Only 200 of an expected 620 students show for 1st day of school
Indianapolis Star article on school attendance.
Marshall Middle School has gone to a year round schedule and added an extra 25 days of teaching time in an attempt to improve test scores, which have been below federal standards. Monday was to be the first day of school for these students. Only about 200 of an expected 620 Marshall students showed up on Monday, with attendance jumping to 275 students on Tuesday.
YIKES!
What do you think of this article? I'm totally shocked that parents could actually claim they don't know when their child was due to start school? How can you be so uninvolved in your child's life to not know or care?
Parental involvement is VERY MUCH key to helping children succeed in school. What more can schools and PTA's be doing to improve parental involvement in the school systems?
Many of these parents are working two or three jobs and are still worried about putting food on the table or a roof over their heads, so somehow homework and reading books kind of gets lost. That's unfortunate, because they are just contributing to the cycle and dooming their kids to the same minimum wage, dead-end life. What can be done to convey the importance of a good education and good attendance to parents who either don't have time to be involved or just plain don't care? The teachers can't teach the kids if they are sitting at home on the couch in front of the TV instead of seated at a desk in the classroom. And if the parents don't show that they value education, the kids aren't going to care.
Maybe this is where the community comes in to help support the family? Neighborhood study groups with a parent who *IS* able to be at home? Grandparents, aunts, uncles, etc. acting in proxy for the parents? After school tutoring opportunities? (Maybe high school honor society kids could earn community service time by tutoring MS and grade school kids?) Employers allowing paid time off for a parent/teacher conference twice a year?
Any other thoughts out there on this subject?
Marshall Middle School has gone to a year round schedule and added an extra 25 days of teaching time in an attempt to improve test scores, which have been below federal standards. Monday was to be the first day of school for these students. Only about 200 of an expected 620 Marshall students showed up on Monday, with attendance jumping to 275 students on Tuesday.
YIKES!
What do you think of this article? I'm totally shocked that parents could actually claim they don't know when their child was due to start school? How can you be so uninvolved in your child's life to not know or care?
Parental involvement is VERY MUCH key to helping children succeed in school. What more can schools and PTA's be doing to improve parental involvement in the school systems?
Many of these parents are working two or three jobs and are still worried about putting food on the table or a roof over their heads, so somehow homework and reading books kind of gets lost. That's unfortunate, because they are just contributing to the cycle and dooming their kids to the same minimum wage, dead-end life. What can be done to convey the importance of a good education and good attendance to parents who either don't have time to be involved or just plain don't care? The teachers can't teach the kids if they are sitting at home on the couch in front of the TV instead of seated at a desk in the classroom. And if the parents don't show that they value education, the kids aren't going to care.
Maybe this is where the community comes in to help support the family? Neighborhood study groups with a parent who *IS* able to be at home? Grandparents, aunts, uncles, etc. acting in proxy for the parents? After school tutoring opportunities? (Maybe high school honor society kids could earn community service time by tutoring MS and grade school kids?) Employers allowing paid time off for a parent/teacher conference twice a year?
Any other thoughts out there on this subject?
posted by Carissa @ 11:46 AM
1 Comments:
At 9:52 PM, July 25, 2007 ,
anna said...
Wow, this is a powerful thing to read. I posted the article to my blog too. I hardly even know what to say.
Except for maybe- YIKES!
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