Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Hunter's Campfire A difference in schools

I'm so old that I remember one of my classmates bringing his deer rifle into the high school. The principal noticed, and asked him why. The answer was that the student was leaving for the deer hunt right after school, the locks on is pickup were broken, and he wanted to keep the rifle safe in his locker. The principal allowed that that made sense, and asked if he could keep it in the office instead. And that's what they did.

Nobody thought much about it, and nobody was the least bit worried about being shot.

Parents could stroll in to bring forgotten sack lunches or books, and students often went off campus for lunch. As long as they were back in time for class, no problem.

That was in Idaho, and a long time ago.

My kids are younger than the one in he OP. The price we pay for tuition for pre-K and 2nd grade at a private school stings more than a bit. That said its the only complaint I have so far and for that am happy. Things like described in the OP is the reason why plus things important to my wife and I can be taught at a private school that can't be taught in a public school. When I started college one thing I noticed is that the kids from private schools made the adjustment to college much faster on average. Plus, when mom and dad are paying a healthy sum for even grade school they have, generally, higher expectations for their kids and the the faculty/institution.

What you are seeing is the difference between institutions that actually want your student, and an institution that has evolved into government subsidized daycare that thaks orders from a bureaucracy.

Fixed it.

Best advice I can give is to avoid public education if you can afford otherwise. And most of us can afford otherwise if our priorities are straight.

CCCC,

"the fact that most parents do not properly involve themselves"

That is a big and important part of it.

My daughter was teaching in a middle school where there were quite a few failing or disruptive students. The parents who really needed to show up for PTO night didn't, and multiple calls from her to the parents were ignored and not returned.

Myron

A sorry state. My kids are in public elementary schools and we can go have lunch with them and go sit in on a glass too if we want.

denton,

"Parents could stroll in to bring forgotten sack lunches or books, and students often went off campus for lunch. As long as they were back in time for class, no problem."

I am perhaps older than you and that was my experience exactly. School lunch was a quarter, so a bunch of us would take our quarter and go up the street to "Pop's" Sunoco and get a couple of candy bars, a small bag of chips, and a pop, and eat junk food for lunch.
Never seemed to have any adverse effects. Unfortunately, those days are long gone.

Myron

I went to high school in the late 90's. We got a new principal. The first days of school, he made the rounds, introduced himself to each 1st hour class, asked if we had any questions. One of the girls asked 'can we still carry knives?' He reached in his pocket and pulled out a full sized Case Trapper, "Like this? yeah, thats fine".

At some BS conference I attended at a neighboring school a few months later (that got me out of class for the day), a vice principal came up to me in the dark auditorium, while a presentation from the stage was going on, "Hey, you got a knife on you?" "Uhhh, yeah, why?" He took it back to another teacher, and they used the tip of my knife as a screwdriver to fix somebodys glasses. I didn't feel right griping at them for dinging up my blade.

Absolutely. We're paying for schooling my twins don't get, lunches they don't eat and buses and they don't ride while my wife schools them. I'd love to have back the tax money I've paid in, but not benefitted from.

Seems like it was only a few years ago when you posted a photo of your wife and daughter on your wedding day. Dang dood, you are getting old!

Good luck with your choice of schools.

I have been impressed how my three son's did well in multiple schools in the US and abroad. Resilience. I have no idea how it might have been with a daughter though I know many expats, non-US, (hint there) that had their's do fine.

Considering most non-US are socialists to begin with, it would make sense that they would have no problems doing whatever the government says.

The weak link is an uncontrolled legal process that has parents looking to play lawsuit lottery over every issue. Put a leash on the legal system and of course, get the liberals out of the building (start at the federal level) and we can have our public schools back again.

kwg

Schools being off limits for the "safety of the children" has two real goals. One to try and protect the School from Liability suits and two to Keep the parents in the dark about what is happening in the schools. The actual safety of the "Children" is irrelevant.
Here safety things are fairly loose and schools are paid for by mining and land lease money instead of direct taxes. Our local high school even allows the baccalaureate service to be held at the school with local Pastors and Priests speaking.

My kids go to public school, and I'm invited to attend their classes at any time I choose. Once a teacher tried to keep me out of the class, and she's been fired.

As several here note, the problems are far from universal - some schools in some places continue to function very well and sensibly - but the overall public school trend has been bad and seems to be worsening. I would venture a guess that the leaders of most public schools that are doing very well would also admit that goverment regs - especially the USDE/fed intrusion - is detrimental and wasteful in the overall sense.

I still stand on the belief that strong local control and responsiveness to highly interested/involved parents is the best medicine.

We moved to a new city when three of our kids were in grades K-8 and they started into what was supposed to be one of the top two school districts in that state. Soon we observed (through the kids) that quality emphasis and high expectations were largely absent in their classrooms, that teachers were teaching to the mediocre and semi-interested students, and that our kids were going to go unchallenged to the point of possible boredom.

We took this issue to the principal - no support there, and no changes. We took it to the superintendent - same kind of response - zero concern. We yanked them out of that school district (endured a lot of bureacratic resistance and foot-dragging) and my wife home schooled the kids. That was in the early 1970s when home schooling was rare and strange, so by quite a few we were looked upon as weirdo pariahs. That attitude soon changed when some interested parents (in the neighborhood and also in our church) saw the differences.

I was deep in the public education field at the time and did not wish to pull that plug - but my wife and the kids were correct and persistent. I will not bore others with the resultant details but our family certainly did the best thing.

Parental interest and involvement - local control and stiff accountability.

The implementation of 'standardized testing' or whatever it is called has eliminated any meaningful teaching and learning. This is mandated by Federal and State laws that government has no business in.

Now teacher's and student's time is consumed by 'teaching to the test' and useful instruction in traditional subjects is lost.

Whatever happened to having to pass certain subjects to be able to move to the next grade or graduate ?

This whole system is just dead wrong, but the public isn't involved enough in their kid's education to get outraged and demand change.

Rant over again,

Myron

Where have you lived/worked outside the US to offer an experienced view? One without child and only recently without wife...

I just switched schools for my kids and this is EXACTLY what happened. In the old school, my wife used to eat lunch once a week with my boys in the cafeteria. When we asked about that in our new school, they looked at us like we were crazy. We are currently looking at other options.

A large part of the decline of our schools can be traced to the rise of progressive fascism. They use the schools to indoctrinate children and thereby creating new progressive fascist voters.

A core goal of progressive fascism it the destruction of individualism and replacing it with government. The people don't need to have weapons the police will defend them. It's even so bad that no one can bring pictures of guns into schools because they are "against every form of violence". I wonder how long it will take till they start burning the books with pictures of guns or that tell about guns used in war?