Public High School Reform : Public School

Education is an integral part of society, School helps children learn social norms as well as teach them to be successful adults. The school systems in United States, however are failing their students. In the world as a whole, the United States is quickly falling behind other countries in important math and reading scores. The United States ranked thirtieth in math on a global scale and twentieth in literacy. This is even more true in more urban, lower socio-economic areas in the United States. In West Trenton Central High School was only 83% proficiency in literacy and only 49% of the students were proficient in math. These school have lower test scores and high dropout rates. Many of these students come from minority backgrounds and are often form low income families. There are many issues surrounding these urban schools. There is a severe lack of proper funding in these districts, and much of the money they do receive is sanctioned for non-crucial things. Schools also need a certain level of individualization with their students, and in many urban classes, this simply does not happen. While there are many factors affecting the low performance of urban schools, the lack of proper funding and distribution of funds, the cultural divide between teachers and students in urban districts, along with the lack of individualization in urban classrooms are crucial factors to explain the poor performance in these districts. Through a process of teacher lead budget committees and

Surprisingly, there are children who do not go to school or do any work at home. With no school and having no curriculum, children may spend all of their time focusing on their passions or interests. However, many of these children are more driven to learn on their own. Denise Witmer, author of the article “Top Reasons to Homeschool Your Teen” stated, “Public high school curricula often fail to engage intelligent teens who are interested in a specific area of study.” At home, these teens and children alike will have the time and opportunities to dive into these areas of study. By not having a set schedule on most days, children may find themselves bored. When bored, they made then begin to wonder and let their curiosity take over. Once they

New York City consists of five boroughs, Manhattan, the Bronx, Queens, Brooklyn, and Staten Island. The borough that I reside in is Brooklyn. Brooklyn has approximately 2.592 million people inhabiting this district and approximately 23.4 percent of individuals who reside in Brooklyn, NY come from a low-income household or in other words come from poverty. With catholic and private schools being expensive, people have to rely on the education system to provide their children with a good education. In this paper I will be discussing the public school education system ranging solely up to high school in Brooklyn New York and giving a general idea of the New York education system as well.

Diane Ravitch, an “educational historian”, answers four questions in her book, Reign of Error. Is American education in crisis? Is American education failing or declining? What is the evidence for reform being promoted by the government and adopted by many states? What should we do to improve our schools and the lives of our children? According to Ravitch, the “crisis” concerning American education is actually a myth. In this book, she addresses myth after myth providing adequate clarity and information. She looks deep into the facts and brings to light what is actually happening in education in America in the following areas: test scores, achievement gaps, graduation rates, teachers and test scores, merit pay, charter schools, virtual school, government involvement of failing schools. In the latter chapters she offers specific solutions with detailed plans and recommendations to preserve and improve American education. Ravitch’s thesis is that American public education must be protected against government privatization and that we must work together to improve our schools. I couldn’t agree more with Ravitch. Government involvement in education has negatively impacted education since the passing of NCLB. Our focus has changed from being innovative teachers to cookie cutter teachers. Government officials should not make decisions without advice from educational professionals. We must all work together to make education work.

America’s education system is a disaster and the government has over the years spent millions on fixing the education system. The government has failed in fixing the education system because they are not the real people who can fix it. The government has made many different programs to fix the education system, like the No Child left behind program. Most people blame the government for spending millions to fix the education system and failing. What our society does not understand is that the government can only fix so much. It is time for all students, parents, and teachers to take responsibly and fix the education system in the way they want. Students, parents and teachers can make the education system better by students taking control of their own education, parents who care for their kid’s education and teachers who make amazing learning environment for their students.

In chapter 5, Reforming America’s Schools, I learned many things that affect me as an educator. An important fact that interests me was that there are four goals that schools should follow. The first one is academic, including a broad array of knowledge and intellectual skills. The second one is vocational, aimed at readiness for the world of work and economic responsibilities. The third one is social and civic, including skills and behavior for participating in a complex democratic society. The fourth one is personal, including the development of individual talent and self-expression. This will affect me as an educator so that I can follow and do my best to complete these goals. Now I am aware of what should be done in a classroom.

The United States is often referred to as the best country in the world in many areas. It may be, but far from it in education. Out of a total of thirty-four countries of the Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development, it ranks just fourteenth in reading, seventeenth in science and twenty-fifth in math (Walker). Despite America's status as a country, America's education is failing because of the large emphasis on standardized education, and the flaws of the students, parents, and teachers. How to fix the education system remains to be a problem.

The idea that American schools are failing is not a new one, but it is an idea that is extremely widespread. There are constant news reports claiming that our schools are worse than ever and Congress has passed extensive legislation such as No Child Left behind in an attempt to fix the American educational system. Some people believe that American schools are not completely failing, but only failing for minority students. Reforms like mandatory busing, vouchers, charter schools, accountability, and high-stakes testing have been proposed to address these social inequalities. Despite the intentions of these policies, they have not always helped close the social inequality gap.

Many schools in the Unites States are far behind compared to other countries. School systems are corrupt in many ways causing the children who want to achieve in their academic goals fall behind. Parents are starting to fear about what school will live up to their standards of education. Unfortunately, students do not have a choice to be always put into private schools because of financial problems. Therefor, these students are then placed in their local public school that could or could not be succeeding academic standards.

What is it that’s making our country suffer from excelling in education? Very few would argue about the importance of our education system today. Issues such as lazy teachers, lack of parent involvement, and teaching useless information in class may hinder progress in today’s education system. An education plays a crucial role and is an essential tool, unfortunately, with all the jaded judgments; our students are not able to value their education. A proper education can open the doors to many opportunities that would have never been possible if it had not been for the knowledge and preparation that one received while in school. With the growing economy and desperate times, it is more important than ever for our country’s children to receive the proper education and training that is needed to allow them to acquire a good job and produce the revenue needed to live. Today's education system is flawed in many ways, and these flaws should be eliminated to ensure a good education for our future generation.

I don’t think anyone has a complete picture of the problem facing America’s education system. There is not just one “fix all” solution and there never will be. People forget what the word “system’ means. A system consists of individual parts that, when combined, function as a working machine. Our machines and systems are always improving as we improve. Every machine and system has a predecessor and just as equally will likely have a successor. When dealing with anything that evolves, one has to consider the path that evolution tends to follow. That process usually includes replacing or upgrading one part at a time. Sometimes you can replace a particular of the system and achieve obvious results, but it is a naive notion to assume that is always

The American education model is over whelming American children with homework, long class periods, no play, and inappropriate curriculum. The American education model requires students to do almost three times as much homework than any other country in

This paper is the first in a series that describes ongoing findings from our work in helping low-performing high schools become more student-centered, personalized, and intellectually rigorous through the implementation of the Breaking Ranks Model of High School Reform. The model offers a capacity-building approach to school improvement based on the recommendations of Breaking Ranks: Changing an American Institution, which was produced by the National Association of Secondary School Principals (NASSP) in partnership with the Carnegie Foundation for the Advancement of Teaching. Data-Driven High School Reform presents a synthesis of the research literature on data driven school improvement, along with illustrative summaries of how the schools with which we are working are using data to support systemic high school reform. This paper highlights the capacities that are essential to data-driven school reform, how we have assisted schools to build these capacities, what we have learned about overcoming barriers to data use, and examples of strategies that promote the use of data for improvement.

Public education in the United States is perhaps one of the most critical issues we face as a nation. Once pronouncing the United States as a “nation at risk”, the educational institution began to implement one reform strategy after another. In efforts to improve schooling for K-12 students, education reform has fiddled with class size, revised graduation requirements, and created standardized testing just to name a few. Unfortunately, traditional public schools are still failing to provide students with a quality education. This is disheartening as we learn that the United States lags behind in math and science compared to our international counterparts. It is safe to say that educational reform has spent billions of dollars over the

Imagine a student falling asleep in class or even not completing their class work in time because they were too tired that day. The teacher comes up to them and questions why they are sleeping during the class. Tons of students in public schools would use the same old excuse saying that they did not get enough sleep the night before. Sadly, this excuse is true for most people who use it. How come it is true most of the time? That is because these students stayed up late at night completing assignments that took time for them to do, and then having to deal with the terrible pain of waking up at five or six in the morning to make it on time for school. Surely enough, this type of situation occurs more than once for students, creating terrible effects for them to have to deal with. This is not just happening to students at a couple schools, but for students in schools throughout the nation (Dean). This is because most high schools prefer the starting time to be earlier in the morning not realizing the consequences it causes. Evidence shows students are severely sleep deprived to this. The “ZZZ’s to A’s” Act, proposed by the National Sleep Foundation, is an act that would require schools to begin at later times than their current times (National Sleep Foundation). Being that students are not the only ones being affected by this problem, this act would be a God send to students and teachers alike since they both must suffer the various consequences of sleep deprivation. By having