High School – Then and Now

Posted: November 4, 2011 in Contributors, Culture
Tags: , ,

I don’t have children, but if I did, I’d probably have to send them to private school or home school them.  The more I read about the public school system, the more hard nosed I get about education in this country.

When I went to Eli Whitney Vocational High School in Brooklyn back in ’64-’68, we didn’t have a disciplinary problem or a truancy problem.  While I’d say the majority of students were black and Puerto Rican, the school wasn’t in the business of propagandizing a politically correct agenda of multiculturalism.  The school was in the business of teaching us skills to get a job when we graduated.  The skills I learned in high school have lasted me a lifetime.  I had no problem getting a job after high school and continued to work while attending college and law school.  The skills I learned in high school, have served me very well in my legal career.

From what I’ve read, things are a helluva lot different today.  A few stories caught my eye recently.

At Achieve Early College High School in McAllen, Texas, students were required to wear red, white and ….. not blue but green – the colors of the Mexican flag as part of their class assignment of memorizing the Mexican Pledge of Allegiance and national anthem.

According to the school’s principal, Yvette Cavazo, “students must acquire ‘knowledge’ of foreign cultures and use language to enhance their ‘understanding.’”

Understanding?  I don’t understand Principal Cavazo’s point at all.  I could understand an assignment which required the student to translate the United States Pledge of Allegiance or our national anthem into another language, but why would I want my son or daughter to learn the Pledge of Allegiance of another country?  If you want to sing some other country’s national anthem, wait for the Olympics.  Ms. Cavazo, how does this help students when they apply for jobs or college in this country?

Is learning a foreign culture now part of a geography lesson?  Is geography even taught in schools anymore?  Last year, when the National Geographic Society surveyed 18- to 24-year-old Americans to find out what they knew about the world, only 37 percent could find Iraq on a map, despite the fact that U.S. troops have been in that country since 2003. Fifty percent couldn’t even locate New York on a map!

And then there’s Evergreen High School in Chicago, where students will only be allowed to have three potty breaks – during the entire semester!  According to Principal Bill Sanderson, the new rule is designed to ensure students don’t miss out on class time.  Each teacher can decide whether or not to enforce it.

Principal Sanderson instituted this rule in order to stop kids from ditching class.  But it doesn’t take into account kids with urinary problems, menstrual accidents or other digestive problems.  I can only imagine the mess that might flow from this ridiculous policy.  Perhaps when the school will be overflowing with parents bringing their children additional clothes, the Principal will realize what a disaster his policy really is.

As I mentioned before, we didn’t have this problem when I was in high school.  Corporal punishment wasn’t used in my high school in the mid-60s, but we were basically disciplined.  We were there to learn.

If students are actually using “bathroom breaks” to hang out with their friends, then it’s more than a simple discipline problem.  Anyone who tries to change the problems in the public school system will just be opening a whole can of worms.  Teacher control, parental supervision and a student’s desire to learn are all problems with no easy fix.  You’ve got more of a problem than simply asking students to “hold it.”

I don’t get it, but if you do, God bless you.

Author Bio:

For over twenty years, Leona has tried to heed her husband’s advice, “you don’t have to say everything you think.” She’s failed miserably. Licensed to practice law in California and Washington, she works exclusively in the area of child abuse and neglect. She considers herself a news junkie and writes about people and events on her website, “I Don’t Get It,” which she describes as the “musings of an almost 60-year old conservative woman on political, social and cultural life in America.” It’s not her intention to offend anyone who “gets it.” She just doesn’t. Originally from Brooklyn, and later Los Angeles, she now lives with her husband, Michael, on a beautiful island in the Pacific Northwest, which she describes as a bastion of liberalism.
Author website: http://www.idontgetit.us
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  • longtime blog reader

    There are 12 million illegal immigrants in the USA.

    http://www.reuters.com/article/idUSN0731888120080208

    People are complaining about how they take jobs, don’t pay taxes, break the law, and burden social services, but almost no one is doing anything about the problem. Some of the solutions that have been proposed so far are unconstitutional and illegal. Arizona, for example, has a law that allows the police to racial profile and stop people simply because they look like immigrants. This law is discriminatory and violates the Fourth Amendment prohibition against illegal search and seizure without probable cause. What does an illegal immigrant look like anyway? Another suggested solution to stop illegal immigration is to deny the children of illegal immigrants citizenship, but clearly violates the 14th Amendment that states that all persons born or naturalized in the United States are citizens. What would make someone more American than being born here? Other solutions against illegal immigration that have been enacted by towns forbid illegals from renting homes, but violate the Fair Housing Act prohibition against discrimination.

    Since many of the suggestions to deal with illegal aliens so far are illegal, I propose
    the following better solutions:

    1. Add immigration agents to patrol the border.

    2. Require all employers to use E-verify to verify that all employees are legal.

    3. Increase fines on employers who hire illegal immigrants.

    4. Do not allow illegal immigrants to have drivers’ licenses. Do not allow them to pay in-state tuition or receive government benefits. Do not make the lives of illegals easier or reward them for breaking the law.

    5. Call the police if you find someone playing loud music, stealing, vandalizing property, drinking or urinating in public, doing drugs, littering, loitering, or illegally keeping chickens in the city. Regardless of whether the lawbreaker is or isn’t an illegal immigrant, the broken windows theory of crime says that small crimes lead to bigger crimes and less respect for the law. Why have a law if it is not enforced? Someone who violates the law by living in a country illegally is probably not going to care about obeying other laws. Any illegal immigrant who is arrested should be deported. If illegal immigrants are hassled enough maybe they will leave on their own or at least try to fit in a little more. I grew up in a small American town and I have seen the bad effects of illegal immigration myself.

    http://www.greeleygazette.com/press/?p=5279

    6. Build more illegal immigration detention centers and deport the illegal immigrants that are here. Maybe deporting millions of illegal immigrants is not practical, but we can deport more. If the USA can put on a man on the moon, why can’t we defend our borders?

    Of course reducing illegal immigration costs money so I suggest raising visa fees for foreigners, increasing sin taxes on alcohol and tobacco, reducing the wages of government workers, cutting welfare spending, ending government farm and airline subsidies, decreasing the defense budget, and eliminating less important programs like Amtrak, PBS, and the National Endowment for the Arts. We should stop extending unemployment benefits, deport the illegal immigrants, reduce legal worker visa quotas, and require unemployed Americans to take jobs in farming, meatpacking plants, construction, landscaping, and hotels. If 13 million Americans are out of work, 12 million illegal immigrants shouldn’t be taking up the jobs.

    The United States is a nation of immigrants, but these are modern times with rules and regulations. Immigrants need to respect these rules. The USA does not have room for all the people in the world. Do you want America to have a population of 1 billion like China?

    We don’t need new laws, we just need to enforce the existing laws.

    Write your representatives, contact the media, and talk with your friends and family about this crisis. Tell them that we have had enough of illegal immigrants. Nothing will change if nothing is done and the government won’t care if you don’t care.

    http://www.usa.gov/Contact/Elected.shtml

  • Ellen L.

    Before I went to high school (’61-66) my public school classes were quite large. No one complained then. We all (for the most part) sat at individual desks, learned our lessons, etc. No one took Ritalin. No one rode a school bus. We all walked. I knew maybe one kid who was probably ADD but we all got thru school. Even if there were probably were some with some form of ADD, who knew? We still did our work and got thru school. Everyone that I know learned to read using Dick and Jane. Didn’t matter if some learned differently than others. We still learned to read (and no computers, either!) I thought we learned the basics. My 5 children went to a very highly rated public school. It was not easy for them. Two ended up with GED’s I think because the system did not suit them and vice verse. 4 graduated from college. One is still trying to “find himself”. The work ethic is not what it used to be. I found with my children that the school has no clout. The school is afraid of parents, lawyers, etc. I was afraid to ever not go to school or not do my work. My kids were allowed to leave the “campus” during their time in high school. I’m sure the vendors liked that, but I still don’t understand that kind of freedom.

  • Wallace Flint

    Hi bernie,
    When I went to high school in Dumont, N.J. from 1942-46, much of those times, of course, was during World War ll. there were different fellings toward our country then. I was a poor student, always “cutting up”. but the teachers knew how to handle that.
    Looking back, the educational system was darned good.I realized in later years how much I cheated myself with my “wise-guy” attitude toward school and life in general. Those teachers in those days were good hard working people, having to put up with somebody else’s bats.They never really complained. with the war going on tho, our feelings toward our country were definately for our country.
    My feelings that our country was a noble nation then and Still is- seemed to help us get through life. In those days, there was no “political correctness” to lie to the kids, like today. May we all keep in mind that “political correctness” is the begining of the end to free speech in this, our country.

    In God We Trust,
    Wally Flint- Boonville, NY

  • Wally M

    I agree with L. Salazar. I’m a little older and graduated from high school in 1957. I am one of five children. We were poor by any standard in that we lived on a small 20 acre farm. We all graduated from college. We didn’t get government loans to finance our education but worked various low paying jobs to pay for school with only minimal assistance from our parents. I’m convinced that this can be done today if the student sets his/her mind to the task. I believe that the government has created a mind set that we are all entitled to a college degree and that it should be financed by the tax payer. Its interesting to note that if every family had two children who went to college, the entire bill would be paid by each tax payer and thus why not pay it as an individual and save the cost of the government taking their cut of the tax? Why do we punish the parents who are childless with the cost of educating other parents children? Stated differently, we are now financing the government rather than getting our money’s worth from taxes that subsidize education. Schools should not be subsidized except for some limited grants for research. This could mean that we could get rid of most of the education agency and save the tax payer billions. I’m convinced that too many of the politicians are taking the country down the road to socialism where everything is controlled by the government.

  • therealguyfaux

    And yet, we hear how it is necessary for all children to attend school so that they can learn how to relate to people of all races, religions, cultures, sexual identities etc etc, as if that were all school was ever supposed to accomplish. I did not grow up in Australia, hence I have been deprived of the company of Aboriginal People while attending school; dearie me, how can I ever hope to understand and relate to these people– I never went to school with them! Trust me, I don’t want to go back to the pre-Brown v School Board days; but what’s more important, having a child who is multi-acculturated, or one that can actually read, write, do sums and, we hope, reason critically and not take everything at face value simply in virtue of its being ‘progressive”? Sadly, most of our children who excel in the public school system are self-starters who would acquire an education in those subjects important to their success one way or another; they succeed DESPITE their “education,” or what’s palmed off as being one.

  • Roger Ward

    Several years ago, my sister was forced to take her 14 year old granddaughter and move to Wyoming from Southern California by the schooling standards, curriculum and demographics they faced if they remained in L.A. She said they were moving “back to the United States.” It was a good choice as she is doing extremely well. Her schooling is heavily based on what all schooling should be — basic, apolitical material that will serve her well in college and in life. She got “lucky” …. but what about the millions of other American students who can’t move across the country to a lightly populated, homogenous state where the educational emphasis is on the basics. Don’t they also deserve an education that is free of forced cultural “diversity” …. and one where they can go to the bathroom when they need to?

  • Nancye

    Thank goodness, my two children and five grandchildren are all grown. If there were any of these cockamamie things being taught/done/said in school then, I never heard about them.

  • Bruce A.

    This makes me happy my kid takes class online.

  • CCNV

    The latest crap to happen to high school students is at the link below. I’d say it’s sour grapes on the part of the opposing team’s parents – and I sincerely hope the principal has his resume updated. (If ‘doing the bernie’ is the worst thing these kids do, then I’d be proud to call any one of them my own!)

    http://www.thepostgame.com/blog/dish/201111/high-school-soccer-teams-shocking-punishment-after-mimicking-nfl-stars-dance

  • Ron F

    We always here about studies asking students to identify countries, etc., to show how poor the education system is today. I do not remember hearing about similar tests in the 60s and 70s so I do not know how students in those years would have compared. Maybe there were similar tests and students did well so it was not newsworthy or maybe there weren’t similar studies. I hope all of the above examples are the exception to the rule or they would not have been newsworthy.