Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: THURSDAY, March 30, 1995 TAG: 9503300027
SECTION: EDITORIAL PAGE: A-10 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE: FRANCES DEEDS
DATELINE: LENGTH: Long
Are schools failing because they are trying to meet all children's needs? Have an abundance of or lack of special programs? Water down the curriculum to meet student needs? Teachers can't meet demands of inclusion? The system can't change? Can't change to what?
Is it because of people like Roanoke County Supervisor Bob Johnson, Roanoke Councilwoman Linda Wyatt, House Majority Leader C. Richard Cranwell, Roanoke Del. Clifton Woodrum and Gordon ``who misrepresent the system, the needs and the options''? Because schools ``aren't, and cannot be, all things for all children''?
On the other hand, Hincker says ``a free, appropriate education can be obtained for every child,'' implying that charter schools and other options (what, for instance?) are answers to all of these problems. What do charter-school advocates think a charter school can accomplish in educating our youth that a public school cannot and/or does not?
What will be the schools' philosophy? Who will build and pay for these schools? Where and how many will be built? Who decides where they're needed? Will buses transport the children? Will taxpayers pay for the new buildings, equipment and materials? Will taxes increase?
Employees must run these facilities. Who pays them? What will the criteria be for choosing administrators, teachers and other personnel? Will charter schools follow the same guidelines the state now provides for certifying teachers and standards of learning? If not, who will devise their guidelines?
Assume all these questions have been answered, and the school district now has charter schools - fully equipped and brand-new facilities, personnel all fired up - ready to open the doors to our children. Answer yes or no to the following:
Will they allow through those shiny portals the physically and mentally handicapped children who need a full-time aide? The slow learner whose IQ is 75? The child with disruptive behavior who needs a special class? A child with a learning disability; a poor child who gets free breakfast, lunch and school materials; a child who has poor scores on standardized achievement tests; a gifted and talented child who is too economically deprived to afford transportation to school; a child receiving Aid to Families with Dependent Children?
Will these schools admit a child whose baby-sitter acts as the surrogate parent and confers with the teacher; a child with lice, a contagious disease (AIDS, etc.); a child who is dirty, smelly and ragged; a child who speaks little or no English; an illegitimate child of a teen-age mother; a child released from a juvenile-detention home; a child with mental problems severe enough to have required hospitalization; a child whose parents are uneducated and who couldn't care less if their child receives education; a physically, mentally, and/or sexually abused child with severe problems?
How about a child on drugs; a child whose parent is in prison; an orphan; a migrant worker's child; a child of any race, religious or ethnic background; an illegal immigrant; a rich child; a ``normal'' child from a ``normal'' home (whatever that is)?
If Hincker answered ``no'' to any of those questions, then she is ``promoting segregation by class,'' as she accused Cranwell of doing. If she answered ``yes,'' and every child mentioned above would be allowed into the charter school, then it's back to square one: a ``failing'' public school, because these children make up our society, and thus our school populations.
I suspect what charter-school advocates such as Hincker and Sen. Brandon Bell really mean is a private school, with strict means-testing for pupil entry, but paid for with public funds. Those funds should be used for everyone, not only the elite! Many people are alarmed about the monetary impact charter schools would have on public schools, since they would take funds away from existing schools.
If proposed charter schools open their doors to all children, they would be a boon to education because we need to alleviate large class sizes. Just ask any teacher. But what is also needed are many more parents who know how to be parents. We have schoolchildren whose parents are children. Public schools don't teach children to have children, nor do schools (excepting some family-life programs) teach parents how to be parents. Perhaps the latter is our failing. But when we try educating people where the family has failed, we're accused of being godless humanists who advocate all sorts of liberal social agendas.
Public, private or charter schools are no better and no worse than the parenting skills of parents from whom children come. Let's place blame for most of our schools' problems on the correct doorsteps. These doorsteps surround the confines of schools; they're not within.
It's a pity that people aren't required to have a four-year degree in parenting before that first child comes along. That degree may not guarantee 100 percent success in parenting, just as a four-year degree doesn't guarantee 100 percent success in teaching. But I bet that we wouldn't have requests for charter schools, and we teachers wouldn't be blamed for ``failure'' of schools. Schools haven't failed. We do the best we can with what we've got.
Frances Deeds, of Vinton, is a teacher in the Roanoke County school system.
by CNB