Public School Observations (Part 1)

In honor of our son's transition to kindergarten, I'm beginning a new series of observations of public schooling, which I hope my husband may join me in.  I'm partly doing this because I seek your input as to whether these are common occurrences, and whether you share my feelings about them, but also it will help me always remember these formative experiences with public schooling from the parent point of view.

1. There is something a bit terrifying about putting your kid on the school bus.  For one, there are lots of moving bodies not wearing seat belts. That seems counter to the messages we give our children each time we carefully buckle them into the car.  Second, that's a lot of kids in one place unobserved by an adult who can pay attention-- the one adult is driving. I haven't seen any patrols on these buses- I used to be a patrol (!), are these now a thing of the past?  Third, it's not clear what happens on the other end.  Our little boy has to get off the bus and find his way to his classroom, 2 floors and several hallways away. We were told he'd be escorted, and yet he came home the second day and said that no one was there, and he simply went classroom to classroom saying "Hi, I'm Conor and I'm supposed to be in Mrs. X's kindergarten."  Huh?
2. There are fancy ways to talk about discipline but they send mixed messages. Our school uses different colored pieces of paper to let parents know what kind of day the kid had. Green is good, yellow is ok, and red is bad. In a 4 day week we got 1 green piece of paper, and three days he came home with nothing, annoyed that he had been good but not gotten a green.  Is his meant to work towards a green, or away from a red? Or not care, and just do his thing?  We're not sure, but we're hearing a lot about it.
3. The sociologist in me is noticing where Bowles and Gintis were right. Tonight Conor shared a set of pictures he made.  He reported that after completing one, his teacher said "Is that the best you can do?" She then gave him another sheet, and he completed the second.  Which one do you think made her happiest? Which one did he like best?

         While unfortunately I have managed to include my shadow in both pictures (argh!), I'm betting       

         you know the answer-- my son was told it is preferable to color within the lines.  That's a first for

         him, previously educated in a Waldorf school. And I'm just not sure how I feel about it. What I
         know is that my son said he preferred the blue picture, and that he didn't like being told it wasn't
         good enough.

Anyway, it's a new beginning, and we're just getting our feet wet. Rest assured, we don't pretend for a moment that this tells us anything about the quality of his teacher or the school.  We haven't raised any objections, and have no plans to. But this is, as expected, a fascinating experience.

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Elites to 99%: Resistance is Futile

Today my Twitter feed brought a swan song for public higher education, sung by a chorus of elites.  It was accompanied in harmony by some   public higher education leaders who are surrendering and turning in their badges.

A few highlights:

• The co-founder and former chief executive officer of CarMax told a crowd attending the Association of Governing Boards of Colleges and Universities 2012 National Conference on Trusteeship that public universities should strive for major tuition increases. Reports the Chronicle of Higher Education, "Poor kids borrow money so that the rich kids can get a tuition discount," said Mr. Auston Ligon, now a member of the Board of Visitors at St. John's College in Annapolis, Md. "Quit subsidizing people like my kids."   
• Gordon Gee of The Ohio State (and buddy of Biddy Martin) is promoting a forthcoming book from Stanford University Press called "Public No More."  This little ditty plays a familiar tune, sung by two business school types. Again we are told, the current business model of higher education is broken (duh) and public higher ed's "longstanding dependence on state subsidies...is unsustainable...recent cuts are permanent...public universities either recognize this...or face decline....attempts to block competitive forces by resistance and delaying actions are self-defeating."  Apparently these dudes never heard of the need to present and evaluate without pre-judgement alternative models in policy prescriptions.
• According to Inside Higher Ed, some educators are full-on gung-ho about privatization and not even experiencing "angst" about it (sidenote to IHE--nice framing, making having reservations sound like neuroses). The chancellor of Maricopa Community College, a man in charge of guiding the futures of thousands of black and brown students, apparently has an oracle.  Rufus Glasper tells us "We have no choice. The state funds are gone forever."  There's no point in anything but his kind of "realism," and his so-called solution is a private for-profit model. 

Just a few questions. Why is the CarMax guy being invited to talk with AGBCU?  What's his expertise-- oh right, car sales. Discounting.  Clearly buying college is like buying a car--all about the transaction. And we all know that poor people with their complete information totally understand how discounting works, that's why high tuition-high aid is so successful...  Say it with me now: puhleese.

Second, when did smart people all start singing in unison about simplistic, singular solutions to complex problems?  Did they all attend a special dinner party together where primers were distributed, and the private monetary incentives for making the education "public no more" were explained?  Sure seems like it.  Because they are talking to highly educated people in a way that is utterly pedantic-- there is one solution and one solution only -- pass the buck onto the "consumer"? Can you imagine if instead they said, "Hey 5th graders, pay your own way through elementary school?" 

Third, how much longer are you people (yes you, our readers) going to take this?  For-profit leaders clearly worked this out quite well ages ago, using their massive profits paid for with your federal tax dollars to lobby legislators and university leaders into believing the future lies in private, for-profit education.  They're doing it from up high in the skyscrapers around the world, while many higher ed leaders are out there wittingly and unwittingly carrying their water and doing their bidding.  We mere "academics" and "students" who won't admit that really we are "obstacles" and "consumers" are simply in the way.

 PUBLIC NO MORE. WE HAVE NO CHOICE. RESISTANCE IS FUTILE. 

Where have we heard that before? 

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