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Parenting
Thoughts on the mom jailed for lying about residence...
I posted in a pp that I believe that this is sad because this woman's children, 2 teenage girls, are destined to be single poor mothers themselves. That children in poor homes, live in poor neighbourhoods, have less opportunities and just repeat the cycle. There are exceptions but these are pretty acceptable facts.
It reminds me of a professor I had in teacher's college, who happened to be a big cheese for years recently with an Eastern Canadian province's government in the education area. He taught a class that he said was meant to teach us new teachers everything that we'd need to know to cover our a$$es. His words to us on our first day of class.
In this class at one point he told us that not everyone was meant to be rocket scientists, that we needed people that would do the minimum wage jobs. (Reminded me of the book Brave New World that I had to read in HS about how they reduced the oxygen on babies so that there would be variations of intelligence to account for different occupations.) And that if a student with a lower IQ wanted to be a rocket scientist, that it was our job and duty to steer them to something else as educators. This really struck home with me and is one of the single most memorable things that an educator said to me in my university days. And I don't agree to be honest, but I can see the problems in leading a child into failure if they can't add 2+2. But to bash their hopes and dreams to me doesn't seem right either.
Anyway, I wonder if this is why we have such variation in school systems, why we turn away from crappy schools. Why this woman felt compelled to break the law to honestly, better her children's chances of success, of their chances of success at LIFE. But NOOOOOoooo because you are poor you have to send your kids to the crappy schools in your neighbourhood, and because you are poor and can't afford the $30,000 tuition, you can't send your kids here. Your kids can't have the same opportunity, but hey, we need people willing to work crappy minimum wage jobs, so it's ok to have sh!tty schools with throw-away students in them. Don't even get me going on teacher's wages and it's effects on students' success.
Sorry, but I get worked up. The schools here in the states are so varied and it's like no one cares. Because not everyone can be rocket scientists right?
This discussion has been closed.
Re: Thoughts on the mom jailed for lying about residence...
Not everyone can be rocket scientists. However I agree with what you are saying. Its a sad reality, and one that will be hard to change.
That being said- just throwing money at students does not work. Just having good to great teachers does not work. Just having involved parents does not work. However a combination of all those things done just right- does work. But the trick is the ratio is different for every student. It sucks really since there is not a magical equation to figure it out.
For example, one of my local school districts is in turmoil right now. 'Everyone' said just to put more money into the poor schools. However, thats what they had been doing. Some averages were around $12,000 per student at the poor schools, whereas the 'rich' schools were getting less than $5,000 per student. That made people scratch their heads!
Its sad, but true- not everyone can be a rocket scientist- however not everyone wants to be either!
Would you want a surgeon who made C's and D's all through school? I sure wouldn't!
This. 100%. I get that she did something wrong & I can see fines or community service as a way to work off her debt to society or the school or whatever. But a felony conviction that is going to undo all the good she DID do for herself and her attempt to provide a better life for her family (by working to get her own degree & career, not by fraudulently sending them to the better school)? That's just asinine to me & I agree that the same people who spout the sentiment "she got what she deserved" are the same people who are going to be up in arms about "those lazy welfare" people.
In short the answer is yes.
In most of the communities around me we have income levels that are pretty high since we are outside NY city and most people commute in and make good pay. For those who have great income they usually choose to either send their child to private school, charter schools, pay tuition to the better town cuz they can't afford to actually live their or live in the neighborhoods with the best schools systems. For those that don't have those choices they must choose to keep their children where they are and struggle to get everyone out and into these better neighborhoods, use a relatives address and send their children to the better schools or hope their child finds their way out.
My parents struggled to move us from Brooklyn, NY to have a better way of life, better schools systems so that we might do what they were not able to do because they immigrated from the carribean which is to go to college, have good careers, and make good money. My husbands story is the same as well. Our siblings, my husband and I are the luck ones our parents succeeded but sadly we are the minority rather then majority.
Unfortunetly, with the way the country is going cutting school funding and not implementing the changes to the schools systems (especially the one the that are under performing) we will find more and more people trying to send their children from the school with the 4% graduation rate to the ones with the 98% graduation rate by any means necessary.
No. But what a shame if they had the talent and IQ at an early age and had it stunted due to a crappy school/crappy neighbourhood.
I just have to say do you know how many children of affluence that were able to get to college with C and Ds in high school because their parents know someone, have money, donate money to college etc. So you may just fine you did have a surgeon who made C and D's cuz you don't see the grades you see the degree on his or her wall.
And do you blame them? There is something to be said of a mother willing to put her own freedom out there to protect her daughter's education. I bet if this had been a year from now, she'd have a better/new job due to her graduation and be able to afford the area with the better schools.
And I couldn't agree more with the pp who said that the same people who would complain about her using the school system are going to be the same ones who complain about her daughters using the systems years from now.
This isn't right either. But of course, this wouldn't have happened to the kid in a crappy inner city school thought would it have?
I don't think she should have gone to jail because I think it is a waste of resources. I do think what she did is wrong and needs to be punished because otherwise everything would be a mess.
I live close to a high school with a 14.8% graduation rate. Clearly that school is not serving the community. It is ridiculous. I think they would have a much higher rate if they had more of a job skill based curriculum, and less of a college bound. I do not believe everyone can, wants, or needs to go to college. There are a lot more jobs that just require you to be able to do things, like fix a pipe, help a customer, cut a board, ect.
Some of the kids coming out of this high school seriously could not even help a customer at the grocery. The kids, and many of the teachers don't speak common English well enough. Dreams are great, but sometimes you just need to be able to pay the rent and put food on the table.
It is not for lack of spending either, they spend more at that school per student and it is a much newer nicer school than ours, with much lower teacher ratios, but the grad rate for our school is 96%.
I bought a house from a guy who was using the address of a property he owned to send his girls to school. He had to sell the house, even though it was much nicer than the other property because he got caught not living in district. We all make choices about where we live. I would live in a studio in a good district before I would send my kid to a horrible school.
Actually, no, we all don't have the opportunity to choose where we live. It would be great if we could, but those children that you speak of that shouldn't be given the opportunity to go to college usually DON'T get the chance to pick where they live.
And why did this make people scratch their heads? Obviously the parents in the better schools could afford to make up the difference, had the better support, their kids were going to do better with less support at school as they probably had it at home, the schools in the poorer area need more support teachers/aids, etc.
You must live in an area with an A school district and not too many poor families.... How nice for you... Having said that, we live in a great area with great schools and can afford to live here. But as a teacher before being a SAHM, this pi$$es me off.
Exactly. As for the mother in the story, do you suppose there was equal access to public housing/subsidized housing in the crappy school district vs. the fancy-pants one? Probably not.
Speaking for my own town, all of the subsidized housing is located within the 2-3 lowest performing school boundary lines. On the other hand, the 3 highest performing schools? In the wealthier parts of town- without public housing options- of course.
I guess it just makes me angry. I am blessed with a fantastic husband that can provide well for our family and it's not an issue. But my Mom was a single parent for a few years before my step father came along. And I KNOW for a fact that had he not came into our lives and bettered them financially, that this might/could have been me, with a single mother who wanted to better my future.
Everyone deserves a chance. This woman's children's was just taken away.
It makes me angry too. Every child should have the chance to be the best that they can be. Unfortunetly that's not the case, but you know what talking about will do very little. This is why people join schools boards, PTAs etc to try to work to ensure these things don't happen.
I don't know...there are plenty of people who pull themselves out of bad situations, from poor educational backgrounds, and do exceedingly well. My father came from that background and he's always always warned me to never use life circumstances as a scape goat (not that I heeded that warning all the time). Not everyone who sees her as "in the wrong" are people who have never suffered from being on welfare/being poor etc. Some people have been there and still think it's the wrong thing to do. Maybe she should have stayed at her school and fought for change...gotten press for refusing a lesser education for her kids rather than lying and forging papers. Who knows..but there are some people who come from crap situations who refuse to let it define them. Now THAT is awesome.
IMO, the only way the public education system in this country will ever change is if we:
take all the state tax money allocated to education, put it in one central pot, and give each school an equal amount (based on the amount of students in each school),
randomly assign students to schools using a lottery system and then bus kids wherever they are assigned,
do the same as above with all teachers.
It's simplified and drastic, and no one would ever go for it. But I don't see another way to fix it.
Oh come on? REALLY? Get real. How often does that really happen, if you take into account all people in the US? In all states? In all neighbourhoods?
Get your head out of your a$$.
Okey dokey!
There are plenty of people that can pull themselves out of bad situations, but not everyone. Not everyone is given a fair chance, and there are people that could do fine/well when given the opportunity but are not capable of breaking out of a bad situation/cycle.
I agree with rookie, though I don't see the US ever doing it.
Because people are allowed to make excuses for eveything under the sun. There is a complete lack of personal responsibility. And before anyone gets all frantic and huffy on me my world has not all been roses and rainbows all my life. But we make excuses for people and ourselves now in a way that they feel like they can't make it out...they are so broken from their crap childhood that there's not even an expectation of succeeding. I am sure that I'll come off as the bad guy here but I am giving more credit to individuals than other people are.
I guess you're missing my point. A lot of these kids aren't even out of their 'crap childhood'. How do you get out if you don't know anything different? If even your parents' attemps are stunted?
I'm done right now on the topic. But it made me mad. There are a lot of single moms who are doing their best and to have something like this happen makes me sad. Nothing like telling her that her kids aren't good enough.
I think in some ways it comes down to the nature vs nurture argument. I do believe that some people are born with a resiliency that allows them to rise above their upbringing, and they should celebrate that. I guess Oprah would be a good example.
But I don't think that is the norm. You do what you know, for the most part. Poverty, illiteracy, crime, etc.--all those things are cyclical. We try to tell ourselves that these things are a choice, but to "choose better" is like choosing medicine as your major when you've never taken a single science class. It's intimidating and overwhelming, and to top it off, a lot of time there's no emotional support for people who try to choose a better life. And time is an issue--often low-income students are also working full time to help support a family.
guess you're missing my point. A lot of these kids aren't even out of their 'crap childhood'. How do you get out if you don't know anything different? If even your parents' attemps are stunted?
I know more than one person who has achieved this. Some people don't even have parents and are raised in the system and do this. I completely agree that our schools need to step it up..without question. But there will always be better schools for a myriad of reasons. And there should not be ones that fail our students like they do right now but with that still comes an element of personal responsibilty...we take that away from people when we pretend like they are destined to fail based on their cirsumstances.
I know I said that I was done but 'grace', what were your circumstances? What kind of neighbourbood did YOU (not your dad) live in growing up? What type of school did you go to? It's nice to have your head filled with puppy dogs and rainbows about moving up in the world, but something tells me that you weren't one of them. You doth protest too much.
I mean really, you are pretty confident. Just wodering if you really have a soap box to stand on.
You doth protest too much.
LOL. Stop being such a Pollyanna.
This woman had the savvy to falsify records and cheat the system. She was getting an education. She was not destitute. She clearly had family support. She DID NOT have to resort to doing what she did to get her kids a better education. Not everyone who goes through a bad school system ends up working a minimum wage job. In fact, if you are a good student in a really bad school system, you have more opportunities available to you than if you were a middle of the road student in a middle class district. Do some research. More money than you can imagine - new schools, better technology, etc. is being thrown at some of the worst school districts in my area. I see it all the time. NONE of it helps if the kids attending the schools are coming from bad homes.
Do you have any idea what 'being a Pollyanna' is? Because I do not think it means what you think it means.
Pollyanna means a consistently positive outlook, in spite of difficulties or obstacles. It doesn't mean that someone is clueless or naive.
In this situation YOU are the one being a Pollyanna, not gdemars.
DS - December 2006
DD - December 2008
Riiiiggght, because those kids get undergrads in Biology, pass the MCAT, do well in med school and then go into surgery, sure.
Those types of kids go to college for "easy" degrees- I worked at a college and have seen it first hand. At my college the "easy" degree was Business Administration. (just so happens to be the degree I went for as well, but not just because it was easy.)
Not saying some kids who made Cs and Ds don't go on to become doctors, but they usually have an AHA moment and change their ways before med school or even senior year in HS- there's always the exception.
And yes, the richer schools have the more involved parents to make up the difference, but that just means that the poorer parents need to step up- that the schools are doing everything they can, that the underperformance is nothing they can help.
Equal does not mean fair, and fair does not mean equal.