"The route to greater academic excellence is nearly a no-brainer. There are three vital inputs to education: parents, teachers and students. You tell me: How much money does it take for teachers to assign homework, and for parents and teachers to see that it gets done? How much money does it take to see to it that kids get a good night's sleep, come to school on time, don't fight in school, and respect authority? If these no-brainer things aren't accomplished, there's no amount of money that's going to make much difference. "
It takes a lot of money to do these things if the child cannot have these at home. You might need to pay teachers enough to have afternoon studyhalls. I donate my time to have a study hall at lunch for struggling readers- but most teachers cannot find that kind of time in their day, because they work full time. So money might just be necessary, since most people want to be paid for what they do. It takes a lot of money to see that some kids get the sleep they need. Some parents force their kids to work, to pay rent to them. Even in my suburban high school we see this. I had a very bright student who constantly feel asleep in my class last year, and that's because he was working. He doesn't feel he can go to college because he'll never be able to get the money together for college AND for rent to his parents. What can you do with parents like that? And those problems mushroom in the inner city environment- where some kids are protecting their siblings, or even providing the majority of care. Those "no brainer" ideas of his are great- too bad he thinks these things can actually come from all the parents. It's not fair to doom the children of dysfunctional parents to failure- they should be given their shot at a future, even if we need to spend a lot of money to break the cycle of their family life. The cost of not doing it is even greater. There are creative ways we can work around the parents- but it will take money for infrastructure, social services, mentors, mentor teachers (who could help take the place of the missing or dysfunctional parents), and most of all it would take a will to spend more, for those who have the least. |
