Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: THURSDAY, March 4, 1993 TAG: 9303040419
SECTION: EDITORIAL PAGE: A-8 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE: BETTY G. PRICE
DATELINE: LENGTH: Medium
SCHOOL-OPENING DATES AREN'T THE PROBLEM
IN REFERENCE to the Feb. 21 story, "So far, tourism winning":I find Salem schools' Superintendent Wayne Tripp's disappointment in the General Assembly's "shooting down" of pre-Labor Day school openings puzzling. To cast disparaging innuendoes that somehow this decision conflicts with the ever-constant mandate for educational reform also is puzzling. I know of no one who believes for one moment that anything in education will be "fixed" by going to school even an extra month, much less a few days.
If education is ever going to really reform, it seems to me that it must start with parental responsibility, which spells discipline. How and why a teacher should be expected to teach, while certain children cause disturbance and keep others from being in a proper learning environment, is beyond me. Parents of these children should be called from their jobs and forced to take their children out of school and to take control, before being permitted to return them to the classroom. Surely, there are many reasons why this is a problem - broken homes, non-caring parents - but perhaps society has allowed such parents to abdicate their responsibilities.
Further, we should stop social promotions. We should not allow anyone out of the second grade (third grade, tops) who cannot read at least the fairy tales for themselves. This will never happen with current procedures. Think about the message we give children when we provide "reading" books into the eighth grade! Why not concentrate on reading, writing and arithmetic in the first few years and then contemplate how much "educating" can be done in the next eight or nine? What's wrong with emphasizing the three R's initially?
Forget the numbers - the statistics that must show low dropout. Teach more, expect more and demand more; the rewards in the numbers game will happen.
Let's address the need for homework. The amount given in elementary school is inconsistent and seems to be expected and/or determined by school and location. Why should this be? Should it be done in school? If so, why call it homework? Why not continue large doses into middle school and high school? "So many young people work," you say (and need to pay for their cars). Is this supposed to be a reason to drop the demands of good teaching and high expectations?
How are students going to function in the real world unless they learn how to work hard, sweat a little, think straight and "put out" when they may not especially feel like it? In addition, how are they going to contribute to the kind of country we have learned to cherish if they cannot write a cohesive, coherent paragraph or spell the simplest of words?
How many of us would have been first-grade dropouts if it had not been for wise adults who pushed, pulled, shoved and yanked the best there was to give out of each of us? Thank God such serious attitudes toward educational achievement were in vogue when I was young. I not only learned to work hard, face and handle my responsibilities and pay attention in class, I still actually expect these things from my students.
It is a sad indictment when a well-known, prestigious college claims that 120 out of 200 freshmen this year need additional language, writing and basic mathematical assistance. We have a lot wrong within the public-school educational system, but I, for one, do not think even a modicum will be altered by opening the school year before Labor Day.
Betty G. Price is director of Professional Reading Services in Roanoke.