Parents and school involvement
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| Thu, 08-23-2007 - 8:49am |
My question stems from a personal experience. My middle child is starting kindergarten next week. I've become fairly close with one of my dd's friend's moms- this is her first child entering the school system. She WOH, I do not, plus I have experience with the school, so she's been calling me with questions and comments.
It started to go bad when she called to complain that the kindy orientation is during the day- when she is working. Then it led to complaints about the parents' read aloud program (when the kids are in library) and other opportunities for volunteerism in the school. I get that these things aren't convenient for her, but I'm getting annoyed with the complaining. How can the kids have an orientation at night when they go to school during the day? None of these events are mandatory for parents or kids. And plenty of activities are scheduled for evenings: Back to school night, the PTA picnic, etc.
She thinks because she can't participate, no one should be able to, apparently. Plenty of WOHP do show up for these things. I think she's being unrealistic if she thought she could put a couple of kids through school without ever taking a vacation day. Am I wrong? Am I missing something here?

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Absolutely. In the end, all of us trust in the school because, despite parents' assertions on a public debate board, there's very little a one parent can do if dissatisfied with the school. A parent has a handful of remedies at his disposal to change things if he doesn't like his child's current school. But a parent cannot run the school.
It's like a job. You hope you get the best job for yourself, but if conditions at work suddenly take a turn and things go sour, then you have little choice but to get a new job. Same with schools. We trust the schools, and if we don't like what they are doing, it's not likely one parent will change an entire direction of a school or even a single class. Instead, if things are as bad as they have been for PKA's older child, then the parent would have to remove her child from the school and place him in a different one.
Before our PTA meetings, every teacher in the school will e-mail to the teacher-PTA representative what his/her class has been doing that month. Then at the PTA meeting, one of the teacher reps will stand and read off these updates.
It's by far the most enjoyable part of the PTA meeting for all of us parents and sometimes it's the longest part of the meeting.
Did you ever really think she was going to get a good education there though? I would never even live in Texas for that very reason. Texas is ranked 48th or 49th in the United States in terms of education.
That's why we moved to where we live now before our children even entered school. If Hazeleyes lives where I think she does (I may have family there), the public schools are very good. Hazeleyes' children are very fortunate.
"Simply living in an exceptional school district is a wonderful thing to do for your children's education."
And there in lies the rub --and the whole basis for the now 19 year battle to fix education funding in NH -- it's all based on property taxes - so if you live in a wealthy community lucky you you're doing a wonderful thing for your children's education simply by being rich! congrats! if you live in a poor milltown on the candadian border -welll...gosh darn it that's just too bad you couldn't do well by your kids and had the missfortune to be among the working poor. The supreme court in NH has ruled this method of funding unconsitutional (nearly a decade ago) and the state still hasn't figured out how to fund it...it's a mess. And during that whole time an entire generation of wealthy kids has once again outdistanced their classmates in the poorer towns....
Yes. We. Did.
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