Imagine a young boy getting ready for his first day of middle school. He cannot contain his excitement and is eager as ever on the drive to school. They pull up, see a huge brick building, and tons of students walking in. He cannot wait to make them his friends. However, when this boy walked into his first class, he was shoved into a wall by another boy much taller than him. This brought his mood down for the rest of his day. At lunch, it was so crowded and he knew no one. Kids pointed and laughed at him while they ate their processed chicken and three day old green beans. This young boy was a victim of bullying on his first day of school and it had changed how he a looked at coming to school as a whole. Whether one has attended a public school or not, one would know the struggles of such a system. A variety of causes have led public schools to have fundamental struggles.
The amount of children attending public school has always been significant, and has only skyrocketed ever since. Due to this, classroom size becomes an issue. So many children are sent to public schools and it is hard to keep the class sizes small when there are limited classrooms. Classrooms are generally not that large, especially when you have 30 to 40 kids crammed into small desks. This can make for an uncomfortable learning experience, or not one at all. A teacher, one person, can simply not control this amount of children. It is incredibly difficult to build bigger classrooms when there is no money coming in to expand these schools.
Without money to expand these schools and give them what they need, we run into another issue. Government funding is an enormous problem in the public school business. Public schools are government funded. However, government...
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...dren, it becomes “acceptable” and ignored. These children feel as if they have no boundaries. However, this is not a new issue for schools in general. Bullying will take place no matter where one is. Public school children tend to act out though, because they feel that they can.
After discussing some of these problems that these schools endure, one would see a better understanding as to why the system is crashing. There are many ways people could try to help with these problems. Organizations are everywhere to help students who are in poverty. Bullying awareness can be spread through other students and parents. Funding is up to government, and until they can figure their own debts out, the money will remain at a standstill. Classroom size, poverty, funding, curriculum, and bullying are just a few of the causes as to why public schools are facing so many problems.
There are many underfunded high schools throughout the nation. There have been many budget cuts to the funding for public education by the government. In fact, many people have reacted to this, and some even protest it, “The rally, [...] comes as recent state budgets dropped funding for public education down to a historic low in 2011” (Lin). It is important to recognize that underfunding in schools is now something schools throughout the United States suffer from. Budgets for schools are being continually shrunk, and even reaching an all time low. These cuts in funding by the government are enough to make people protest, and rally. Though there have been many protests, and even strikes, there has been no major change. The quality of education in turn suffers from the ever shrinking budgets, and will continue to do so as they lose more and more funding. Furthermore, school districts are being forced to cut their budgets, and find where they can save money, “The district needs to trim ne...
How will this growing problem be fixed, not only in the United States but the world as well? One important action is to continue the effort to improve schools worldwide. Schools in poorer areas of districts would benefit from a greater number of better trained teachers and faculty. Other actions to help improve schools would be to add more leadership and extracurricular activities, encourage students to focus and stay in school, and making things such as school lunch and recess better. It is important to have students enjoy being at school and enjoy learning, otherwise they'll lose intere...
The improvements made by public schools should not be discounted, either. While there are certainly schools and school districts that remain very troubled those administrators and schools boards are not standing idly by. There are continuous improvements in such schools, and there needs to be even more. Taking money from them when efforts are being made to improve their condition will clearly on hinder such improvement. Private schools are and should remain an option for all parents, but our society mustn't waver when it comes to supporting our public schools.
School funding is a recurring issue in the modern era. Debates ranging from give schools more money, to get rid of the system in place and reform a new idea have been plaguing the world over the years. “The American Recovery and Reinvestment Act, signed in 2009, provided more than $100 billion in education aid to offset budget cuts..” (School Finance). Later, “Congress provided an additional $10 billion in 2010 to avert mass teacher layoffs (Education Week, "Total Recovery Act")” (School Funding). These numbers are just a sample of the struggles in school funding, that is costing a ton of money to keep afloat. “There are many ways schools fund varying from state to state and even school to school. Income taxes, corporate taxes, sales taxes, and other fees provide 48 percent of the elementary and secondary school funds. 44 percent of local districts draw money from local property taxes. The federal government makes up approximately 8 percent of state education budgets. These funds are a dealt out on a per-student basis, and categorically to ensure enough resources for each special program or facility” (School Funding). These funds play a huge role in every student's education, either positive or negative. The three main areas that need to be addressed in the school budget are extracurricular funding, building and equipment maintenance, and last but not least staff funding.
It is very rare that a book can be so compelling that it changes the way you think. Daniel Kahneman achieved this in his groundbreaking book Thinking, Fast and Slow. In his work, Kahneman challenges common notions of human psychology by offering a unique perspective of why we make certain decisions. Based off his contributions throughout his career, Kahneman compiles his experimental findings on human behavior into a complete manual to the human mind. The book delves into human nature and cognition, how we process our decisions and in what frame of mind do we create our perception of the world. More specifically, Kahneman deals with the irrationality of the way we think that leads to biases, mental shortcuts and defense mechanisms. His findings not only acts as an informative self-help but questions the very nature of everyday life.
In February 2010 Chicago Public Schools (CPS) reported their shockingly large budget deficit which will affect the 2010 / 2011 school year. The decreased state funding, increased salary and benefit costs, and the increase of operational costs for Chicago Public schools leaves a deficit of $700 - $900 millions dollars. This deficit of funds will have drastic affects on teachers including teacher and staff layoffs, school closings, and loss of teacher benefits. More importantly the effects of budgetary issues hits hard on our students’ increase the inequities of especially poor urban schools. These children have nothing to do with poor management of the funds for their basic right of an equal and highly performing education. There are an increased number of dilapidated school buildings, an increased number of charter schools, and a loss of afterschool programs such as music and sport activities, minimal school supplies, no transportat...
According to American press and news on TV, low income schools do not receive a fair share from the state government and local funding that affects our children’s educational quality and effectiveness. It also causes their schools to receive less supplies
...making class size smaller. If the school itself cannot afford to educate its students, then the government needs to provide the school with the money to do so. They’re America’s children too.
A major problem with public school is lack of funding, and it seems as if nobody follows the money once it gets to the school. The students and staff both suffer from the lack of money in schools. I attended a really poor middle school named Bishop-Spaugh Middle School. In middle school, students were almost never assigned any homework because students didn’t have any books. Teachers at this school also were compelled to buy many essential items such as paper, markers, and erasers because the school didn’t have enough money to provide the supplies to them. Money inside of schools isn’t being handled correctly. In the movie The Cartel, $1 billion was given to a construction company to build and improve schools. However, a couple of years passed and the company never built a single structure and the money was gone. Nobody knew where the money disappeared to (Ventures). The same people in charge when the money disappeared stayed in charge for a very long time. Because of the lack of money, schools we...
Doing what is needed would require reallocating money and personnel and looking outside the system for new ideas and people. Money is a huge issue: in the words of one superintendent, "You need to be able to change how every dollar is spent." But that might require funds from existing programs and schools in upper-income neighborhoods. Influential neighborhoods have the programs and teachers parents want, and they won't give them up readily.
There are many other areas around the United States where urban schools suffer from lack of funding. In many of America...
As an important aspect of the United States, education needs to be funded by the government. Education is an important aspect of the United States. The people of the United States pay taxes; therefore, the citizens pay for children to go to school. Why should the government take that away? The law requires students to attend school so they might as well enjoy themselves while doing it. Children cannot do that if the government takes away some of the most beneficial subjects or activities at school. If the government end the funding of schools, where will schools get the money needed to function?
Bullying has been a part of schooling for as long as children have been congregating. To some it seems like a natural, though uncomfortable, part of life and school experience, while to others it can mean terrifying experiences which spoiled and characterized otherwise happy years in school. Dan Olweus, a pioneer in bully behavior research documented that 2.7 million children are affected as victims, and that 2.1 children act as bullies (Fried, 1997, as cited in Aluedse, 2006). With bullying cited as the reason for violent, gun-related crime in the past few years, school districts as well as national governments have put anti-bullying policies in place. Bullying is a complicated phenomenon, involving more than one child demanding lunch money from a smaller child. It is a worldwide epidemic hitting schools everywhere. Virtually everyone has seen or experienced bullying. With technological advances, bullying is even hitting the internet. Parents, teachers, students and governments agencies alike are attempting to put a stop to bullying practices.
Proper school funding is one of the keys to having a successful school. Americans believe that funding is the biggest problem in public schools. School improvements revolve around funding. There needs to be funding not only in the successful schools but also the schools that aren’t doing as well. In documentary, Waiting for Superman, it talks about how smaller class sizes will help students. Funding is what will help the smaller class sizes. State funding mechanisms are subject to intense political and economic scrutiny (Leonard). Studies have shown that funding is inversely related to accreditation levels (Leonard). School funding needs to be increased, but there must be accountability as well.
Learning occurs when each child is developmentally ready, and this happens at a different pace for each individual child. I experience this daily in my Kindergarten classroom. Although a lot has changed in education over the course of my career, I try to focus on the constant that each of my students can learn on any given day and that I must challenge all of my students to reach his or her potential. This is my school’s motto, and we recite it daily. Education has faced many challenges over the years with politics, the economy, students’ culture, and legal issues. Politics does play a crucial role in education. Different school systems and population areas receive more or less government funding. Educational dollars can play a key role in a school system receiving the latest technology, updated facilities, educational funds for teachers, and curriculum needs. I have been able to experience this for myself by transferring schools from the city to the county school district. The social aspect of learning affects children in different ways also. Different cultures of schools are negatively and positively affected as well. Having taught in an inner-city school for 9 years, I was able to witness firsthand the downfalls and negative effects that come into play for students who come