Arguement for Homeschooling?

[Kali]

http://counterpunch.org/salasin08252005.html


> August 24, 2005
> Tommy Franks Invades Logan Street Elementary School
> The Militarization of Our Children
> By ELISA SALASIN
>
> As Labor Day draws near and children head back to school, much
> important attention is being focused on recruitment tactics (sanctioned
> by No Child Left Behind) in our country's public secondary schools and
> colleges. However, this hounding and seduction is not just happening in
> our high schools. Rather, it reaches down to children as young as 8
> years old. Here, though, it is packaged as leadership, character, and
> discipline development, or as top-secret motivational presentations by
> so-called medal of freedom recipients
>
> On April 19, 2005 Tommy Franks visited Logan Street Elementary school
> in Los Angeles to do what was billed as a "motivational presentation"
> for the school's students. The "non-profit, pro-military" organization
> that sponsored Franks' secret (without family consent or knowledge)
> presentation to the school's fifth graders was actually U.S. Trust, a
> private investment firm with $102 billion dollars in assets. Logan
> Street school is 89% Latino, and 93% of the students receive free or
> reduced lunch. This is exactly the population that is heavily targeted
> by NCLB-related recruitment efforts. I suppose that US Trust and Franks
> were there to encourage the students to be all they can be?
>
> We don't know what actually went on during Franks'
> performance/presentation for the fifth grade students, because
> apparently the video of the event has been destroyed by the school
> district. However, one parent speculated: "Rumor is that he took
> pictures with our community youth to be used in a future run for office
> bid on the republican ticket."


More at the link. (I got this in an email)

http://counterpunch.org/salasin08252005.html

[proud2BlibKansan]

1. Gee let's start a rumor with no information

We don't know what actually went on during Franks' performance/presentation for the fifth grade students

psst: This is why the right makes fun of us and calls us tin foil hatters. :eyes:

[Kali]

2. Um, it was an opinion piece, but I think the POINT was

recruitment targeting - not what Franks did or didn't do...did you go to this link?

http://www.inthesetimes.com/site/main/article/2136/

The Children’s Crusade
Military programs move into middle schools to fish for future soldiers
By Jennifer Wedekind

<snip>
Chicago public schools are home to the largest Junior Reserve Officers’ Training Corps (JROTC) program, which oversees the MSCC, in the country. When moving up to high school, Chicago’s graduating eighth-graders can choose from 45 JROTC programs, including three full-time Army military academies, five “school-within-a-school” Army JROTC academies and one JROTC Naval academy.

Proponents of the programs tout leadership training and character development. But critics quote former Defense Secretary Gen. William Cohen, who described JROTC as “one of the best recruiting services that we could have.” Rick Mills, the director of Military Schools and JROTC for the Chicago Public School system, dismisses these concerns. “These kinds of programs would not be in schools if there weren’t kids who wanted it, parents who supported it and administrators who facilitated it,” he says.

<and>
In 2002 the Bush administration passed the No Child Left Behind Act with a small, unpublicized provision: Section 9528, “Armed Forces Recruiter Access to Students and Student Recruiting Information,” requires high schools to give all student contact information to the military. Most students aren’t aware they can opt out by filling out a form.

<and>
Opponents of the JROTC program also cite ethnic profiling, arguing that the military targets students from minority and low-income areas. The Chicago Public School system is 49.8 percent African American and 38 percent Latino. Students coming from low-income families make up 85.2 percent of Chicago’s student population. JROTC director Mills is correct when he says the racial and socioeconomic status of those in Chicago’s JROTC program reflects the school system as a whole, but only five schools in all of the more affluent Chicago suburbs have JROTC programs.

[proud2BlibKansan]

3. Okay that at least is a better source

ROTC has been around for years. I believe the bigger concern is the mandatory access for recruiters under NCLB.

[Kali]

4. ROTC in High School, sure

but military "presence" in lower grades?

[proud2BlibKansan]

5. I am an elementary teacher

and we have a wonderful program on aviation taught by air force officers at my school. So I have learned not to automatically oppose military presence at school.

I posted about this a month or so ago. These air force guys are awesome; they are good to the kids and don't spend a minute recruiting. They are also mostly progressives and told me they didn't vote for bu$h in November.

I am as anti-military as a person can be. But this air force program has been a great addition for our school. Plus, they are teaching the kids a subject none of us teachers are experts in; without these air force guys, we wouldn't be teaching aviation in our elementary school. This is what Hillary meant when she said "It takes a village".

[Kali]

8. Your program sounds pretty interesting

actually it sounds fantastic! Still, it makes me a little nervous sending the message that the whole picture is positive..."you can do this if you join up" is still a part of it. Is there a balance in the way of other programs? Anybody coming in doing a course on gardening or something similar? Or is the best class, the favorite program, this aviation project presented by the military?

[proud2BlibKansan]

9. Yes we have some other non traditional classes as well

I understand your concern. If these military guys ever even looked like they wanted to start recruiting, I would be the first one to protest. But they emphasize to the kids that there are many different careers in aviation - airline pilots, mechanics, etc. So I have never detected any recruiting going on.

[LWolf]

6. No.

It's an argument to get parents and the general public up on their feet opposing the takeover, corruption and destruction of the public ed system by the neocons and religious right.

As an educator, I've been screaming for a decade, when they were working at the state level. I was sure when they hit the federal level with NCLB that Democrats and moderates of all political persuasions would fight back. I've become a little cynical in the ensuing years, watching my profession going down the drain, and my students get less independent, less flexible, and less thinking every year.

Why should it have had to get to this point before people began to sit up and take notice? It's not like we weren't pointing this stuff out years ago.

[Kali]

7. I admit, I haven't been too involved with my kids school

I got so disgusted the few times I have tried, I just couldn't spend the time hitting my head against a wall for such a slim chance of having any effect.

Example. School had a quasi-PTA group called the Site Committee. They decided they wanted to be have a real PTA and get affiliated with the national org. I attended the meeting and had a few questions such as, WHY? What was the expected benefit, outcome of the change? What were the goals of the committee? The word "goal" was too much for them. The idea of some kind of plan of action and end results was not part of the thinking - it was all about immediate and superficial benefits.

All they could talk about was the first fundraiser so they could pay dues and get insurance for more fundraisers. (but no discussion on WHAT THEY WANTED TO RAISE MONEY FOR) This is in a small town that is pretty red, views open space and beautiful rangeland as VACANT space, just waiting for developement (hopefully dense with more golf courses - two street lights and two golf courses already - in southern AZ! ... oh sorry :rant:

As you can see I felt I probably wasn't going to be the most effective agent of change in THAT environment.

[LWolf]

10. Parent group

So here's an example of wrong priorities, and wrongly directed focus.

The vilifying of teachers has been a very productive tool for the right; it means that when teachers/schools say a policy is wrong, it's because they are incompetent, greedy, lazy, or whatever...not because the policy is wrong. It hamstrings our ability to get a message out.

When what's happening at your school hurts kids, and when it is directly the result of a piece of legislation, parents and the general public need to work at whatever level the legislation is enacted/enforced at; state and/or federal levels. While I appreciate the parents who have helped to support my class and school over the years, what is needed at this point doesn't need to happen at the school site. It needs to happen in the street and on the airwaves. People need to be educated about the destructive policies, and they need to oppose them. Politically. They need to campaign to take destructive policies off the books, and they need to stop repeating the destructor's buzzwords, and/or voting for them. Right now, public ed is a very top-down system, so we need to start at the top and work our way down to the local district and site level.

There are many things inherent in the traditional public ed system that are not helpful and could use reform; those can be reformed at the local district or site level, when legislation and political policy up above is no longer mandating standardization.