Though some of you think that I loathe the yuppie culture of Willow Glen, it really is a beautiful area and I realize that residents pay an arm and a leg to live there and maintain their million-dollar homes. I recently drove to Willow Glen for dinner at a friend’s house with two of the aforementioned yuppies (on their home turf no less). As I drove past Willow Glen Elementary, I thought how sad it was that most people who live in those expensive homes don’t send their kids to the local public school, putting them into private schools instead.
My friends, new parents of a four-month-old baby, were talking about getting more involved in the local Catholic school because they felt the Willow Glen public school wasn’t the best option for them. They mentioned how there is a group of moms that are attempting to “take back” Willow Glen Elementary by starting a movement to encourage those that live in the area to enroll their sons and daughters in the public school—making it their neighborhood school again, not a school of bused-in children from all over the city. In my research, I couldn’t find anything official from this group, as I believe it is somewhat of a grassroots movement. However, their goal is to convince the locals to send their kids to Willow Glen Elementary so that there won’t be room there for kids from other areas of the city.
This leads to questions that are not politically correct and hard to talk about. Why is there this “white flight” from public schools? How many parents (Willow Glen parents just being the example here) want their children to be educated with the children of “like” families? How is it that a high-income neighborhood school ends up educating low-income students and students for which English is a second language?
I am not saying that this makes for a bad school, by any means; some of the best teachers are employed in schools that have low Academic Performance Index (API) scores and many non-English-speaking students. It is much more complicated than that. Many public schools have students with parents that don’t become as involved as they should in their child’s schooling due to poverty and language barriers. They also take students that may be behaviorally or mentally challenged. What can be said over dinner but not in a larger context is that many parents, like my friends in Willow Glen, would rather have their child in a private school where the student body is monitored and the parents know the kids have to shape up or be shipped out. Public schools (and I know there are great ones with wonderful teachers and excellent programs in San Jose) are only as good as the families of the students—the more involved and the more educated they are, the more desirable the school tends to be for the middle- to upper-income population.
Unfortunately, many San Jose Unified schools, especially those in the city’s core, have become less and less desirable. It’s good to see a group of moms trying to change all that, but the problem is a touchy one that will not be easily solved and it will continue to be debated for years. However, we must have this discussion because being politically correct and not addressing these difficult issues is not helping the problem one bit.
I do believe in “integration” and “diversity” but you can’t ignore the fact that the SJ Unified Schools are lower performing and there is a definite flight from these schools….
Maybe some people in these “wealthy” areas (i.e. Willow Glen or Los Gatos) choose to send their children to private schools because some public school teachers show up hungover to class.
SG – while it is simple to look at “white flight” in purely racial terms, it is naive. I send my child to private school bacause it is obvious that there is a cultural agenda in the public schools that is in conflict with our family’s values. I don’t need my child’s school to teach religion, but I don’t want her in an environment hostile to Christianity either.
Also, the hyper political nature of the teachers union in their opposition to standards and testing is very disconcerting. If local public schools were reflective of community values, not hostile to them, I’d rather have my child in public schools.
Years ago some parents in Naglee Park wanted to redraw district lines so children in the area of 12th Street would be eligible to attend the public school by William Street Park. I don’t think they got very far; at the time, I thought that would have set a precedent for parents through out the district to submit similar requests and that could have really opened a hornet’s nest.
To me, one of the bottom line problems is English. It always amazes me that English has the status of the common language, not the official language of the United States. So students do not have to really learn English. No, the teachers have to become proficient in Spanish and Vietnamese in some districts. Seems that it’s always the lower end of the totem poll that brings things down, rarely the upper end.
Good provocative question. I live in the Rose Garden and also feel funny about how few kids attend the local schools. I don’t think any of the kids on our street do so. I’m not throwing stones, because my kids attend a Catholic school, too.
I feel like the public has heard so many bad messages over the years about public schools (lack of achievement, lack of discipline), that we’re hesitant to take a chance with our kids.
Similarly, kids tend to not just go out and go to the parks, the library, or ride bikes like when I was a kid. It’s either go to some class or sports practice, or a pre-scheduled “play date”. Is the world so much more dangerous now, that we are so cautious with letting kids out?
It would be nice for things to be more like when I was growing up (pre Prop 13), when everyone went to the neighborhood school.
Nice job SG. I’ve been enjoying your last several columns very much.
I am not a parent, but I have friends who are. For years now, several of my girl friends have been telling me that their kids are being left behind because teachers spend more time trying to teach the non English speaking children. This frustrates them because they work, and they can’t devote the kind of time fighting the educational system the way the wish they could. Their children have told me that teachers ignore them, and focus their attention on the non English speaking students first. How true that is I don’t know, but I’ve heard this from others, so I’m not sure what to glean from this.
My friends don’t live in Willow Glen, and they certainly don’t own a million dollar home, but they aren’t the dregs of society either.
Being a curious sort like you, I decided to take a walk through a few schools in Campbell, the nicer parts of San Jose, and one in Los Gatos. I was pretty surprised by what I saw and heard. At the Los Gatos school, there were some non English speaking students walking around talking, but in Campbell and in San Jose, over half the students weren’t speaking English. I was pretty shocked.
Another thing I noticed was that whites are no longer the majority; in fact they are the minority. I love diversity, I think learning new cultures are a wonderful way to grow and learn, but I just hadn’t realized how much things have changed. I also noticed that kids were cussing, fighting, and didn’t dress in a manner I’d want to see my children leave the house in. I also noticed that these children were walking around talking on cell phones! My God, I only use mine occasionally, and it’s expensive!
My point? I can see why parents wouldn’t want their children in that environment, if they can afford a private school. School isn’t just a place we learn academics. It’s a place we learn how to be social, how to interact with others, how to behave, and a host of other things. I’ve got to tell you, I’d much rather have a child in a school that demands excellence, teaches proper social skills, provides superior academics, than a school that is short on money and can barely afford to teach the very basics.
So if we want better public schools, we need to finance them, and redo the way they do things. Starting with putting non English students in seperate classes, until they learn the language, and then mainstreaming them in with other students. I think it would be great to teach English speaking students another language too because it will open a new culture and job market to them, they otherwise wouldn’t have.
Patrick
White Flight isn’t meant to be racial, it is simply stating the facts, at least in San JOse Unified…..the reason many people don’t talk about this issue for fear is being called racist.
Do San Jose public schools compare favorably with other city schools – Los Gatos, Cupertino, Plao Alto ? A few do but look at the test scores many don’t.
Your child can get a good education if they are in right SJUSD school and child is focused which not all are but it takes work and luck on school assignments.
Many parents with smaller families, children with educational challenges, needing additional attention or prior public school undesirable experiences will not take a chance on San Jose schools if they have the financial ability to send childen to private schools
I think the problem is not that the teachers are poor in those public schools (they are often better and more trained than those in private schools) its the social thing that parents worry about. Private schools have few “bad kids” or “bad seeds” because they get kicked out if they are bad. Public schools must educate everyone, no matter what.
Los Gatos, Saratoga, Los Altos are examples of where public schools are almost better than some private schools, but they are the exception, not the norm. I would agree that teachers spend their time on Non English Speaking students – you always spend more time on the low kids, no matter what. So I can see why parents of English speakers feel that way.
its a complex problem, that is for sure…
#3, Go visit some of the schools in the district, see what the teachers have to work with. As a former, battle scared teacher in San Jose Unified, I never witnessed a teacher showing up “hung over.” Trust me, it was an eye awakening experience that I wouldn’t wish on anyone, and I was at SJUSD high end school before busing! You might check the credentialing of public school teachers, often you will find they are kept to higher standards than what private schools require, meaning the majority are very highly qualified, it’s not the teacher’s fault, which is usually the simplistic answer to the state of education.
And, since many teachers are forced to become proficient in languages other than English, this takes away from continuing education in their subject matter.
#8 Exactly
I agree with Bridget and others that school is more than academic but also a social learning environment. One reason that I am scared to send my kids to public school is not so much the elementary schools but jr high and high school. There are drugs and alcohol to some extent in all schools but the gang influence and violence is what disturbs me.
The main difference between public and private schools is parental involvement. That differnece is not just the stay at home moms who volunteer their time but the parents who are actively involved in their kids education and not just a place they use as daycare. Parents need to pay attention to their kids and the influences that surround them. That crosses all socioeconomic lines.
While you are at it, get rid of the teachers that should be put out to pasture as they are just biding their time until retirement. How many people like that are in the district?
It’s more than the ability to kick out the bad kids. Public schools have, and always have had, the ability to flunk students. They just choose not to use it.
Year after year kids get passing grades, despite the fact that they can’t read and can’t do basic math.
Five years later, some poor teacher is stuck with a class full of unprepared students.
But don’t forget that it was also teachers who passed those kids in previous years. Or that those same kids will get passed along again, still without a decent education.
There needs to be a complete paradigm shift in how we educate our children. The current public school system, except for rare high-performing districts, is a failure. Indeed, it cannot succeed the way it’s now being run by PC District offices, with large amounts of non-English speaking students and parents, and the majority of teachers who are in it for the paycheck only, and unconcerned parents.
I went to Catholic school. From third grade through eighth, my SMALLEST class was 45 kids in those 6 years. We had a full spectrum of intelligence levels. Yet most of us learned and went on. I continued with Loyola High in L.A. (like Bellarmine here), graduating in 1963. My parents struggled and sacrificed to put me through those schools. I was expected to do my part by studying hard and getting grades commensurate with my perceived intelligence level.
A HUGE difference in success is parental involvement. My folks made sure my homework was completely done before I could play or watch TV. They took an interest in my work, almost to the point of being annoying about it.
So many parents these days take zero interest in their kids; except to drive them to school, when walking to and from may be the only exercise they get all day. Part of childhood obesity. My son walked to school, over a mile each way by 9th grade, or rode his bike.
Teachers seemed more dedicated to their students then than they do now. The teacher’s unions have corrupted the system with their constant clamoring re pay and benefits, and their steadfast and well-financed opposition to being held to any standard of accountability; i.e., that a kid who graduates from eighth grade should at least be able to read and write fairly well. Performance based pay seems to be anathema to them.
The non-English speaking PC programs they have now do not integrate kids into American society, ESPECIALLY when the child goes home to a non-English speaking parent (s). English classes for parents should be mandatory, so they can help their kids to learn like my folks helped me.
Busing has been a total disaster. The kids sit together by race on the bus, hang out by race in the school, and go back to their own mostly segregated neighborhoods after school. Participants in sports may be the only exception…oh yes, and the druggies hang together irespective of race. Stoner kids are more tolerant, I guess.
The overpaid, non-producers in the district offices pretty much all need to go. They draw the highest salaries and add the least value (if any at all) to the educational system. They push paper up line and down line. Too many are mere bureaucrats in the worst sense of the word. In fact, there are too many separate districts, each with their highly paid, marginally productive district office staffs.
My son was in Catholic school until 9th grade in 1980, when he went to Markham Junior High an adjunct to Willow Glen High, and allegedly one of the better schools in SJ Unified. He was a year younger than the other kids, since he started school in second grade, not first.He had learned to read, write, add, and subtract in day care.
He came home after about two weeks @ Markham and said, “Pops, you gotta get me outta here before I forget everything I ever learned. They’re teaching stuff I learned 2 years ago!” He also described how the kids broke off into single race groups, and how as the new kid he had to make his bones with each of them who came calling. He took the test and transferred to Mitty in 10th grade.
Now schools proceed on what I call The Convoy Schedule—the entire class must proceed at the rate of the slowest student.
It’s little wonder that anyone who can sends their kids to a private school. Many students in many districts who succeed do so in spite of the system, not because of it.
We must stop promoting kids who don’t grasp the work; we need teachers to be compensated based upon results ( and that means more than just test scores), not merely time in grade; we need to cut bloated district offices and staffs; we need to jettison non-performing teachers; we need to reduce the 100,000+ sections of our education code (there are literally pages on what it takes to take a kid on a field trip); we need to involve parents in school ofor more than just responding to discipline problems; we need to educate parents in English as well as the students, and get kids into English proficiency faster (no more clases in Spanish or Vietnamese etc. for years on end. Kids learn a new language on the playground quite easily, so why don’t they do so in school?); and we need to jettison non-performing kids from the classes with performing kids so they don’t drag those who work at it down with them.
Pouring more money at it won’t solve the systemic problem. I don’t see how No Child Left Behind can possibly succeed except by dumbing down the entire population. Sad to say, there are some we will be compelled to leave behind if we don’t want the system to crumble.
JMO and Bridgett, I am right there with you. I went to St. Clare’s and St. Leo’s and the smallest class I was ever in was like 42 kids. Most were right around 50. It seems to me that if we had nuns armed with rulers in the public school system we’d have a lot less problems. But just try finding a nun even in a Catholic school these days.
JMO, I had the same situation as your son, only mine was between Catholic schools, not between Catholic and public. St. Clare’s was way ahead of St. Leo’s and I was spinning my wheels through most of the 4th grade. When I did choose NOT to go to Bellarmine after a St. Leo’s screw-up D-average kid in my class got the Bellarmine red carpet because his family had money and I, as a B average kid from a middle income household was told I needed summer school. I lost all respect for the Jesuits at the ripe age of 14 and continue to consider them a bunch of useless freeloaders. I managed fine at Hoover and Lincoln and earned myself a scholarship to SCU, but that was back in the olden days when they had an ESL program for the non-English students and nobody was dragging anybody else down. Now every damned public school seems to be a giant ESL program. Something is seriously wrong with that picture.
When I was at Lincoln the teachers and students respected the facilities for the most part. “Do Right” was the school motto. At the end of each day, every teacher would draw the shades on the top two windows in each tier simply for aesthetic reasons, probably a practice that started in 1941 when the school opened. Drive by Lincoln any evening or weekend these days and it looks like a sloppy mess with a checkerboard of shades half up and half down. Yes, the teachers are overworked but do they not even care about the appearance of their place of work? Does nobody take pride in their school anymore? Not even the teachers? I think this is a reflection of a much larger and more urgent problem than just window treatments, of course, and I am very disappointed with the way my tax dollars are being used by the school system. It’s no wonder that those who can manage are sending their kids to private schools.
Dear San Jose:
I wanted to thank Johnmichael #14 for one of the most thoughtful and intelligent pieces that I have ever read on this website. And, I’d like to thank Single Gal for having the guts to raise the topic!
Pete Campbell
Considering the demographics of the Willow Glen area, wouldn’t a plan to have the locals enroll their kids at WG Elementary throw off the whole SJUSD system for integrating that school? Wouldn’t you have to allow for kids from “other areas” to be bussed in to maintain the proper student body mix?
What’s going on in Cupertino? Surely they can’t have schools that are made up of 100% Asian students yet schools are the main reason they are choosing to buy homes in the Cupertino district.
Did I miss something or have the rules around integrated schools changed?
Thanks Pete – but we do get more comments when people are saying how stupid or ignorant I am – where are all those people? Maybe I’ve won them over or this is a topic they are still too scared to touch…
# 14 JMO,
You did yourself proud. yours was an excellent post, replete with very good examples to explain your points of view.
When it all is discussed, I fully believe that a childs education is the responsibity of the parents, not the school. The school is there to assist the parents with the child’s education not the other way, with parents assisting the school. I am sure that there are some parents that tell their children,in September, “You better get good grades this year”. And that is all they do until May, when the grades come, they say to the kids, I thought that I told you to get good grades.
Parents should show a sincere interest in the children’s schoolwork on a daily basis. The children will know that the parents truly care and will strive to please them. This should be started at the kindergarten level and continued though college. Further I believe that the parents should make and keep in personal contact with each teacher and ask questions so that the teachers know your interest and attitude.
Napper, I agree 100%. I didn’t even get nagged about doing my homework when I was a kid. Between the nuns and my parents, I knew I’d have hell to pay if I slacked off.
Too many parents today are leaving the important job of child-rearing to the schools, which is not what schools or teachers are for. So many images on TV show real life situations with out-of-control classrooms. Teachers’ hands are tied. If they wanted to get physical and slap these students into submission they’d get fired, sued, or both. It’s as if students today treat every day like it’s a substitute teacher day. They are fearless and know that between CPS and the skewed legal system, they are in complete control and not the teacher.
Beating some sense and respect into these screw-up kids sure sounds like the right approach to me. It’s time the adults took back control of the schools they work in.
# 19,
You’re right on all counts. My question to you is: Who created the system? How did we let it get to where it is today? Our smart lawyers have created so many laws to the point where everyone is careful not to look at someone cross eyed for fear of being sued.
As for the SJUSD situation, just keep in mind who created all the rules and regulations, and who is creating more rules and regulations to supersede the previous rules and regulations.
After reading some of the posts, I was reminded of the burglar who cut his hand on the broken glass he broke while breaking into a house, sued the homeowner, and won a settlement! Also, let’s not forget the overheated coffee settlement. How about Carlie Fiorina who was fired from Hewlett Packard and forced to take $30 million with her for doing such a lousy job. What created that culture?
Have we finally outsmarted ourselves?
I think the fall of the Roman empire is going to pale in comparison to the crashing and burning of the American one. I’m glad I probably won’t be around when it happens, but if today’s students are making up the pool of future statesmen (like they could even BE statesmenlike anyway) this country is in serious danger of collapse. We already can’t produce a decent engineer. They’re all coming from across the Pacific.
How did this happen? I say it’s a product of the me-first, I-don’t-spank-my-kid-ever-and-the-teacher-better-not-either, litigation-obsessed boomer mentality that has removed character-building from the entire child rearing and educational scenario. Cripes, we have teachers who also subscribe to this same philosophy. Corporal punishment works wonders, all of you kid-whipped yuppie parents! Try it sometime and you’ll never go back to “Oh Brandon, I wish you wouldn’t do that.”
Finfan must be on vacation away from his computer. I’m sure he’d have a spot-on assessment to offer regarding this alarming situation.
MarkT #21: Haven’t you heard, parents now want to FRIENDS with their kids.
Being “parental” is a pejorative among the psycho-babble set.
#21,#22.
I’m more optimistic.
Look at the Summer of Love dregs from the 60’s. There you’ll find the root cause for the cultural decay you see today.
As those types type die off I think the country will regain it’s moral compass and move forward.
Mark T,
I saw this post the other day and intended to comment, but never really got the time.
Like you, and several others who’ve posted on the subject, the schools I attended were run in a traditional manner, one that put discipline and performance above personal circumstance and wishful thinking—an organizational model that I view as masculine-based. This model has proved itself time and again throughout history, which is not surprising since it is based on Man’s true nature, something that this culture has been trying its best to discredit for fifty years.
It was realized long ago that in order to teach the young, the young must be made to submit. This meant, in days gone by, speak when spoken to, obey the rules, work hard, respect the institution. This was, of course, an imperfect solution, but it was realized then that imperfect is the best achievable result when dealing with humans. Some kids worked harder than others, some kids broke rules, and some didn’t give a hoot about learning. Thus was born a grading system, academic honors, a dean of students, suspension, expulsion, and flunkies.
The school system was doomed when it was decided that imperfect wasn’t good enough. Think about it: how can a system that is fed imperfect raw materials produce perfection? It can’t, thus the public school system was laid open like a ghetto appliance store being picked clean by looters. First came the demands of the race-merchants, followed by those of the egalitarians and feminists and culture-destroyers. Very quickly, every failure could be explained with nothing more than a demonstration of imperfection within the school system; and with every failure came a new program, a change in academic standards, a rule relaxed or dropped, and an increased commitment to diversity.
The end result is the mess we now endure, a system that has lost its masculinity—that stiff, intolerant characteristic that allowed schools to safely and efficiently serve those who wanted to learn. In its place we have tender, caring school administrators of both genders who specialize it coddling the lazy and the stupid, and aren’t worthy to clean the chalkboards of the dedicated, no-nonsense men and women who were once the heart and soul of the public school system.
And these new people, this new system, who is it serving? Students are now graduating from high school with middle school skills; disrespect and disruption have become the norm, rather than a reason to summon an administrator; and the drop-out and expelled demographic has not changed at all.
I don’t know if the system can be fixed. As long as private schools provide an outlet for the wealthiest of the fearful and frustrated parents, I suspect the public system will not only continue to decay, but that we, as a society seemingly incapable of waking up to reality, will allow these same unnatural, deleterious ideas to destroy our military and public safety institutions.
FFF –
I agree with much of your post – very well put. I attended SJUSD WG schools during an era when they were considered among the best in the county (that was a long time ago)Today they (along with the rest of the SJUSD schools) are a joke.
We must let the entire public school system rot thru to ruin before it can be resurrected and returned to what made it great in your day and mine.
It can be said with certainty that the greatest mistake our nation ever made was to allow the government to educate our children. The 2nd greatest mistake was collective bargaining rights for “educators”.
Harry Browne makes the case against public schools eloquently by following this link:
http://www.fee.org (Foundation for Economic Education)
(click on “Freedom Library” and go to “Audio Online” and scroll to title of speech on public schools)
I live in Willow Glen and am sending my daughter to private school, St. Leo’s and Notre Dame.
Both schools are very diverse and probably have similar demographics to San Jose Unified public schools. I think the key difference between these two schools and our nearby public schools is parental involvement.
I want my daughter going to a school that is diverse, where the parents are involved and the kids want to learn. And I don’t think Willow Glen High School is that school.
SG- What saddens me most is how much the educational system has changed. I still remember some exceptional teachers I had. In many ways we pattern ourselves after teachers that we loved growing up. I can remember many who profoundly touched me. Back in the “old days,” a teacher would hug you if you got hurt, or cried. Today, teachers are afraid of being accused of inappropriate behavior.
We got to study art, music, poetry, and Drivers Ed was free. Today, kids are deprived of these great studies. At recess we ran, played, you know, exercised! We took field trips to great historic places, and to the woods to study plants, creeks, and trees. We had to write papers on what we wanted to be when we grew up, what we did over summer vacation. We got to bring the person we admired most, to class to give a speech. Today, they don’t do much in the way of developing a child’s spirit, and character. It deeply saddens me.
Every holiday, I’ll run into a teacher at Big Lot who is buying some inexpensive items for their class. They always tell me there’s no room in the budget for it, so they pay for it out of their own pocket. I offer them a few bucks because I admire their kindness, and they always say no thank you. I think that is something that sets certain teachers a part from the ones who are fed up, and give up.
I have friends who are teachers, and I feel for them. They say the politics, the rude way kids behave these days, and the lack of parental involvement is depressing. I believe them too. A few years ago I took a few day courses at San Jose City College. My God, what a joke that was. These young students were talking during the lecture, answering their cell phones, reading trash in class with their feet up on the backs of chairs. It was pretty sickening. Several of my instructors spent more time disciplining them, than teaching! If it’s that bad in college, what is it like in High school, and elementary school?
I wish these parents who are trying to take back their schools luck. I went to Catholic School when I was younger, and they didn’t take any crap off us, and taught us at a level higher than in public school. When I got to public school later on after a move, I was so far ahead; they had to kick me up two grades! I don’t know, a good swipe of a ruler, or a trip to the Reverend Mother, sure worked wonders on us.
Bridget,
Based on your post, it is painfully obvious that basic sentence structure was omitted during your two grade “kick up”.
Mark T: Thanks for the link. The speech was interesting and entertaining, which is not surprising, given that, these days, Libertarian’s are the only people who don’t appear to be serving a prepackaged meal.
Private School Mom: Since you apparently can’t find a public school “that is diverse, where the parents are involved and the kids want to learn,” shouldn’t that cause you to question some of your assumptions?
Do you assume that there are no public schools that have students who want to learn? Probably not. Do you assume that there are no public schools that have students who want to learn, and parents who get involved? I wouldn’t think so, given that there are many such schools in Los Gatos, Saratoga, and Cupertino. Seems to me that, stripped bare, what you are really saying is that there are no acceptable public schools that are also diverse—diversity being a feature that you claim to value.
But if you really value diversity, why would you ever agree to a private school? The only diversity available at a private school is the kind that has been sorted and screened for compatibility and values. But that’s diversity with an asterisk—certainly not the kind of diversity that challenges public schools, destroys neighborhoods, and now overwhelms every government safety net. Yours is the diversity* of the exclusive neighborhood and gated community, where dedicated capitalists of all ethnicities pay top dollar to live in safe and civil surroundings. Yours is the diversity* celebrated by political big mouths who are themselves careful where they live, and even more careful where they send their kids to school.
I grew up in a different kind of diverse neighborhood, one with nary an asterisk to be found. And let me clue you in on something: it wasn’t pretty. I went to school with kids who were borderline morons, didn’t bathe, possessed no manners, and celebrated puberty by joining a race-based gang. Lesson one for me and the rest of the decent kids was to develop good fighting skills or make friends with those who did. The only homework my father ever helped me with required a pair of boxing gloves.
In my kind of diverse neighborhood there was only one kind of tolerance, that born of fear. Make the Cholos fear you and they don’t call you racist names, don’t block your path in the hallways, don’t jump you after school (at least not in packs of less than 4). We didn’t have parental involvement in school, we instead had police involvement—every day.
It used to be that my kind of diversity was available in only the most depressed neighborhoods in town. But today, thanks to the school district’s dedication to social engineering, SJUSD kids in many neighborhoods have the opportunity to experience real diversity.
The only thing they don’t have is an opportunity to attend a school where parents get involved and kids want to learn.
#28-I am amused that someone who has a name like BlandBung would be lecturing me on sentence structure.
Perhaps you might read the post for its content instead of making uncalled for pot shots at the writer, me. If all you can take a way from what I said in my post was the need to criticize, perhaps you need some social skills, a heart, and a brain.
Ah, some insight into FF—a deprived childhood in a poor multiracial neighborhood with gangbangers. Was it Chesterston who said “The child is the father of the man.”?
Bridget: Is BlandBug Dubya, ya think?
28- This is a pretty serious topic that, until your idiotic comment, was going along just fine. I agree with Bridget, English lessons from a guy named BlandBung aren’t necessary.
I went to both public and private school. I would have to say I liked the latter better.
I think JMO put it best. I agree with everything he said.
Bridget raises some important points too. Putting non-English speaking kids above the rest, and therefore slowing down other children isn’t right. Equal opportunity must not apply in our schools today, if English-speaking students are being left behind to fend for themselves. I don’t pay taxes to enrich this kind of educational discrimination.
Hi Single Gal,
What is it with you thinking everyone in WG has a million dollar home. I own a home in Willow Glen proper, as defined by the Willow Glen Neighborhood Association and I have to say, there isn’t a home worth a million dollars on my street
Maybe you should try and base your opinions on more than just one family you know. It’s a diverse community.