Tuesday, December 8, 2009
Government Schools
Just gotta vent....I am sick and tired of government schools that hide behind the phrase, "it's policy", in order to avoid making decisions. I have run into this phrase on three separate occations in the last 2 weeks for ludicrous behavior on the part of teachers and administrators. Individualism is dead in the government schools and it is all about PC and grouping of students. Just bunch them up and push them through...forget about the individual.
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5 comments:
What do you mean by government run schools? Do you mean school districts run by the city?
I mean any school that recieves public funds (taxes) to pay its administration, teachers, and programs.
Well, any large entity, government or otherwise is going to have policies. Policies often arise to control the behavior of a few, but are applied to all uniformly. So if there's a policy you don't like, it's probably because there has been a small number of people who have caused a problem. Administrators do hide behind policy, and sometimes the policies are overbearing. An example of an overbearing problem is the 'zero tolerance' on weapons and drugs in school, which has resulted in children being suspended for having fingernail clippers and Advil in their possession.
Alan's comments are wise. At our school, we have policies of course, but we try to word them as loosely as possible to allow for as much flexibility as possible.
Although being flexible is the best approach for us, it has certainly caused a lot of difficult moments. We end up having to explain minutely why we make the exceptions that we do. These exceptions cause resentment. That causes some to claim that we treat various students differently (which is true, because of their circumstances) and thus are unfairly lenient or strict regarding equal application of rules and policies.
We are a small private school, we can show flexibility, but I can't imagine how our policies could work in a big public school. I think Brian's frustration must be the result of decades of public school teachers and administrators having to hunker down such to survive the demands coming from all directions.
Examples from Alan's comments: my first thought as a teacher is to assume that there have been instances when students have used fingernail clippers as weapons or carving devices to scratch on bathroom stall walls, to assume that there have been instances that students have brought to school full bottles of Advil and distributed them to anyone asking without the parental permission of those asking. I would assume that schools have already dealt with abuses and thus have had to lay down some silly law. As Alan says, there have been a minority of students/parents who have pushed the limits of common sense and now everyone pays. If the schools don't act in full knowledge of a problem, they can be sued.
I am curious though about the words 'ludicrous behavior'.
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