tractor
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Post by tractor on Oct 3, 2014 7:08:30 GMT -5
For some reason this just popped into my head while driving to work this morning. So often on these boards I read about people buying a house, even if it's more than they can afford, just to be in the right school district. Here in Michigan we have schools of choice, which means I can live in any school district, pay my taxes to that district, but send my kids to a public school in another district. This is what we do now, and since we have that option, we have never had to worry about what district our house was in.
I assume this isn't an option on other parts of the country? Otherwise people wouldn't bring it up so often. So does anyone else have the schools of choice option? Or are we really that special?
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The Captain
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Post by The Captain on Oct 3, 2014 7:24:42 GMT -5
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ponomo
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Post by ponomo on Oct 3, 2014 8:05:41 GMT -5
We have open enrollment here. You can apply to go to any school, but they do not have to take you! They only accept kids if they have room, the best schools are filled with kids who reside in the district, so your chance of getting in without living there is non-existent.
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andi9899
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Post by andi9899 on Oct 3, 2014 8:32:32 GMT -5
We do not have that option. I don't live in a very good school district, so I sent my kids to private school. In recent years, you have the option to send the kids to the better school district for public school, but you have to pay out of district tuition. I kept my kids in private school because it costs just about as much, and they wouldn't have to leave their friends. Plus the class sizes are smaller and they get religion as part of their classwork.
They go to "public" school now in the district I live in, but it's not the same as all the other public schools. This school runs grades 8-12. You have to be accepted. They look at 6th and 7th grades years for grades, test score, discipline records and require an entrance exam. All the classes are advanced and the kids have to meet GPA and disciplinary guidelines to stay. It's the only public school in the district I live in that I would ever put my kids in. Well, unless they get kicked out, then they can go to the other schools. I'm not paying a bunch of money to put them back in private school for them to screw around.
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tractor
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Post by tractor on Oct 3, 2014 9:16:03 GMT -5
I guess I missed it, oh well, no need to rehash the same thing over again. Sorry about that.
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The Captain
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Post by The Captain on Oct 3, 2014 9:46:46 GMT -5
I guess I missed it, oh well, no need to rehash the same thing over again. Sorry about that. Actually I wasn't trying to shut you down, but inviting you to join the discussion in the other thread. ( I'm sorry if I didn't come across clearly )
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tractor
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Post by tractor on Oct 3, 2014 9:51:55 GMT -5
No worries Captain, I didn't take it the wrong way, no sense discussing the same thing at two different locations. Maybe I need to change the title of this thread to something more exciting like: do you expect your kids to go to homecoming, even if they don't want to? I am trying to get my boys to go, but apparently it's the the thing to do anymore.
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Phoenix84
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Post by Phoenix84 on Oct 3, 2014 9:52:33 GMT -5
I guess I missed it, oh well, no need to rehash the same thing over again. Sorry about that. Actually I wasn't trying to shut you down, but inviting you to join the discussion in the other thread. ( I'm sorry if I didn't come across clearly )
How does it feel being a jackbooted thug shutting down threads TheCaptain.
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The Captain
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Post by The Captain on Oct 3, 2014 9:54:10 GMT -5
*SOB*
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973beachbum
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Post by 973beachbum on Oct 3, 2014 10:17:25 GMT -5
What happens to the kids who are have learning disabilities or just can't meet the GPA?
It feels like we are setting up a system where only the children of the richest and smartest have a chance at a quality education in large parts of this country today. It is very sad to me because I grew up believing that everyone had a stake in making sure we had a well educated society. No one benefits IMO when kids are locked out of it.
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Post by Deleted on Oct 3, 2014 10:43:37 GMT -5
Our new area has open enrolment. The real estate agents we interviewed were really pushing the idea. However the parent has to provide transportation if the child doesn't go to the assigned school. I am not sure how possible that is when the adults in the household work. Also the better high schools have waiting lists, so there is no guarantee your child will get in. We are renting and looking to buy in the area that gives her the best assigned schools.
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tractor
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Post by tractor on Oct 3, 2014 10:46:17 GMT -5
What happens to the kids who are have learning disabilities or just can't meet the GPA? Maybe private schools can be that selective, but the public schools have to take everyone, and fill slots on a first come, first served basis. In fact near us, only the public schools have the funding to take care of special needs kids. As far as GPA, I find it interesting that in the public school almost half the kids show very little interest in school, while the brighter kids tend to be involved in multiple things. My son has 150 kids in his class, he knows maybe 50 of those kids, the rest tend to be like ghosts, wandering the halls and hiding in the back of class hoping to not get called on. Most of those kids often do not go on to college, and 10-15% do not graduate. Not that this is a new problem, but even in a "normal" public school you have a huge divide between those that want to be there, and those that want to get it over with ASAP so they can get out of there. It's impossible for teachers/schools to get everyone on the same level. Even in the private schools, you have kids who don't want to be there and who do poorly (I was one).
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Wisconsin Beth
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Post by Wisconsin Beth on Oct 3, 2014 10:52:26 GMT -5
I'm fairly sure that during "3 choice enrollment" for the 2014-2015 school year, the programmers forgot to turn on "siblings in school" for our school and possibly the entire district. Here, you start the enrollment process to enter a kid in any MPS school in Feb. via the "3 choice enrollment" where you're basically picking the 3 schools you want your kid to go to. If you have siblings, you're supposed to be given preference to the school that the sibling is enrolled in. I dutifully documented DD on the paperwork for DS and submitted on day 1 or day 2 of the enrollment period. Waited 6-8 weeks and was told he was #26 on the wait list, which means that somehow 125 kids were signed up in front of me. -faint-So I called the District Office for enrollment and talked to a live person. Explained and was told they'd call me back after someone looked into. I don't remember if someone called me back for more info but I ended up calling several times and left messages on voice-mail. I was picking up DD one day from school and mentioned it to other parents who were appalled. It was suggested repeatedly that I discuss with the Principal of her school. I talked to the school office staff. Turns out we were NOT the only ones this happened to. I think they added 6-8 slots to the K4 classrooms to cover this. They like to have 24 kids in the classroom and we were at 26 with DS, which has since dropped to 24. We have charter and choice schools. And you can enroll your kids in schools outside of the district but there's no guarantee you'll get in. Last year a family friend who lives in our school district but send their kids to a different school district (I think via Open enrollment) has 4 kids in 4 different schools because that system decided to drop the sibling rule.
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giramomma
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Post by giramomma on Oct 3, 2014 11:03:33 GMT -5
What happens to the kids who are have learning disabilities or just can't meet the GPA? It feels like we are setting up a system where only the children of the richest and smartest have a chance at a quality education in large parts of this country today. It is very sad to me because I grew up believing that everyone had a stake in making sure we had a well educated society. No one benefits IMO when kids are locked out of it. My school system does not know how to effectively teach the low income population in our city. Right now, that's about half the kids.. It's been like that for the 20 years that I have lived here (except the poverty rate was lower). Schools that are 80% low income kids do not perform well. At our neighborhood school, reading proficiency is 12% for 3rd to 5th graders. You cannot tell me that most of the kids can read, minimally, at grade level, and it so happens that 88% are just really bad at whatever assessments the district has. At a school that many of my low income music students go to, the student poverty rate is 65%, the reading proficiency rate jumps to 29%. Should we be surprised that another school that my private music students go to has a student poverty rate of 20%, and the reading proficiency rate is 70%? My school district does not offer options other than the school you are supposed to go to, based on boundary lines the school board draws up. No child is locked out of an education. The school board does not support charter schools. Clearly, this position is not working.
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973beachbum
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Post by 973beachbum on Oct 3, 2014 11:11:11 GMT -5
What happens to the kids who are have learning disabilities or just can't meet the GPA? Maybe private schools can be that selective, but the public schools have to take everyone, and fill slots on a first come, first served basis. In fact near us, only the public schools have the funding to take care of special needs kids. As far as GPA, I find it interesting that in the public school almost half the kids show very little interest in school, while the brighter kids tend to be involved in multiple things. My son has 150 kids in his class, he knows maybe 50 of those kids, the rest tend to be like ghosts, wandering the halls and hiding in the back of class hoping to not get called on. Most of those kids often do not go on to college, and 10-15% do not graduate. Not that this is a new problem, but even in a "normal" public school you have a huge divide between those that want to be there, and those that want to get it over with ASAP so they can get out of there. It's impossible for teachers/schools to get everyone on the same level. Even in the private schools, you have kids who don't want to be there and who do poorly (I was one). I tied to find the link for this years but it was taken down because they had zero seats available in most grades except 9th. the note said that all available seats were going go have to go to siblings of already enrolled choice students. The 9th grade had 12 slots and required the student to sign up for the Stem programs which has media and engineering classes required. So a regular ed kid is probably going to struggle in the honors program. A kid who needs special help for their classes is totally out of the question.
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973beachbum
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Post by 973beachbum on Oct 3, 2014 11:48:16 GMT -5
They go to the local public school, get bad grades, possibly drop out, and very few of them go to college. You know, basically follow the same path they would have even if the smart rich kids got their education on the same campus with them. School has always worked that way. I live in a district thats around 65% hispanic, with roughly half of the students on free/reduced lunch. The high school program we're hoping the kids get into is more like 80% Caucasian with around 20% of kids being on free/reduced lunch. My kids would be one of those 20%. There are no remedial classes. Everyone has to take so many AP classes to graduate. The course and homework load is pretty high compared to the regular high school. If you can't keep up academically they boot you, and you go back to the regular high school. It locks some kids out, and meh. I don't really care. I'm trying to get the best education possible for my daughters, not trying to make life fair, which is a fools errand anyway. There should be a third option though. It shouldn't be a choice of my kid either is a brainiac or they have to go to the dropout factory. I think it's great that we have programs for smart hard working kids. It shouldn't block out all the other programs for kids who may be good hardworking kids but who can't do AP calc. It shouldn't be either or. And I say that as a person who lives in the district that people lie and cheat to get into. I will say though that the school that people come from to go here don't seem nearly as bad as what is mentioned on this thread.
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techguy
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Post by techguy on Oct 3, 2014 11:51:26 GMT -5
I have School of Choice where I live and I do not like it. Why should I have to pay more to live in a good school district and then some schmo' from a less desirable neighborhood gets to invade my area?
Yeah, yeah, some of the kids from the undesirable areas are probably good kids with good hearts. Sorry, I get that people want to be fair to everyone, but it's not fair if some people aren't paying the price.
The bottom line is that if you want to go to a better school district, then live within the area of the better school district. Don't be a leech to others. Unfortunately people feel too entitled and think that they should have a right to everything, including crossing social economic borders.
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giramomma
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Post by giramomma on Oct 3, 2014 11:55:00 GMT -5
They go to the local public school, get bad grades, possibly drop out, and very few of them go to college. You know, basically follow the same path they would have even if the smart rich kids got their education on the same campus with them. School has always worked that way. I live in a district thats around 65% hispanic, with roughly half of the students on free/reduced lunch. The high school program we're hoping the kids get into is more like 80% Caucasian with around 20% of kids being on free/reduced lunch. My kids would be one of those 20%. There are no remedial classes. Everyone has to take so many AP classes to graduate. The course and homework load is pretty high compared to the regular high school. If you can't keep up academically they boot you, and you go back to the regular high school. It locks some kids out, and meh. I don't really care. I'm trying to get the best education possible for my daughters, not trying to make life fair, which is a fools errand anyway. There should be a third option though. It shouldn't be a choice of my kid either is a brainiac or they have to go to the dropout factory. I think it's great that we have programs for smart hard working kids. It shouldn't block out all the other programs for kids who may be good hardworking kids but who can't do AP calc. It shouldn't be either or. And I say that as a person who lives in the district that people lie and cheat to get into. I will say though that the school that people come from to go here don't seem nearly as bad as what is mentioned on this thread. I agree it shouldn't be either or. But what do you do? I can't fight the education system in our city for parents who aren't able to for whatever reason. The best I can do is volunteer (which interestingly enough, my school with the 12% reading proficiency rate isn't asking for volunteers yet, and they ALWAYS do by this time of year.) And, like dark, I have to put my kids where they will excel. Not where they will be one of two in class that can read at grade level (or close to it.) I WISH it were the public schools. I wish socioeconomic status didn't make a difference. But it does. These are the rules I haven to play by. I can't change it.
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Wisconsin Beth
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Post by Wisconsin Beth on Oct 3, 2014 12:22:24 GMT -5
One of the things that's really tough is that any changes can take so long to implement and really affect student achievement. By the time a new program is put in place at your school they may have moved on to junior high, high school or graduated. And apparently any change needs to bring everyone up to par within 2-3 years or they decide it's not working and pitch it for the next latest and greatest plan to fix the schools. I did see something, within the last few months, that said that getting a good principal was the key to a good school. Because a good leader will get buyin from the teachers, which translates into better teaching somehow. And if a good one leaves, the school may tank because the teachers don't have faith in the next one. I have no idea if it's true or where I read this.
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Lizard Queen
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Post by Lizard Queen on Oct 3, 2014 12:23:49 GMT -5
My school district used to be one of the top-performing for the area. Then, they started taking schools of choice kids, and the test scores dropped--a lot. Then, the school district next door- which is one of the worst in the state- ran into financial problems and more of the kids from that district moved into mine or took up more SOC slots. My kids aren't regular school aged yet, but I've read rumblings about disciplinary problems at the schools now. I thought SOC was great to bring in more diversity into the district, but not when it brings the academic experience of all the children down--way down. My district severely restricted SOC slots this year, and lost lots of funding because of it. It seems to be on a downward spiral. I'm prepared to move, send them to a private school, or get my kids into the better run charter school, but I'll have to figure out transportation in that case. It's just a damn shame, since the school WAS really quite good, and we live very close. I will not let my kids' educations suffer for it, if I can at all help it.
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Wisconsin Beth
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Post by Wisconsin Beth on Oct 3, 2014 12:34:33 GMT -5
I wasn't holding out a lot of hope but DH wanted to try the public schools. We got EXTREMELY lucky and got a call a week after school started to say that our 2 top MPS choices for DD had openings for K4. We picked the one closer to home and worked out a schedule with the grandparents for transportation. It's one of the best ranked public schools in our quadrant of the City. And because it's an immersion school, you have to test in after 2nd grade so the pool of kids is limited by that.
I admit, we had NO idea what we were getting into with an immersion school.
There's a consolidated high school for all the immersion schools and that's fairly close to home too, if we stick with it. We've got German, French and Spanish available here.
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Wisconsin Beth
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Post by Wisconsin Beth on Oct 3, 2014 12:36:56 GMT -5
Basically, that's it in a nutshell Dark.
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techguy
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Post by techguy on Oct 3, 2014 13:13:42 GMT -5
That's what choice always does. People talk about diversity, but really no parent wants it. We all want our kids in a school with a student body that's all getting good grades, doing their homework, and not causing disciplinary problems. What we want is the exact opposite of diversity. We want all the kids to be kicking ass and chewing bubblegum academically. I could give a shit what color my daughter's classmates are. I'd send them to an all black school with them being the only white girls, provided that school had amazing test scores, expected high achievement from every student, and didn't put up with disruptive behavior in the classrooms or on campus. In other words, I don't want diversity at all. I want an entire school full of Type A test killers keeping their noses to the grindstone. While I agree with Dark's premise, it's actually more advantageous to go to a school with low performers if you want your child to go to a good University. Because while a good University may accept more students from a Type A test killer school, the competition is extremely tough to get into the top 5% of a Type A school. However, it would be a breeze to be a the top 5% of a disadvantaged school. So, for me, I would prefer if my kid went to a low performing school since it would be easier to get accepted to a Good University. HOWEVER, it's the kids at the low performing schools that I don't want my kids to hang with. I prefer my kids to hang with other kids who want to be achievers and good citizens. Ironic.
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Wisconsin Beth
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Post by Wisconsin Beth on Oct 3, 2014 13:15:41 GMT -5
That's what choice always does. People talk about diversity, but really no parent wants it. We all want our kids in a school with a student body that's all getting good grades, doing their homework, and not causing disciplinary problems. What we want is the exact opposite of diversity. We want all the kids to be kicking ass and chewing bubblegum academically. I could give a shit what color my daughter's classmates are. I'd send them to an all black school with them being the only white girls, provided that school had amazing test scores, expected high achievement from every student, and didn't put up with disruptive behavior in the classrooms or on campus. In other words, I don't want diversity at all. I want an entire school full of Type A test killers keeping their noses to the grindstone. While I agree with Dark's premise, it's actually more advantageous to go to a school with low performers if you want your child to go to a good University. Because while a good University may accept more students from a Type A test killer school, the competition is extremely tough to get into the top 5% of a Type A school. However, it would be a breeze to be a the top 5% of a disadvantaged school. So, for me, I would prefer if my kid went to a low performing school since it would be easier to get accepted to a Good University. HOWEVER, it's the kids at the low performing schools that I don't want my kids to hang with. I prefer my kids to hang with other kids who want to be achievers and good citizens. Ironic. On one of the recent threads about eduction/school someone had an argument that disproved that. I'm not sure which thread or poster it was though. Anyone else remember?
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Post by Deleted on Oct 3, 2014 13:25:29 GMT -5
That's what choice always does. People talk about diversity, but really no parent wants it. We all want our kids in a school with a student body that's all getting good grades, doing their homework, and not causing disciplinary problems. What we want is the exact opposite of diversity. We want all the kids to be kicking ass and chewing bubblegum academically. I could give a shit what color my daughter's classmates are. I'd send them to an all black school with them being the only white girls, provided that school had amazing test scores, expected high achievement from every student, and didn't put up with disruptive behavior in the classrooms or on campus. In other words, I don't want diversity at all. I want an entire school full of Type A test killers keeping their noses to the grindstone. While I agree with Dark's premise, it's actually more advantageous to go to a school with low performers if you want your child to go to a good University. Because while a good University may accept more students from a Type A test killer school, the competition is extremely tough to get into the top 5% of a Type A school. However, it would be a breeze to be a the top 5% of a disadvantaged school. So, for me, I would prefer if my kid went to a low performing school since it would be easier to get accepted to a Good University. HOWEVER, it's the kids at the low performing schools that I don't want my kids to hang with. I prefer my kids to hang with other kids who want to be achievers and good citizens. Ironic. college admissions look at the performance of the high school the applicant is from so they may take all of the applicants from top performing school A, even if one applicant was in the bottom of their class and none from bottom performing school B even if the applicant was in the top 10.
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Post by Deleted on Oct 3, 2014 13:26:26 GMT -5
Colleges look at the classes the school offers, SAT scores, and other factors so I think it's probably not a great plan. AP classes, honors classes, IB programs, grading system (since some schools don't weight grades in harder classes).
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Wisconsin Beth
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Post by Wisconsin Beth on Oct 3, 2014 13:27:29 GMT -5
thanks Anne and single!
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Lizard Queen
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Post by Lizard Queen on Oct 3, 2014 13:28:05 GMT -5
That's what choice always does. People talk about diversity, but really no parent wants it. We all want our kids in a school with a student body that's all getting good grades, doing their homework, and not causing disciplinary problems. What we want is the exact opposite of diversity. We want all the kids to be kicking ass and chewing bubblegum academically. I could give a shit what color my daughter's classmates are. I'd send them to an all black school with them being the only white girls, provided that school had amazing test scores, expected high achievement from every student, and didn't put up with disruptive behavior in the classrooms or on campus. In other words, I don't want diversity at all. I want an entire school full of Type A test killers keeping their noses to the grindstone. While I agree with Dark's premise, it's actually more advantageous to go to a school with low performers if you want your child to go to a good University. Because while a good University may accept more students from a Type A test killer school, the competition is extremely tough to get into the top 5% of a Type A school. However, it would be a breeze to be a the top 5% of a disadvantaged school. So, for me, I would prefer if my kid went to a low performing school since it would be easier to get accepted to a Good University. HOWEVER, it's the kids at the low performing schools that I don't want my kids to hang with. I prefer my kids to hang with other kids who want to be achievers and good citizens. Ironic. Well, since my kids are just going to be starting elementary school soon, I don't give a damn about how well they do on the tests compared to their peers. I just want them to learn, and not have big parts of the school day wasted by the teachers dealing with disruptive students. I'd also rather he not learn to be a little shit and have an attitude from the other kids. (They went to a different daycare for 7 days last summer, and DS1 developed an attitude from it. I had never heard a whiny, "I don't want to" from him before then.)
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cktc
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Post by cktc on Oct 3, 2014 13:33:39 GMT -5
My area offers open enrollment, but I still have a 5 year plan to move into an awesome district. My dream home would be in a planned community, so it wouldn't really make sense to send my hypothetical kids there if we couldn't live there too.
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giramomma
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Post by giramomma on Oct 3, 2014 13:39:53 GMT -5
While I agree with Dark's premise, it's actually more advantageous to go to a school with low performers if you want your child to go to a good University. Because while a good University may accept more students from a Type A test killer school, the competition is extremely tough to get into the top 5% of a Type A school. However, it would be a breeze to be a the top 5% of a disadvantaged school. So, for me, I would prefer if my kid went to a low performing school since it would be easier to get accepted to a Good University. HOWEVER, it's the kids at the low performing schools that I don't want my kids to hang with. I prefer my kids to hang with other kids who want to be achievers and good citizens. Ironic.See, you can't generalize here. I work with low income kids. There ARE kids that will make it. These kids are starting to infiltrate an elite organization, mostly for folks who are "haves." One of them the only way you can tell that she isn't middle class is because of her shoes. Her parents work, are involved in her life, set the bar high, they even own their home (granted it's in one of the poorest neighborhoods, but they still own a home.) So, are you saying you wouldn't want your kids to hang around with her? That's too bad. She's a great kid, and she's going places. There's another set of sisters I teach. Again, generally you would not know they are poor unless you are careful enough to notice their shoe and boot choices. Mom and dad work. They are good kids, don't have access to technology, so reading is one of their only options for entertainment, etc. There are days I WISH my kids would sit and have a chat with them, on what it means to be wasteful. They would put our family to shame, in terms of managing resources. Their older sister joined the army and is studying to be a nurse. Hooligans, indeed! I think what you want to say, is that you don't want your kids to hang around with kids whose parents don't give a sh*t. That I don't blame you for. Because I see it too. The parents that have kids they cannot afford, the parents that cannot be bothered to parent for whatever reason. And, to that end, I also see plenty of families with money that don't give a shit about their kids. In our private school, we are a have not. You can't tell that by first glance. You have to come in and live with us to really see our choices to figure that out. Well, except for the fact that DH works 20 hours a week and we don't have a full time nanny, nor do we go abroad in our spare time. My kids are readily accepted even though we don't have a second home in Mexico.
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