As another poster has already said so well,
when we have parents (a small number
admittedly) who won't even provide their
children the basic needs of safety and decent
living conditions, how are we ever going to
hold them accountable for not being
supportive of their child's education?

I believe that much of the problem for
children of the lower socio economic status
families stem from the parent's own negative
experience in school. So many of them had a
tough time, were problem students, got poor
grades, that their attitude towards school is
passed along to their children. Thus the
student comes to school with a built in
attitude and poor learning skills to boot.
They come to us expecting to fail because
their parents, their uncles and aunts, maybe
even their grandparents did. So punishing
them with fines, loss of tax rebate, denial
of driving privledge will probobly have
little effect, as crazy as that may seem.
Their very lives, in some cases, are examples
of cycles of failure. They're used to it.
Something is needed to break that cycle of
failure.
Now for those who know me and know my
feelings, as expressed on the main chatboard,
some of this is going to sound nuts, but I
think instead of punishing them for their
failures, we ought to try and reward them for
their successes, however small they might be.
Rather than tying monetary bonuses for
teachers to the results of test scores, why
don't we allocate tax rebates or credits to
specific improvements in academics and
behaviors. Work it like you would an IEP
(individual education plan); student,
parents, and teachers would map out a
specific plan with specific goals and
depending on how many of those goals are met,
the student's family will be rewarded. Sound
crazy? Perhaps. Expensive? No more than what
we already pay out in welfare benefits and in
maintaining prisons, where too many of the
unfortunate end up because they get little or
no education, have little hope, and wind up
doing something desperate.
What happens if the parents simply refuse to
cooperate, just don't care, won't make the
effort? I know that happens. Brace yourself.
I think parents like that don't deserve to
have children. More than than, I think
children deserve better. Children of parents
who consistently show they don't care about
their welfare (academic or otherwise) should
be made wards of the state. Sounds Orwellian,
you say? Perhaps.

Bill T, spectre@nr.infi.net,
1/05/02

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