What is Wrong with our Educational System?: NO CHILD LEFT BEHIND ISN'T WORKING!

[ateenandatot]

O.K. I am not teaching any longer, although I am very passionate about education and would like to take part in working towards educational reform. As a new and ambitious teacher, I was disillusioned. The district I was in has a reputation for being hard to work in. I was one of the first of many to leave that district. But I chose not to apply elsewhere as a teacher.  Here in Texas, we are required to complete 150 hrs. of continuing education to renew our teaching certificates. So even though I am not sure if or when I am going back to teaching, I do wish to hold on to that certificate. Therefore, I have to continue to attend workshops.

I attended a workshop on motivating those difficult to motivate students on Tuesday. It was a really good workshop with lots of useful information. In fact, I briefly contemplated applying to one of the many teaching positions available in our general East Texas area. Then I said to myself, "are you nuts?!" I didn't answer myself, so maybe there is still hope for me. Anyway, I digress.  The speaker spoke in support of the TAKS test (this is what we call our standardized "no child left behind" test in Texas). I still think that the TAKS test does the opposite of motivate.  I also wondered how I could have better motivated the student I had in third grade who fell asleep EVERY day and could NOT be woke up because her momma made her get up with the babies at night while the momma slept. The school counselor told me to call the grandmother, who often took care of them. It was true. The grandmother kept the older two siblings.This little girl stayed with the mother and had to help out. The grandmother had suspected this was going on and was in agreement that it needed to be stopped. She was going to talk to her daughter. The mother took immediate action. She called me and cursed at me in the middle of the night and called her little girl a liar among other things. The mother was on welfare and did not work during the day, nor was she ill, yet she made this little girl care for the babies at night. The most pitiful thing I have ever heard was when this same little girl told me so sadly that her momma was going to have another baby and "now I'm going to have 3 babies to take care of."  And what about those kids whose parents are in jail? I have had so many  of those also (in just 5 1/2 years of teaching). Then there are the children who are going through their parents' divorce or adjusting to new blended families. But no one who has the control over the curriculum, the testing, or the system itself seems to care about the emotional needs of children.

I guess maybe that is so much of my problem with teaching. Where I was at, there were so many kids with sad stories like these. How do you feel as an adult when you are tired, depressed, scared, confused, or discouraged? Do you feel like doing your best at work? Does it make you feel hopeful? Our school counselor couldn't see students to counsel them because the new role of school counselors in Texas is now "keeper of the TAKS." They keep up with testing regulations and procedures and things of that nature. No one had a plan on how to help or even attempt to help these children, yet the teachers were supposed to get them to pass a ridiculous test that meant absolutely nothing to them. Of course I am not saying that the school systems can change the home lives of students, but can we at least take it into consideration and find some way to work around it rather than pretending it doesn't exist? Can't we take a child where they are at academically and move them forward and consider that a success, even if forward for them isn't passing the standardized test for that grade level? Would it be so bad to have more kids repeat a grade level early on if that is what is needed without the state punishing their schools for doing so? Why do we have to expect all children to reach a certain academic level at the end of each year? These are individuals! Couldn't we have a test at the beginning and at the end of each year to measure growth of each individual student rather than comparing them to each other? If they were showing improvement then that would prove that their teacher had taught them, even if they weren't where the other kids were. Wouldn't that be sufficient enough to show that teachers were teaching all of their students? And wouldn't that motivate the kids more to see how much they DID learn instead of dwelling on how much they DID NOT?

As if the problems kids face at home and the lack of time for counselors to counsel kids weren't enough of a problem, some public schools give new teachers their most challenged students. I have witnessed this firsthand. While the students from the more affluent homes were placed in  the classrooms of the more experienced teachers, the newer teachers got the at-risk  kids. There were a few exceptions, but this was so true that I have heard another former teacher refer to certain teachers at this same school as "the county club teachers." This makes no sense. The more experienced teachers should have gotten the more challenging students, or at least the students should have been more evenly distributed among the classes. I don't just say this only out of frustration as the new teacher who had the at-risk students, but was it really fair to the students themselves?

I guess I am the one who needs to feel motivated before I can motivate children.  If I do go back to the teaching profession, I am going to do my best without worrying about TAKS scores or evaluations to the point that it interferes with my ability to really teach and motivate.I am going to do what I do best: CARE. ABOUT INDIVIDUAL KIDS.  If I can't find a school that accepts that from a teacher, then I am done for good. The first year I taught, I didn't know that I should worry about test scores to the point that it made me lose sleep. I taught the way I wanted to within the 4th grade scope and sequence. I LOVED my job and "my" kids. And you know what? The kids scores were in the average of the grade level. We weren't way below or way above the other classes. We also had a great year. The behavioral problems were nothing like what I would see the next year and the kids were happy that year. I had people tell me that I had some really difficult kids in my class and I honestly didn't know what they were talking about. We LOVED school! Our room rocked. If it isn't broke folks, don't fix it. 

I believe a teacher goes to college so that she can learn how to monitor and adjust her lessons to meet the needs of her individual students, NOT to read some ridiculous scripted curriculum verbatim or copy-cat the lead teacher on a daily basis--especially when the lead teacher has kids that came in at the beginning of the year that are (on the whole) way more advanced than other teacher's students. I guess that is a lot of my problem with teaching. It is just a big game of politics and red tape. It is NOT about the children, their lives, their futures. It is a lot of numbers and statistics being thrown around by school administrators and government officials and if you don't duck, you will likely get hit in the head on more than one occasion. These standardized tests and the advanced curriculum that they ahve brought about are causing us to lose a whole group of children. Basically the state (Texas for sure) is saying to them that if they aren't  the kind of student that you would expect to someday attend college, then they don't count. So kids are actually being pushed so hard to learn things they just aren't ready for that they miss out on some of the more basic concepts that everyone in society will need to function with some measure of success.

Schools are for children! They aren't for companies to market their curriculum. They aren't for a politician to use as a way to get himself elected and then forget all about how much he promised to help.  They are NOT  supposed to be a way to encourage businesses to set up shop in your state because you have standardized tests that are to their liking. (It is said that major corporations are part of why we have the tests we have in Texas.) It is NOT a place to pit kids against each other in competition rather than encouraging them to be all that they can be as an individual. 

We do not have a NO CHILD LEFT BEHIND educational system in our state or in our country We have kids being left behind every day. I can guarantee you that one. And nobody seems to give a damn! Or do they?  If you are a teacher, tell your administrators, the school board, heck, go to the state board of education and tell them NO MORE!  meaningless curriculum and standardized tests. NO MORE! counselors who aren't allowed the time to counsel kids. NO MORE!  talk about how the educational system has been improved when clearly it has NOT been. Parents: Don't be afraid to go to the schools and see what is going on. BUTT IN! Attend school board meetings, P.T.A./P.T.O.  meetings, volunteer. Write to your government representatives if you agree about test scores playing too much of a role in public education. Even if your kids are successful, take the time to care about the others who aren't! Why? Because they are ALL our future!

[May-20]

Jul. 10, 2008 at 4:41 PM Beautiful!! And absolutely correct all the way.