that we have. I find ignorant people disgusting who say these students don’t know the value of education…they do know the value and they try, but life has thrown them a crappy situation for their life and it is up to us the adults, the community, the state, the GOVERNMENT to give them an oppurtunity (not test scores) that may not have existed to their parents and it is called HOPE!

As a teacher at a high minority, low income school, I find the EmmyKate’s comment offensive. To state that the problem with education lies solely in the urban black community insinuates that the problems of below-level literacy, high drop-out rates and poor test scores are race specific.

This is fallacious logic that this film (in my opinion) unwittingly promotes.

Yes, Douglass High is a predominately “black school.” But the problems presented there are not race specific. The problem lies in having an out-dated educational approach that does not reach our youth.

The government’s attempt to establish a national standard has proved detrimental to all involved in the educational process– teachers, administrators and students.

The group most satisfied with standardized testing seems to be the group least affected– parents.

NCLB hinges largely on the assumption that parents take active roles in their children’s learning experience. This is not reflective of many modern families, especially by the time children have reached high school.

Often I meet parents who acknowledge that they have grown weary over the years of receiving calls from teachers and administrators about their child’s misbehavior or failure. These parents have expressed concern that the teachers are unable to handle the child for an hour or hour and a half. They have explained to me how they work two jobs and rarely see there child to tell him or her that Miss So-and-So said he or she failed the one algebra test he or she was in class to take. These parents wonder how to get their children to class, especially if they only receive negative calls about the child’s score when they are present.

These parents are just as overwhelmed as their children.

How often have I been forced from the phone with the deflated sigh of, “I’ll try to talk to her about it when I see her.”

So, if some parents are unable to spend the time nurturing their children (and let’s be honest, some simply cannot), and teachers have at least 25 to 30 students in a classroom and are unable to function as both parents and educators thus become insufficient in both capacities, who becomes the support system? The other teenagers.

Ideally, your child emulates Douglass High’s honor scholar who asserts his “gang is the drumlime.”

But those kids who haven’t found there niche or have found the local drug dealer deserve help, too. I agree with the government, they should not be “left behind.”

But testing is not the solution to these problems. It is a symptom.

We can keep these kids in school by altering the way they envision their futures. We can give them hope.

Offer our children a chance to rise above the poverty. Give them programs that will certify and teach them career skills that will help them break the cycle of generational poverty.

Give them interesting curriculum that is specific to their environment. Allow the teachers to control that curriculum to ensure it affords enrichment. Take the power away from districts because schools are diverse and what works in one school often flops in another.

Increase and improve art programs, music programs. Give the programs that get the kids in the classroom adequate funding. Offer a rap class or a graffiti class. Get interested in what these kids like.

Vote to develop courses that excite and invigorate our students and stimulate our teachers. Take the night off and attend school board meetings. Start community petitions. The power to improve the educational system lies in parents’ hands.

I’ll tell you a secret, the state and district fears parents. You are it’s funding. Make your money count by using your voice to direct it.

Remind us why we want to be there. Remind us, teachers and students alike, what there is to love about the educational process.

Good that you finally figured out to whom to reply.
I insuate nothing; you may infer what you like.
The portrait of Douglas as presented in the documentary underscored the fact that these kids are just not prepared to learn and no matter how you try to explain it away, the fault is with their parents. There are plenty of kids of all colors across the country (black included) who do well in school –even under “an outdated educational approach” — because their parents are there to care.
Your talk about giving kids hope is pure psycho-babble. What kind of hope is there for a kid who can’t read or write? What kind of “career skills” can you give them, if they can’t communicate? I’m sorry, but rap and grafitti classes won’t cut the mustard.

It’s time for a healthy dose of reality. These kids will fail unless they have the BASIC skills of communication and reckoning. They acquire those skills in school. If they don’t have the reasoning power to figure that out for themselves, then it’s up to the parents to set them straight.
If this offends you, maybe it’s because you really know this to be true and you just can’t admit it.

i am a 21 year old black female, and frankly i am tired of hearing people put me down just because i’m black. the stereotypes such as what you emmykate suggest are disrespectful and im sure they are discouraging to people younger than me who are just learning to build their self esteem. you are only on the outside looking in at a hot mess of problems that one person is not to blame. Thats too bad that you have to work in the ghetto, because me myself and many other people have to live here and on top of that listen to so called “righteous” folks as yourself bash us. “Work hard and you’ll suceed” or be “responsible” and you won’t be in the position you’re in. Well, i work, i go to the county college because thats all i can afford even though i have a 3.6 I can’t afford to go to new york university. i wanna go to this school and that, but you gotta have money to go to school which equates to you gotta have money to suceed. so no wonder the culture of money and drugs becomes acceptable to too many youth. these kids look at me, in school with my books and my gpa and they go, well she didn’t get anywhere she’s still living here with the rest of us. i’ve known “responsible” as you say, people who have gotten shot to death for being in the wrong place, wrong time. I have friends who went to school with me and dropped out because they couldn’t afford $300 for books, but they weren’t “poor” enough for financial aid. as long as we live in a society where college is twice your salary, then you’ll have angry mommas stormin in the schools to beat up kids. america is a big fat joke with their promises and that work hard to suceed crap. in order to suceed in this country you gotta have money, bottom line. if you do suceed without it, then you’re just a lucky pick out of a hat.