Public schools stink! I went to public school and public universities, and it's a miracle I know anything at all. Most of what I know today, I learned on my own or from my family.
Lately, I've been wondering: If my own education was independent and family-based, is that typical of most students? I've concluded the answer is yes. Smart, motivated parents tend to have smart, motivated students. I think that the public schools are secretly aware that children learn more on their own and from their parents than they do at school. Proof? Exhibit A: The increased quantity of homework that today's teachers assign students. This past year, my grade-school children frequently brought home one to two hours of homework per night. With so much homework, I often wondered if my children were learning anything at school. So I asked them, "What did you do at school today?" Frequently, they said they watched Lion King or had a party. Exhibit B: Testing. In our state the tests for No Child Left Behind are called the PSSAs. Our oldest actually quoted one of his teachers saying, "PSSAs are more important than SATs." Translation: the school exists not to educate our children, but to perpetuate itself. The teachers care more about their jobs than our children's futures. As a result, the teachers stress achievement on testing, but rarely educate on topics that might inspire the children. One elementary school teacher informed us that they only cover new material for two months out of the school year. The rest of the year they are reviewing old material and taking standardized tests. I would add watching movies and having parties.
Our family's days of public education are now over, marked by our eldest graduating from public high school last week. Presently, my wife and I spend a lot of time trying to undo the damage a public school education has inflicted upon him. This senior year, the teachers and administration were not focused on academics, but on ritual. Homecoming, painting the field, winter ball, senior trip, student council, band, clubs, sports, prom, and graduation ceremonies were the focus. I initiated contact with both the principal and the vice principal this year. Both times, they changed the subject and discussed one of these rituals. As traditional Catholics, our family gets plenty of ritual at church. We do not appreciate the secular administrators of the public school enforcing empty rituals upon our children. Just because the rest of society is starved of rituals does not mean that we are. We are already full.
Our second son will be entering 10th grade this coming year. Because of his age, we allowed him to decide whether to stay in public school or to start homeschooling. We were somewhat surprised when he selected homeschooling. His reasons were as follows: 1. He said, "They [we] don't do anything at school." 2. Our school district will still allow him to participate in sports. 3. He can work at his own pace, and he hopes to be attending community college while his peers are still attending high school. He didn't care about all the rituals. He expressed a desire to get away from the social meat grinder. And he felt that most of the teachers are just overgrown kids themselves. Lately, however, he's expressed some misgivings. Partly, he realized how much work homeschooling would be and got cold feet. He's also brought up the number one excuse for not homeschooling, "socialization."
Having raised a child all the way through high school, I'm beginning to wonder what parents and teachers really mean by "socialization." High school, especially today, is brutal. As an adult, if I encounter a boss or coworkers who are unbearable, I can always look for a new job or quit. But public school students seldom have the option of changing schools or quitting. Instead, these students are stuck and need to learn how to brush off criticism. Is this what parents and teachers mean by socialization? No, I don't think so. High schools do not orchestrate social stress in order to develop their students' stress tolerance. High school is not West Point. Rather, high schools go out of their way to eliminate stress, often creating more stress in the process. High school is more like a cult. Today's students learn to socialize in an environment of rigidly defined rules and standards. Does this eliminate bullies and discrimination? No, quite the contrary. Much like my work-experience with bright criminals in jails and prisons, policies that are too rigid allow a few mean-spirited but bright students to figure out ways to bypass the system. Zero tolerance policies are a particularly useful tool to these clever students, who back administrators into a corner and force them to forget common-sense. In this way, a handful of "mean kids" actually run the social milieu of high school.
This is not the type of socialization that most parents desire. Many parents have an idyllic recollection of high school. With the error of euphoric memory, they forget the painful events and only remember the good times. In truth, adolescence is a painful time of life. Being stuck in a box with hundreds of other youths struggling with the same issues does not prepare a young man or woman for adulthood. Teachers and administrators who have likewise not resolved these same issues—hence perpetually in high school—only exacerbate the problem. In reality, socialization begins and ends in the family. Children learn their values from their families, from their primary relationship bonds. At the extreme, children who fail to make those bonds with their primary caregivers may later be unable to form meaningful attachments to other human beings. More commonly, children who do have loving parents but spend much of their lives shuffling from daycare to elementary school to middle-school and to high-school come to identify more with their peers than with their families. Under these circumstances, public schools start taking on characteristics of gangs or cults.
Luckily, our children have done well despite public school. I'm proud of our eldest for graduation. Frankly, academics were a minor part of his accomplishment. Surviving the "mean kids" (and I hope he wasn't one of them) was an amazing feat. He's a better kid than I ever was. If I had to go to public high school today, I doubt I'd graduate. So, with the past twelve years under our belts, for many reasons, my wife and I have decided that public schooling is not worth it. My advice to parents of public school children: Caveat Emptor.
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