Educational Open Thread

SCHOOL — 1957 vs. 2007

Scenario:

Johnny and Mark get into a fistfight after school.

1957 – Crowd gathers. Mark wins.  Johnny and Mark shake hands and end up buddies.

2007 – Police called, arrests Johnny and Mark.   Charge them with assault, both expelled even though Johnny started it. Both children go to anger management programs for 3 months.. School board holds meeting to implement bullying prevention programs.

Scenario:

Robbie won’t be still in class, disrupts other students.

1957 – Robbie sent to office and given 6 of the best by the Principal.  Returns to class, sits still and does not disrupt class again.

2007 – Robbie given huge doses of Ritalin. Becomes a zombie. Tested for ADD. Robbie’s parents get fortnightly disability payments and School gets extra funding from state because Robbie has a disability.

Scenario :

Billy breaks a window in his neighbor’s car and his Dad gives him a whipping with his belt.

1957 – Billy is more careful next time, grows up normal, goes to college, and becomes a successful businessman.

2007 – Billy’s dad is arrested for child abuse. Billy removed to foster care and joins a gang. State psychologist tells Billy’s sister that she remembers being abused herself and their dad goes to prison.

       

Scenario :

Mark gets a headache and takes some aspirin to school.

1957 – Mark gets glass of water from Principal to take aspirin with.

2007 – Police called, Mark expelled from school for drug violations. Car searched for drugs and weapons.  

Scenario :

Pedro fails high school English.

1957 – Pedro goes to summer school, passes English and goes to college.

2007 – Pedro’s cause is taken up by state.  Newspaper articles appear nationally explaining that teaching English as a requirement for graduation is racist.  AFRE files class action lawsuit against state school system and Pedro’s English teacher. English banned from core curriculum.  Pedro given diploma anyway but ends up mowing lawns for a living because he cannot speak English.  

Scenario :

Johnny takes apart leftover firecrackers from 4th of July, puts them in a model airplane paint bottle, blows up a bull ant nest.

1957 – Ants die.

2007- Star Force, Federal Police & Anti-terrorism Squad called.    Johnny charged with domestic terrorism, Feds investigate parents, siblings removed from home, computers confiscated.  Johnny’s Dad goes on a terror watch list and is never allowed to fly again.

Scenario :

Johnny falls while running during recess and scrapes his knee. He is found crying by his teacher, Mary.  Mary hugs him to comfort him.

1957 – In a short time, Johnny feels better and goes on playing..

2007 – Mary is accused of being a sexual predator and loses her job. She faces 3 years in Prison.  Johnny undergoes 5 years of therapy.

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    • Edger on October 28, 2009 at 13:24
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  1. I wondered this morning. Were we (50-somethings) the last ones to experience Trick or Treating through your own neighborhood… going to the ones you always knew would have the BEST treats, and skipping past Crazy Cat Lady house maybe (sometimes she did have good stuff, which you’d know cuz she’d have her porch light on) but definitely skipping that one weird old guy….?

  2. Writing on bathroom wall prompts school lock down, SWAT team with bomb squad response.

    Lunch delayed because Purell dispenser was empty.

    Army and Marines in full dress BDUs hand out mandatory standardized tests.  Yes, I saw it this very morning.

  3. where did this come from anyway? its so…. sigh … its like … it reminds me of the many times I say that the far right and the far left are actually about to meet up, back around the back way at an alternate “middle” point.

    I mean, edger, are you being sarcastic with this? Of course you are. The wingnuts are the ones who lament the passing of the Good Ol’ Days when you could just beat your kid into submission and not only get away with it, but be lauded as a pillar of society bla bla bla.

    OTOH, Im sick to death of the bullshit in the schools myself, with the over-doing of phony bullshit “P.C.” that misses the whole frikkin point!

    Im often reminded of, well, when I worked with SE Asian refugees way back in ’92, some older folks, VN, struggling to learn ESL. They had a hard time (naturally) with idioms. They would always get it backwards and I used to just laugh. “No, it’s ‘piece of cake’ and ‘easy as pie’; NOT ‘easy as cake’…”. That mix-up is the metaphor for me for the whole way P.C. has been spun around on its tail.

    I guess Im just kind of in a mad mood, but I have a husband who teaches in the public school (inner city, “hooligan” gangstah students) and a daughter who is a student in a different (IB) school, same district, different scenario, but … sigh. Education (w a capital E) is such a flippin mess. Its NOT equal, its not “correct”, its not fair. By design.

  4. you know these all point to an underlying phenomenon……

    they are all part of a deeper thing that we human beings do………

    their absurdity……

    and their espousal of a deep value that must be conserved as enacted in the modern response……..

    one other thing in 57 there were less than 3 billion of us……

    all embedded in considerably less complexity and dynamic change…….

    today around 6 billion embedded in considerably more complexity and dynamic change………

    scale is everything……

    the path to hell for humans is cobbled with the best of intentions…..

    but its bricks are made from our sufferring and ignorance….

  5. Scenario:

    Robbie won’t be still in class, disrupts other students.

    1957 – Robbie sent to office and given 6 of the best by the Principal.  Returns to class, sits still and does not disrupt class again.

    2007 – Robbie given huge doses of Ritalin. Becomes a zombie. Tested for ADD. Robbie’s parents get fortnightly disability payments and School gets extra funding from state because Robbie has a disability.

    So what this is meant to illustrate is that ADD isn’t a “real” disability, and that zombification via corporal punishment, fear, public humiliation and abuse is somehow “better” than zombification via drugs.

    What an ignorant, steaming crock of shit.

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