I don't know but they way I understood it.....day care would have to be offered thus the enrichment part of the day. The 8:30-11:30 would only be for remediation students. No teacher would be hired to have an enrichment class. TA would be covering the day care.
Your first post said, "I wanted to say I'm kind of upset at so many people on this board assuming that kids who need remediation have no parent involvement at home." Your second post quotes someone saying, ""It is my belief that many children that need the remediation assistance already have poor parental involvement at home and the turnout for the classes will be poor if the school is not providing transport. Read the two. Yours is worded to read many people think ALL kids who need remediation have no parent involvement at home. The second quote states a true and well documented fact that MANY children that need remediation assistance have poor parental involvment at home. I just don't think you and I are on the same page here. I am talking about students that would probably thrive in school if they just had the proper parental involvement and guidance I described in my post. Im not talking about a Special Ed kids. Gee whiz, Im not that insensitive! I know you and a lot of other parents work their butts off to help their Special Needs kids. Let me give you an example that may explain where Im coming from better. I once went to a kindergarten open house at a VERY low performing school The president of the PTA approached me and practically begged me to get involved in the PTA. I asked her some details about the PTA. She said SHE WAS THE ONLY PTA MEMBER! I met her child. He was SEVERELY disabled and in special ed full time. She had a different base school but drove the 30 plus minute drive from her upper middle class high performing neighborhood school to this school because it was the closest school that had the special needs program her child needed. She told me although her child would most likely not participate in anything PTA sponsored she felt parental involvement was her obligation to the school as a part of being a good parent. Now where were the other parents of approximately 1200 students whos kids were not in special ed? I did some research. One argument was the general population of families were poor. OK since when does being poor keep you from attending a PTA meeting, selling items for fund raisers, helping to organize events, volunteering in the classroom. Another argument was many of these parents didnt speak English. HELLO There were so many in the school who spoke Spanish they could have had a Spanish PTA and let the English speaking minority figure out how to translate. I hope this better explains my point. And by the way if anyone is wondering. My child never went to that school. One part of me wanted to go there and try to make a difference. The other part of me could not let my child's mind rot in that environment. I think sometimes about going to volunteer there even my child attends school elsewhere. -DB's wife
I'm not sure if your comment was targeted at me, but I will step up and admit that I'm one of the people who made comments regarding lower-performing kids. I certainly didn't mean to imply ALL children who struggle in school do so because their parents are not involved. Sorry if my comments came across that way. Some children just need extra help, and there's absolutely nothing wrong with that. However, there are a lot who fall into the poor parenting category. I see them every week, and it just blows my mind to understand how parents can't spend a few minutes every day to determine if their kids are learning what they should be. I bend over backwards trying to help mine, as I'm sure you do with yours. Agree that this proposed calendar will probably not help either category as much as they are trying to say it will.
It's interesting that name upsets you, but there's no confusion here. The school system can try to polish this t.u.r.d. with words like "enhancement" but at the end of the day it's a year round schedule, just without multiple tracks (yet). Compare it to Wake County's year round schedule. Looks pretty similar to me.
Thank you DB's wife for clarifying my statement. I am not of the belief that ALL children that would need remediation have little parental involvement. I am friends and family to more than a handful who have challanges and am amazed at their stamina. Irish
I think people are predisposed to freaking out when they hear the term "year round" calendar. I'm curious, do you think if it were introduced as a modified calendar do you think people would be reacting differently? Im not saying I support the new calendar suggestion in anyway but I just wonder if it were presented differently if some of the reaction might be different. DB's wife
No, I don't think changing the name matters at all. The issues are still the same. Multiple schools with multiple schedules (nightmare for working parents), no real data to show that the improvements are worth making the change, no detailed strategy for paying for this (killing AIG and early college most likely)... Also, I think if this calendar passes now that we will be seeing proposals for multi-track within the next few years. Call it academic enhancement, year round, modified, or whatever - I call it a bad idea.
yep, this is year round, you're right.... http://www.johnston.k12.nc.us/educat...F8xOTMwNS5wZGY= July 28 to Sept 30 - 9 weeks in school Oct 1 to Oct 15 - 2 week break (Fall break) Oct 18 to Dec 21 - 9 1/2 weeks in school Dec 22 to Jan 10 - 2 1/2 week break (Winter break) Jan 11 to April 8 - 12 weeks in school Apr 11 to April 25 - 2 week break (Spring break) April 26 to June 8 - 7 weeks in school June 9 to July 27 - 6 1/2 week break (Summer break)
I just want to jump in here, albeit a little late. When I was a kid one of the elementary schools in my town did a pilot program named "The 45-15 Plan". In a nutshell, kids went to school for 45 days and then were off for 15. My best friend’s brother went to that school and he and his parents loved it. This family was very much into camping, hunting, and fishing so the plan would have been great for taking vacations during the traditional school year as opposed to being confined to summer. Unfortunately for the family my friend and I were in Jr. High and that school wasn't on the program. As a kid I thought it was a terrible idea, but now I can see a definite advantage to families.
year round school is great IMO if you can afford it. We were lucky enough to have a family with a self employed dad and a stay home mom while my kids were coming up and it was terrific. I do understand that after school and track out care can be a problem for some people which is really a shame.
As a kid I always loved having the summer off from school and I enjoy it with my child now. But if I try to be open minded and open to change here might be a good way for me to look at educating my child. He should probably be educated year round. If I think about it, its sort of my child's childhood "job" to learn what he needs to know to be successful in life. Some kids do this by attending some sort of school system and there are some that are homeschooled, etc. Most of us go to our jobs year round so why shouldn't a child go to his "job" year round? Am I making my point at all??? (DB has a much better way with words than I do!) I can't say I have the answer as to which method, calendar whatever would work to make this happen but I think the traditional school calendar most of the U.S. follows is antiquated. It was originally designed to be productive but most of us don't farm in the summers any more! Children in the US are often being out performed by students from other countries. No only is their curriculum different in other countries but they often spend more days in school than our kids do. via MSN Encarta We might have to alter some traditions we now hold dear in order for our children to be more competitive globally. It would just become a different way of life that we would have to get used to. Just a thought. DB's wife
Two comments, probably both not strictly relevant to the posted topic: 1. Under-performing kids may or not be the result of under performing parents. Some parents are under performing -often for very valid reasons- but that doesn't release the public education system* from their responsibility to educate these children to at least a minimally functional level. 2. I find it somewhat ironic that a major concern for many parents seems to be vacation scheduling when a vacation is the least of their worries for many folks, myself included. *'system' in this usage refers to exactly that. I believe that, by and large, the 'system' prevents teachers from doing what they do best. Peace.
A thought I had is to improve the quantity and quality of work that does get done in those 180 days. I've been in classrooms where more time is dedicated to breaks, lunch, recess, free time and snack than learning. I'm not saying kids don't need a break, but maybe there should be a better balance. Just a thought.
NOT being mean. but I suspect the quality of education may be improved with more breaks! I don't know nuthin' 'bout no edjaction but in my experience people in general start to lose focus after 30 min without a break (smokers not withstanding!). In my experience, a 2 min break every half hour or so helps a lot. I know my son's performance suffers when recess (...or what's left of recess, but that's another topic) isn't available. Just something to think about about.
So much is in how we word things. I think we all know that having underperfroming parents is only one reason that might be causing a child to be under performing. I can directly relate to this being a reason because I have seen it for myself. I know of one child in particular that comes from a crappy homelife but is thriving in his school environment. He is so smart. (hmm. I wonder how much farther he could go if he had a supportive homelife?) Anyway, there are lots of things that can cause a child to under perform. Not having a supportive homelife can be one of them. In the second point you make is my point exactly. Vacation scheduling should be the least of our worries. As far as the "system" goes. I think overall it is probably at least adequate at best. Its geared toward serving the average public. I once heard newspapers are written at an 8th grade education level. Dont know how much truth there is to that but I guess if so the public school system has to do something like that too. (Right or wrong) DB's wife
I agree, the data provided being from one school that had nowhere to go but up and then went back down seems inconclusive to me.
So they are going into the daycare business. I guess they will need the money to pay the power bill in July/August. Is it just me, or does "enrichment" and "remediation" sound like fancy buzz words for review?
