Quitting Public School
From a TownHall OpEd by Michael McBride...
I am through. After this semester, I am pulling my daughter from public school. I won’t be enrolling her in private school either. It is pretty obvious to me that between the diminishing capabilities of teachers to grab students’ attention, and increasing social pressures for adolescents…that the high school environment is not the place to be “learning”…school related subjects at least....
Last semester there was the reading of “To Kill a Mockingbird.” My daughter, a tenth grader, is an adept reader who has handled more advanced English courses, so taking a Senior’s English course was not discouraged. The pace for reading “To Kill a Mockingbird.” was established at an arduous, one chapter per week. My daughter finished the book in ten days, and she was idled in the class for the next six weeks, and by the time the test on the book was given, she had read the book a total of five times. It was a monumental waste of educational opportunity, and astonishingly inefficient.
Five weeks into this semester we have had three lost homework assignments by the Math teacher, who, of course denied losing them. My daughter, at our insistence, copies every homework assignment and produced copies the next day. Finally, one of his Teacher’s Assistants admitted that he may have “thrown it away.”...
So my daughter, exhausted by the ridiculous social pressures that are unduly prevalent in high school, and the inept and snail-like delivery of course material, is begging for us to home school her.
And so we shall. We’re quitting school.
