The Blame Game "Pardon me, Maam, while we give your child an A when the real grade should be an F." As an integral part of the educational bureaucracy, which has slowly deteriorated over the years, hundreds of educators, grew weary of the constant static, headaches, and infinite negative parental and administrative hassles that perpetually accompany low grades. Close parental involvement in the child’s educational process from kindergarten through high school is obsolete. Justifiable? Maybe. In most households, because of the economy and an innate desire for a certain standard of living, both parents are employed full time, return home from work exhausted, and have little time or desire to be a part of the student’s school life. Our schools have simply become nurseries, baby-sitting institutions -- more so with the late-addition of after-school Child Care programs. If the child is doing poorly, it must be the teacher, the school or both. The Blame Game remains in effect until the student’s grade is raised. The student inherently knows it via hearing the parents’ comments at the supper table or from “secretive” eaves-dropping parent-teacher phone conversations. How many times the student was corrected about daydreaming, fooling, wasting time, failing to take advantage of extra-credit opportunities, and failing to turn in homework or assignments are irrelevant points both to parents and administrators. Teachers’ accountability remains in the domain of how many times Johnny was allowed to re-take tests, have his seat changed, given extra days for homework, get involved in “cooperative learning” (a Money and logistics are the bottom line: Retain too many students and the already-overburdened system becomes a quagmire, comparable to our legal and prison system. Room must be made for incoming students into each grade. Contrary to higher educational institutions, Johnny is not allowed to drop out until he reaches age 16. Till then, the teachers must endure his presence in the classroom and must find ways to “get him promoted,” regardless of his lack of achievement or performance.
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Why is Johnny a failure? The constant social promotion, euphemized as “administrative placement,” that he has experienced since grade school has instilled into him a void of disgust for failure and the much-needed value of the inner contentment of success. Johnny has learned the system at an early age. In middle school, he still does not know his Times Table and is still reading on the second-grade level. Unknown to parents, Johnny cannot be retained simply because he does not know his Times Table or cannot read or spell on his level. The Times Table do not constitute the entire Math curriculum any more than reading or spelling constitute the entirety of a Language Arts’ curriculum. Envision a teacher informing the parent, “Johnny can’t be promoted because he cannot spell.” The instant, legitimate query from the parent: “What about all the other facets of the Language Arts’ curriculum? Grammar, Literature, Library Research, Dictionary Reference, etc.?”
Education will never work when students don’t. According to the National Collegiate and Testing Institute, because of low-entrance exam grades, over 85% of students entering junior colleges must take one of more remedial courses. To pour vinegar into the open wound of Social Promotion, society’s business world also caters to Johnny’s deplorable status. Kudos to Mc Donald’s, Burger King, Subway, etc. for hiring teenagers; however, the students are given minimum wage, part-time hours only – to avoid having to award the student with corporate benefits -- hours that too often interfere with the students’ school life, inciting the students to make money, not education, their ultimate goal – are trained to perform only menial tasks with no higher thinking skills required, and are instilled with the value, “You need us; we don’t need you.” Additionally, if the computerized cash register fails to function, so too do the youngsters. Johnny and his fellow cohorts are not expected to utilize any mastering of memory skills of a price list. Computer buttons are pre-labeled. The teenage students are expected to effect nothing but robot skills via pressing the correct button. They are purposely not trained -- nor expected -- to utilize any mathematical computations that are necessary to serve the customers. The computer, which instantly adds, computes sales’ taxes and any change due is the corporate deity. If the deity fails, the one -- and only -- solution surfaces: Instantly post a sign on the door, “Store temporarily closed.” Is our public educational system gone awry? Maybe. Regardless, the Blame Game thrives: It must be the teachers or the school. Simple solution: Implement the Voucher system. Whip Johnny into a private school, funded by tax-payers’ federal and state monies. When Johnny persists gleefully jaunting on his failure road, who will now receive the brunt of the blame?
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