[TriLUG] OT: Education

[Shane O'Donnell]

Unfortunately, the "fixing of schools" has been far from lip service. 
"No Child Left Behind", a federal initiative to improve the quality of
public education, has not only been implemented at great cost and
fanfare, but it's largely created (perhaps "worsened") the "teach to
the test" problem you described.

If you want to fix public schools, you need to fix the problem, not
the symptoms.  In my book, the problem is the vast number of parents
that don't seem to care what quality of education their children get.

In the short term, I agree with your "charter schools are doubly
doomed" comment.  They are an "alternative" to a state-provided poor
education which, while an "alternative", are not necessarily an
improvement.  Personally, I'd rather see a voucher system.  If people
can vote with their tax dollars, someone (public or private) will
begin to step up to provide a better value proposition for the tax
payer that's interested in a better education for their kids.

Shane O.

P.S.  Put LINUX in our school computer labs!!!  The price is right &
the technology is sound/appropriate.  (wanted to make the post
relevant for the list...)

> When somethings broken you tend to want to fix it -- except for schools -
> fixing them is just lip service.
>

--
Shane O.
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Shane O'Donnell
shaneodonnell at gmail.com
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