Parents Poised to Take Over Failing SoCal School: Best for Kids?

There are two major text book systems in the USA that schools use, the Texas Standard and the California Standards. The Texas Standard has now had most of the books corrected to reflect true historical facts not the revisionist history that started to change in the early 1900's by Progressives. The California Standards not only lean far left but also lean pro gay and definitely Revisionist. The major changes in the text books were changed by a man and wife text book writing team that were Progressives and they rewrote them in the later 1930's. That's when children started learning that the founders were fed up with taxation and that's when the Boston Tea Party and other events came more to the forefront and God took a back seat or no seat at all as they "progressed". They literally took sentences out of documents so it would read differently. Parents were busy surviving not worry what a kids text book said. When the next text books came along they just copied what was there in the last one and then expanded on what was going on in the world and in their State. So the Revisionist game was on.

If you read the Declaration of Independence as the generations prior to the revisionist books had those growing up knew the founders and knew their wives and they knew they were Godly men and had founding this country on Godly Principles. The Progressives deliberately change that. That is when the preaching of Separation of Church and State was taken out of context and children and adults alike believe that to be Gospel but that was not the founders meaning nor intent. In fact the very first American Bible printed in the USA was by Congress for the use in the Schools. My mom had hers in school and that's how they use to learn to read but also the morals and how to treat one another.

The Texas Standard which most of the country prefers now have the new text books coming out correcting mistakes and showing all points of view not only Evolution as only California teaches but also Creation as Evolution is just a Theory not proven fact.

California Standards are so poor that a kid doesn't stand a chance at the truth.

I wholeheartedly disagree with your statement. YOUR kid isn't the only kid in the class, you know? I'm so sure that child is "bright" and "wide awake" and "ready to learn" with a "full belly" and "nice, clean clothes."

Look, teachers are educated, professional, hard-working, and trained to do their jobs. Your comment, "And if the parent disagrees with the reasons...," tells me a lot about your angst in the response you just made. It tells me that, as a good parent, you've gone in and TOLD the committee HOW to do their jobs: And it doesn't work that way.

It's great to love your kids--I have kids, too--but part of loving your kids is to recognize that they are all different and that they all LEARN differently. There isn't a SINGLE strategy to teach ALL children. It takes multiple strategies, in use at the same time, in the same classroom, and provided by a trained professional.

Parents who are really involved with their children probably DO talk with teachers and work out some strategies together, and that works to some degree: We try to be as consistent as we can. We can, though, only do so much.

We aren't the student's first teacher: That IS the PARENT. We aren't hired to RAISE your child, and there's the disconnect that I see most these days. This never happened before, but I hear it more and more in meetings, that we aren't raising THEIR child to THEIR expectations. Teachers TEACH a subject, we don't RAISE your child: Don't expect that we will.

ALSO, once children are out of grade school, they don't have a single teacher anymore. Elementary school teachers have a degree in Elementary education: They teach everything on a basic level, such as Music, Social Studies, Math, Science, Language Arts. This is usually K-6 or K-8 in some states.

However, MOST states for grades 7-12 require that a teacher have a degree in a specific subject such as History, and a corresponding Teacher certificate in that subject area. Their are no "frauds who crammed their exams," it is a multiple-class, minimum 24 credit-hour process to gain the teaching certification (24 credit hours = 8, 3 credit-hour classes, each class a semester long). Then we take the certification exam, which is either 4 or 6 hours long, depending on the exam. There is also a semester-long Student teacher internship to be taken before the exam.

I have been teaching over 20 years. I have BA/History, with minors in English and Science, a triple endorsed teaching certificate for 7-12 Social Studies, Language Arts, and Science, and teach all three subject areas. I also have 2 management certifications, an A/AS-Aviation Maintenance Degree with my FAA A&P certification, a Master's Degree in Geology, and a Master's Degree in Education Administration. I also have been an athletic coach though I am retired from coaching now.

I arrive at school at 7 a.m. and I leave at 7 p.m. I teach Astronomy and Geology from 7-3, then teach English, History, and Science from 3-7 in our Alternative High School classes, where I also serve as the Principal. We have 700 students at our high school.

I am responsible for lesson planning for all subjects, plus attending meetings and conferences, in-house trainings, and I also teach Summer school for a month after school ends. I get 3 weeks off, go back for a weeks's worth of training in what we call the Summer Institute, and get another week off to set up my room, get my first semester lesson plans ready, and then we start school for the Fall semester. THIS IS WHAT MANY TEACHERS DO.

I CANNOT understand why people disparage teachers all the time: it makes NO sense to me. It IS a difficult job. We are required to be educated at GREAT expense, yet everyone wants to gripe about how "much" money we make. No one gripes about a PLUMBER charging $65/hour, but I only make $35/hour. THAT'S WITH ALL OF THE EDUCATION I AM REQUIRED TO OBTAIN.

ALL other fields that require this much education pay MUCH more than teachers: So WHAT is the malfunction here?

Frankly, I am sick and tired of all the teacher-bashing. It IS NOT deserved.

Thank you for a credible response.

And I will say this: I defend the teaching profession AS A WHOLE because of responses like some I see that are way past what we might name as "snarky."

The truth is, though, that at least 30% of the teachers I've known ARE the people others complain about. These people need to find another profession. I mean it, too. They are not good teachers, not good people, or worse, BOTH. They are an embarrassment to teaching, and sadly, the ones EVERYONE remembers when this subject comes up.

There are 7 million teachers in the United States: 30% of that would be 2.1M. That's a lot. They need to be replaced. But disbanding the NEA and the AFT is not the way. Parents taking over schools isn't the way. There's a better dialogue to have.

I venture to say that every profession has exactly the same underperforming people: doctors, lawyers, engineers, firemen, policemen, and so on. When I look at the news, I see that all of them are under "attack" as well. It seems like EVERYONE who is not a SERVICE PROVIDER is complaining about service providers!

We have become very mean and nasty in our country to OTHER people...it's sad.

Thank you again for a credible response. As you can read through all of the replies on these pages, not everyone will agree.

I have a tough time dealing with the incredible amount of hate and bile and animosity directed at public school teachers who for the most part are loyal, dedicated, hard-working individuals dealing with 120-150 students per day with every kind of problem in the world present in the classrooms and hallways of every school in the United States.