Read other letters about this article

• Wednesday, April 12, 2006 07:17 PM

  It is NOT the schools's fault

  I am a public high school teacher, at a prestigious magnet school that was ranked 74th in the nation this year by Newsweek Magazine. And you could find students at my school who wouldn't know the names of the first five US presidents in order. I had to think for a couple of minutes myself to remember them, and I had John Quincy Adams in the wrong place. And I went to a prestigious private high school in the 70s.

  It is not the schools's fault that there are no communities any more. It is not the schools's fault that children spend more time in front of the TV than they spend interacting with their parents. It is not the schools's fault that when corporal punishment was removed from the schools it wasn't replaced with anything effective. It is not the schools's fault that politicians and bureaucrats have decided that the best way to deal with all these problems is to further hamper teachers by forcing us to focus our energies on standardized tests.

  Teachers have to be everything to many students. They have to be parents and community, role models and babysitters. Even at my way-above-the-norm high school, I spend less than half of my time and energy actually teaching.

  The problems in our schools are a reflection of problems in our society in general, not problems that can be addressed by looking only at the schools in isolation. It is short-sighted, as well as unfair to those of us who are teaching, to look at this situation as "problems with public schools." This approach is doomed to failure, as is every attempt to treat the symptoms instead of the disease.

  But most especially, it is unfair to the students, who are our children, and our future.

  —Paul N Henry
  Permalink
  Flag
  Click "Submit Flag" if you feel this post is inappropriate. Explain why below if you wish.

  Cancel