Detroit parents want DPS teachers, officials jailed over low test scores

[tonysam]

WTF?


Detroit -- Impassioned parents demanded jail time for educators and district officials Saturday following the release of test scores that showed fourth- and eighth-graders had the worst math scores in the nation.

City students took the National Assessment of Educational Progress test this year, and 69 percent of fourth-graders scored below the basic level in math and 77 percent of eighth-graders scored below basic.

The Detroit scores on the progress test were the lowest in its 40-year history. The sample of students included 900 of Detroit's 6,000 fourth-graders and 1,000 of the district's 6,000 eighth-graders.



Sharlonda Buckman, CEO of the Detroit Parent Network, called for jailing and civil lawsuits against anyone in the city's educational system that is not doing his or her share to help properly educate children.


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How about jailing negligent parents and kids who frequently blow off the tests and don't take them seriously?

Naturally these parents are egged on by an Eli Broad "Academy" flunky. Susan Ohanian:


There's lots of blame to go around, but of course it is entirely coincidental that this organized parent attack, getting parents to heap blame on teachers, comes right when the district, under the financial leadership of Robert Bobb, who completed his course at the Broad Superintendents Academy in 2005, is twisting teachers' arms to accept a contract that forces them to lend the district $10,000, $250 to be taken out of their paychecks every two weeks.

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[sui generis]

1. I'm all for jailing stupid parents.

Seriously. Your kid involved in crime? You get your ass tossed in the clink.

Your kid have bad grades? You do not pass go, and you go to jail until you learn some critical thinking skills, which for many may be a life sentence.

The apple does not fall far from the tree. If your kids are failing, then you've failed as a parent. You shouldn't be allowed to have children if you think it's up to the educational system to raise them for you.

[tonysam]

2. Exactly. But of course these parents are being egged on by those

who want to privatize public education by demonizing teachers.

[Vincardog]

3. The stupid parents will see real failure when the privatization plans are complete

[tonysam]

4. More clarification about this parent "group" from Schools Matter

None of this, however, seems to matter to outfits like The Skillman Foundation, a corporate non-profit tax dodge in Michigan with a 50 year history of accumlating tax credits for friends of the Ford family, all the while pushing public policies that are corporate friendly. The Foundation is a founding funder of the the Detroit Parent Network, and it was this weekend that the Network's CEO (yes, Virginia, parent groups now have CEOs) of that illustrious group, Sharlonda Buckman, called for jailing Detroit teachers, who must be to blame for the latest NAEP math scores for Detroit, which show that children in the City without Hope don't give a neighborhood rat's ass anymore about how they do on, yet, another meaningless test.

While Sharlonda doesn't seem to care about is that the corporations who pay her for her services, or the State of Michigan, or the U. S. Department of Education don't seem to have any plan to help alleviate the $219 million dollar hole in the Schools' budget or to help improve learning in the Schools. Never mind that that Skillman Foundation has almost a half billion in corporate assets (non-profit assets, of course) that they are not interested sharing to pay down the Schools' debt. What Sharlonda and her handlers are supporting is the plan to take $500 per month from each teacher's salary to bring down the budget deficit--with a promise to pay back at retirement time. Hah!


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[ProgressiveProfessor]

7. There are a few teachers I have known who should be jailed as well as many many parents

There is more than enough blame to go around and all parties own some of it in various fractions.

Another point many ignore is that Detroit and its school are minority majority electorates. This is a major departure from the historic political solidarity of African-Americans, which is a good thing in the long run.

[tonysam]

9. Well, the point is this parent's "group" is funded by those interests

which want to privatize public education. You need to read between the lines.

[Ozymanithrax]

5. Detroit and Michigan have a long standing budget crises that has affected the qualtiy of education.

From 2004:
Support city workers and
school employees against[br />budget cuts!]
From 2009:
Granholm slashes school funding by $212 million

Parents should quit bitching about grades and be thankful they got what their taxes paid for, ignorant children. Both Democrats and Republicans have chosen to gut school funding. The parents got what they deserve because they got what they voted for.

[ProgressiveProfessor]

8. Detroits economic base is dropping fast. Until that is resolved, $$$ for anything will be hard

to find.

[shraby]

6. Did the Detroit schools ever change their policy of

suspending students for misbehavior to one of detention after school with extra studies while serving detention?

[proud2BlibKansan]

10. Let's jail the parents too!

How about we build a great big jail so everyone who is mad at anyone else can just send them to jail!!

[kerrywins]

11. Lets Jail Everybody!

The state loves flexing its muscle.