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SQLGeek wrote:I am loathe to send my child(ren) to public school but I don't think there will be any alternative for us.

There are more alternatives than ever before, especially in you live near a large population center. Some homeschool groups are organized to teach children when both parents have to work.

JALLEN wrote: A less efficient means of educating our children could scarcely be imagined. We waste more and more on education and have less and less to show for it. All of it is squandered on the altar of teacher union demagoguery, and the pretensions of the educational lobby. These folks constantly whine for choice in other areas of life. Why not have it in educating our children?

Having attended public school myself, both in California and Texas, and having homeschooled my children, I can attest to the inefficiency of public schools. And absolutely these ridiculous unions are a problem. One of my sons is an honor's graduate with a B S in biology. He was employed for awhile as an English tutor for students at the local college. Now he is tutoring public school children in mathematics. He is prohibited from tutoring any other subject because he is not a "certified teacher." So, he can tutor college seniors in English but not 1st graders or high school sophomores. He can teach the SAT --all of it-- but can't "tutor" a high school student in any subject but mathematics. OTOH, my wife quit high school and got a GED. SHE taught our youngest to read, and schooled him herself until his mathematical needs exceeded her ability, when he was around 12 or so. He graduated UT Austin as a double major (B S and BA degrees), got a perfect score on the LSAT, and was admitted to Harvard Law School (though he chose to go to the University of Chicago on full scholarship). Since both of my children have exceeded this public school graduate in academic achievement, without the assistance of a public school or a union "certified" teacher, my experience leads me to see about zero value added in return for the agony and expense of our public school system. In fact, given the public school indoctrination in collectivism I'd say the public schools are worse than nothing.

I just don't get it. We're way past the time when there is any mystery left about the public school agenda. Geez, it was obvious 25 years ago, and now there isn't a day that passes without more revealing idiocy. If you send your children to a public school this is exactly the kind of thing you have decided to expose them to. Sending your kids to public school and then complaining about what happens there is like joining the Navy and complaining about going to sea. The schools are a lost cause; they're critically infected with the collectivist liberal virus and there is no treatment or recovery possible. The only way to stop it is not to play their game. Only when enough people stop sending their kids to public schools will any of this nonsense change.

MotherBear wrote:

Dave2 wrote:

MotherBear wrote:Guess I'll just chalk it up as yet another reason we're homeschooling.

"To avoid having teachers sexually assault children as part of the class" shouldn't have to be on the list of reasons to homeschool.

You'd think, wouldn't you?

I spent all of three years in the public school system and even in that short time managed to get stuck with a high school teacher who graded according to the skimpiness of his female students' clothing. It's really something when the cheerleaders who can't find Africa (or anything else) on a map are making better grades in geography than the honors students who know the capitol of Lithuania. He never actually did anything to me (aside from give me the creeps and bad grades), but his behavior was well known among other students and apparently counselors at some of the middle schools warned their students not to get into his classes. My parents and I met with administrators and complained multiple times throughout the year. They'd look at my grades and my work, adjust my grades to better suit my work, and pretend the issue was resolved. I also had an English teacher who made fun of me in front of the rest of the class because my parents had me opt out of reading a book that included some graphic material they didn't feel was appropriate. When it came time to discuss the book in class, she'd tell me to go to the library so that they wouldn't "sully my virgin ears." And this was at a "good" district here in central Texas. Yeah, I'll take care of my kids' education myself, thanks.

Obviously you weren't a good student because you failed to learn the two primary lessons of our public school system: conformity and obedience.