Well, Right up my alley. I've got a JD I only used for a year as an intern for the SFDA's office. I got to see a wide variety of criminals, and, we had a few moved to federal court.
I've also been a teacher, on and off, since 1999, mainly in special education, dealing with the folks that end up in the system. Here's my two cents.
The kids that get out, and make it, are about 100% religious, and, needless to say, from religious parent/s. Our school system pretty much denies the effect, and benefits of religion, and, we are reaping the result of those policies.
The schools run on a system similar to the prisons: the biggest and strongest are dominant, and, barring gangs, enforce their will by threat, or use, of force. Between the ages of 6th grade, and, 18, kids have an open season for crime, where they get slapped on the wrist, and, their records sealed. If you want an example of this, just follow me into Oakland, Berkeley, or Richmond, and watch some basketball games, and, I promise you, you will see a shining example of this sort of survival of the fitest society at work.
The special education system which was designed to help kids, is circumvented by administrators, and, education, at least in our area, and, is top heavy, salary wise. San Francisco is the poorest paying big city in Kali for teachers, yet the superintendent quit a year early, to take a job in the midwest, and was paid 550,000 dollars in a severance package. IIRC, it was 400k for severance, and 150k for selling back her lifetime health insurance to the city.
The influx of illegals has created a tremendous strain on the public school system in Kali. Most of these children end up in special ed, or lost in the public system. The resources are not avaliable to teach them properly, to busy paying 400k packages to administrators that quit their job, without out doing it.
Most need intensive English, and, that requires a ratio of about 1 to 5, with aide and teacher for 10-12, to be effective.
The system has moved a LOT of college material, in math in particular, into high school, and, even into grade school.
The result is the kids face more difficult tests, and materials then we had, have less time to master them, and
are graded earlier, into being failures. If you can't pass the High School Exit Exam, which now has statistics, and Calculus on it, you don't graduate from High School. In other words, our public education system is creating a cast system, stratifying society, which, will in the end, destroy the middle class, create a huge lower, dangerous class, and, prime the country for either a police state, or a revolution.
San Francisco has open enrollment, which means any child may go to any school, depending upon a lottery(however, if you know the SF system, everything is corrupt, and, I'm sure with legal pressure, you can get your child to what ever school you want).
SF has over 50 gangs, mainly a gang for each public housing project, plus the Asian gangs, etc. I had a gang member diagram the gangs, and it took the entire front chalkboard, about 50 feet wide, and about 8 feet high.
(local policeman came in, and started scribbling and copying madly;-) Many children face crossing 4-7 gangs territories on the way to school, on the bus. Just imagine having to be on combat alert, coming to school, leaving school, and at lunch, and you start to get the reason they quit coming, or, when they get to school, are too stressed to learn.
Mt. Diablo High School in Concord is similar, with a gauntlet of gang cars running around, after school, as the kids try and walk to BART(Bay Area Rapid Transit).
The irony of this is that while the kids lives are in constant threat, SF voted to ban all ownership of handguns by residents.
They really are in LaLa land, unaware of what is right down the street, and, the experience of their children.
What it really comes down to is numbers. The poor are procreating, inspired by a welfare system that pays them well, or has in the past, to do so. They are a poor tax base, and, therefore, their schools are poor, and they get an education that isn't so good. Even if the money WAS there, as I explained to my kids: I can give you an intense hour and a half of e
English, but, if the minute you go out the door, you go back to Spanish, that means you are using
another language 22.5 hours a day, and, chances are real good you aren't going to pick up English.
From the top end, we have administrators, and lawyers, writing laws, like No Child Left Behind, that make accomplishing the goals impossible, and, refuse to accept that what worked for them is not for everyone. Somewhere in the system has to be the recognition that some people are not going to be 4.0 students, and, that just because they are not, it doesn't make them F students.
What we've done is told these folks they can't make it in our society, so, they have made it, just illegally. I've been privy to the multi-law enforcement meeting in San Diego in 2000, concerning gangs, and, all those kids we have flushed out of the system have made it, for awhile anyway, importing drugs, etc. We currently have a MASSIVE group
of very strong gangs that are REALLY scary, and, meanwhile, while telling the world it's our biggest problem, Diane Fienstien is the only one with a CCW, making sure none of the rest of us can defend ourselves, and working actively to make sure the Second Amendment is taken out of the Constitution.
As a teacher, I'm at a crossroads right now. I've taken many assignments, and, many have been impossible, unless you like working 20 hours a day, and, even then, some just aren't doable. When you have to schedule meetings, Individual Education Program meetings, with administrators, psych folk, probation people, translators, parents that don't show up, and Lord only knows who else, and, you can't get the parent/s to show up, or make the meeting, and, you have 24 kids like that to do, the logistics of just doing the IEP's is enough to make you quit, much less actually trying to teach 4 subjects, to 3 grades, with classes up to 24, and, half of the students in each class can't read(this was my last middle school job), in a building my doctor was convinced was filled with mold.
Real, quick solutions are to change the system. The common law had it right, with 14 being the age of majority, and, at that age, you should be responsible for
your actions. 7-14 we need to try major crimes as adults.
WHY? If the gang bangers can't use 14-18 year olds to do crimes, they are going to go younger.
Also, accept everyone isn't going to college, and along a Euro model, provide trade training in high school.
Dumb down the text books and materials, back to the level we had as kids. Being able to do the work, and, get a decent grade, in a reasonable amount of time, provides for a balanced life style. Currently, the teaching materials are being dictated by the top 2% of the society, the facist-liberals, who insist that what worked for them, being
full time, facist studying monsters, should be the deprived life style that all students should have. I was a 99.8% SAT/ACT 3.5 gpa high school student. However, my female contemporaries, who didn't play sports, and did nothing but study, are now administrators, and run our schools. They did NOT have balanced lives, since, at that time, female sports were not avaliable, or encouraged. This group has designed, and painted us into this corner. In great part, this was due to education being the only avenue for intelligent women to go into at the time.
And, this is the last bit of my rant:
My Mexican kids HAD balanced lives . They were at the bottom of their class, but, they played sports, they went to soccer games, they have great social groups, they worked in their families businesses and had money the other kids didn't. They took off December and January, and spent two months in Mexico, playing in the warm sand, and enjoying the ocean. They came to school a month late, for the same reason. THEY HAVE FUN, AND ENJOY LIFE. That joy of life, we are driving out of our society, with taxes, and absurd standards for students.
Maybe the Mexicans have it right. Come here, work for 6 months, make enough money to live like a king in Mexico for the other 6 months, and, don't pay taxes here, because the income is too low.
Finally: PAY TEACHERS MORE, SO YOU CAN MAKE A DECENT LIVING. Math teachers qualifications, for Kali schools, pretty much insure they can make 80 grand, starting, in private business. Why teach math?
I bowl with a retired LEO, and his son, soon to be LEO. Why? They figure the pay is far better then teaching, and, they know what they face, and would much rather be able to carry a gun, and, have their own 'blue' gang...
S
PS
I'm at a real crossroads right now, wondering what to do...
