Rahm Emanuel sends children to prestigious private schools rather than Chicago Public Schools. Photo via Rahm Emanuel photostream Flickr Commons.

When it comes to the many challenges facing Chicago parents and education, what’s good enough for the goose is not good enough for the gander.

When Chicago Mayor Rahm Emanuel settles into his charming little upscale neighborhood on Chicago’s North side, he had to make a difficult decision — will his children live like the hoi polloi in Chicago or will they live like spoiled, rich, protected,  limo escorted privileged kids with access to alternatives? Well, of course it’s the latter.

Rahm and his wife have decided that his children will not experience public schools like the rest of the regular folks even though — contrary to popular belief — there are some outstanding schools within the CPS system. One thing that CPS does well is their magnet schools which give children an opportunity to take courses outside mainstream offerings and challenge them academically to excel. Some schools even offer Japanese in middle school grades and offer impressive gifted programs. Unfortunately for Rahm, the house that he and his wife chose was just outside the boundary of one of those magnet schools. This put Emanuel in a predicament.

If he chose a house on the right side of the tracks, would his decision to send his children to one of the most prestigious schools in all of Chicago been met with even more disdain? Could you imagine the headlines? ‘Good Chicago school not good enough for Rahm’s kids?’

Whatever the reason, Emanuel is sending his children 30 minutes away to attend the same school, The Lab at University of Chicago, where Barrack and Michelle Obama sent their children. (Of course, it was only a 10 minute commute for the Obamas when they lived in Chicago versus the 30 minute plus commute via car the Emanuel kids will have to endure.)

During the election period, Emanuel side-stepped questions from the press, asking him if he would send his children to Chicago Public Schools. He simply stated that he and his wife were undecided. Had he been more truthful, he would have said that the decision would be put off until after he was elected so to not offend anyone.

Emanuel released an official statement about the private school scandal, which read in part, “My children get me as a parent, not as the mayor. So it’s a decision Amy and I will make. We’ll do (what) is best for them as children and their education.”

Translation: No ‘good’ parent in their right mind would send their child to a Chicago Public School.

That’s all fine and dandy, however, when former-Mayor Daley took control away from the state of Illinois to run the Chicago schools, claiming he could do it better, the representation of CPS by the mayor came with the job whether Emanuel likes it or not.

In an interview Emanuel gave to NBC News’ Mary Ann Ahern, he was so put off by the journalist questioning his reason for sending his kids to private schools and her wanting an explanation as to how that might look to the average voter, he had a melt -down.  Emanuel, who has been an outspoken critic of the teachers and the public school system and was, in part, elected to systematically improve the schools for all children, not just from totally unacceptable to a little unacceptable. This would be a victory he would take to the next election without any shame even though it’s likely that Emanuel will never fix the school system enough to allow his own children to be handicapped by the school system he’s been entrusted to run.

When Ahern questioned Emanuel, he got pissed and left the interview. Not only did he leave, but he pointed his finger at Ms. Ahern’s head and scolded her in a demeaning way. He snapped —  how dare she ask where his children were going to school.

It’s a legitimate question though. If the schools are not good enough for our elected officials, why are we elevating and empowering those who look upon us as chumps?  If the average person’s right to a decent education is only extended to the powerful, wealthy and politicians, how will the problems plaguing our schools ever get fixed?

Another thing, Mr. Emanuel, plenty of famous people have attended Chicago Public Schools. Just ask your buddy Rod Blogojevich. He went to CPS’ and look where it got him!

The post Chicago Mayor Rahm Emanuel’s kids too good to go to public schools appeared first on Imperfect Parent.

How beneficial is homework? Photo via stock.xchng

You know what I hated about school? Homework.

You know what I loved about summer? No homework.

Homework for young children — let’s not fool ourselves — is homework for parents. Now, I realize that America currently ranks #25 in most academic studies compared to the rest of the world and that homework is vital to the overall learning process and academic achievement (whatever that means), but sometimes I have to wonder if the amount of homework equates to higher scores and advanced learning.

I suppose you can look at it one of two ways, those children who struggle with homework are likely the children that could use the extra help. In these cases, parents are forced to take on the role of academic tutor. In the event that the child has not yet learned the concepts, parents turn from tutor to primary educator.

But really, is homework all that it’s cracked up to be? How much is it really helping our children?

While I’m sure there are two sides to the argument, there is compelling evidence to suggest that homework isn’t helping our children achieve world-wide standards and may even be counterproductive. According to physorg.com, case studies show that American children are getting more and more homework while their overseas peers are getting less and the correlation might surprise you. In higher school achievement countries like Japan, there is a downward trend towards homework while in America, the trend seems to be towards an increase in homework. The results seem to suggest this has yielded a net zero affect.

“Their findings indicated a frequent lack of positive correlation between the average amount of homework assigned in a nation and corresponding level of academic achievement. For example, many countries with the highest scoring students, such as Japan, the Czech Republic and Denmark, have teachers who give little homework. “At the other end of the spectrum, countries with very low average scores — Thailand, Greece, Iran — have teachers who assign a great deal of homework,” Baker noted.”

Part of the problem, as noted in the case summary, is that a child’s parent(s) have a vast variation in education levels and time to support homework. In poorer families, homework can be the cause of additional stress and in wealthier families, the stress translates to resentment of busy work within very busy family dynamics. In other words, the education system cannot foist its own ideal way for a student to spend his/her time outside of school and might fail to consider the differences in parental resources.

I see this whole mindset as part of the problem. For children needing extra help, homework is not always the solution. More education support and “extra help” resources (and most importantly, time to do homework and ask questions) need to go towards the proper nurturing and tutoring of that child and not simply sending homework home with the expectation that caregivers will properly teach the child. Even among the most well intended parents, school is much different today and I know myself, I have been guilty of even telling my children the “wrong” answer, because I’m not currently in Algebra and I don’t have a teaching degree.

If a child is failing to learn the needed concepts in school, that is the real issue here and no amount of homework is going to make up for that. For the child who is doing well in school, homework can amount to nothing more than busy work. In fact, depriving a child, in my opinion, of recreation outside of school in the name of doing homework is not only counterproductive, it’s insane. Look at our overall scores nationwide, it simply isn’t working.

Do you have a parenting related debate topic you’re dying to write about? Email us at admin (at) imperfectparent.com to get your voice heard! If we use your debate post, we’ll give you a few bucks and a high five.

The post There’s no way to sugar coat it, homework sucks appeared first on Imperfect Parent.

One in four adults say they read no books at all in the past year, according to an Associated Press-Ipsos poll released Tuesday. Of those who did read, women and seniors were most avid, and religious works and popular fiction were the top choices.
The survey reveals a nation whose book readers, on the whole, can hardly be called ravenous. The typical person claimed to have read four books in the last year — half read more and half read fewer. Excluding those who hadn’t read any, the usual number read was seven.

“I just get sleepy when I read,” said Richard Bustos of Dallas, Texas, a habit with which millions of Americans can doubtless identify. Bustos, a 34-year-old project manager for a telecommunications company, said he had not read any books in the last year and would rather spend time in his backyard pool.

Hey, I know fiction has been on the downside for a bit, in a bit of a slump, but reading only four books in a year? That seems incomprehensible to me. For those of you who have stopped by my blog you know this. There are books everywhere-four a week, even.

“Fiction just doesn’t interest me,” said Bob Ryan, 41, who works for a construction company in Guntersville, Alabama. “If I’m going to get a story, I’ll get a movie.”

The NEA released a study in 2007, “To Read or Not To Read”. What they found was ‘Americans are reading less, Americans are reading less well, and that the decline in reading has serious civic, social and economic implications‘. Programs are sprouting up such as The Big Read (NEA) in an effort to get people to pick up a book and ‘restore reading to the center of American culture’. I want to be optimistic and say, Yes! This will work!  Then I think, as long as we have people saying “I get sleepy when I read” and other such things, we’re not going to get very far.

The post “1 In 4, 4 In a Year” appeared first on Imperfect Parent.

The Department of Children & Family Services did nothing short of turning their back on reports of abuse offered by witnesses who contacted the agency on the children’s behalf. Many serious and obvious red flags witnessed by the department itself were systematically ignored. If blaming the school district is their way of scapegoating, there is plenty of blame to go around. These children were discarded and knowingly left in the hands of madmen because government employees decided that the abuse wasn’t heinous nor egregious enough to be worth their time.

And their pain was not brief. According to the Sun Sentinal:

There Nubia and her twin brother, Victor, were “repeatedly hit, punched beaten…bound and left for days on end” and locked inside a bathroom by their adoptive parents, according to police

The parents are now in jail and charged with bludgeoning Nubia to death. Her body was found Valentine’s Day in the back of a pickup truck alongside Interstate 95 in West Palm Beach. Victor barely survived a chemical dousing.

Getting back to the homeschooling aspect of this story, as this is an interesting and viable point. A Florida Board of Education member, Roberto Martinez, made the problem of unmonitored homeschooling clear when he said this about the Victor and Nubia:

These kids were not home schooled. They were home-detained, tortured and executed.

The state of Florida acknowledged that there is far too little oversight of homeschooled children especially for those children who are at risk, but how do you continue to follow and monitor these children without legitimate homeschooling parents, who often want to be completely off the public school grid, getting their panties in a wad?

This isn’t the only case that raises concerns about the homeschooling excuse. The Sun Sentinal goes on to report that another child, young 7-year-old Roberto Fortin III, was also taken out of the Miami-Dade school system to supposedly be homeschooled and although these families are completely unrelated, young Roberto was found many months later at a local Children’s hospital…

…malnourished, in diapers, and covered in wounds that had become infected. He weighed only 40 pounds

Since I write many new stories about child abuse on this very site, my anecdotal experience has shown me that half of all severely beaten and tortured children are either not in school or supposedly “homeschooled.”

The real question is, will homeschooling parents allow more transparency at the expense of their privacy and rights to ensure that children are properly protected? If objections occur, one has to wonder just how altruistic these homeschoolers are. Children being removed from society cannot be the loophole which allows these types of crimes against children to go unnoticed. Perhaps children should be required to check in with the school, in person, once a month. I don’t know what the answer is, but the current setup certainly isn’t to the benefit of all children.

The post When homeschooling means torture appeared first on Imperfect Parent.

While New York City’s Mayor Bloomberg agreed to close down it’s city’s “rubber rooms”, which are places where teachers spend their day reading magazines and doodling while they collect paychecks because their misconduct prevents them from continuing to teach in the classroom. While the city tries to fire these teachers accused of misconduct, their hands are tied as the unions render them almost complete immunity against termination.

It’s not necessarily that I think teacher’s are paid too much nor do I begrudge them their benefits, I’m just tired of hearing teachers complain about how they’re over-worked and underpaid. Sure, they might have to take work home with them. (Welcome to the real world toots!) Most of America works 8am – 5pm, without extended vacations around holidays, they have to scramble for child care on Columbus Day type “holidays” and teacher institute days. Plus, the vast majority of the working stiffs in this country work all summer. Gasp!

Case in point — my middle school-er had a 5 1/2 day weekend this past weekend for 2 teacher institute days before the weekend and Columbus day after the weekend. Teacher institute (at least in my neck of the woods) are days in which teachers are supposed to be getting caught up on their piles and piles of work. We sent my son’s science teacher an email last Thursday (the school district’s preferred method of parent/teacher contact), on said institute day, to inquire about my son’s grades, the potential for extra credit and to clarify missing assignments. Here it is, almost a week later, with my son doing poorly in science and we’ve yet to receive a response from her.

So, what do you think? Do you think teachers get a bad rap or are you tired of them holding children hostage while they strike for higher pay, as our taxes continue to rise and other countries continue to surpass the U.S. in education and rudimentary skills?

Am I just being totally unfair here? Maybe I don’t understand the extent of their hard work. Perhaps there are some teachers out there that can make me feel better when I see teachers go on strike.

The post Teachers: Working hard or hardly working? appeared first on Imperfect Parent.

The 2010 Kids and Family Reading Report, released Wednesday and commissioned by Scholastic Inc., offers a mixed portrait of e-books and families. Around six out of 10 of those between ages 9 and 17 say they’re interested in reading on an electronic device such as the Kindle or the iPad. Around one out of three from the same age group say they’d read more “for fun” if more books were available on a digital reader.

Studies have shown that kids are exposed too much ‘screen time’ (television, games, ‘learning’ games from companies such as LeapFrog, etc.), but what about e-books?

The 2010 report shows, as other studies have, a decline in reading for fun as children grow older. More than half read for fun between ages 6 and 8, but the percentage drops to around 25 percent by ages 15 through 17 and just 20 percent for boys in that age group. Newman sees technology as both a problem and possible solution.

“We know that around age 8 they (children) start to lose interest in reading,” Newman says. “Obviously, digital media is competing for kids’ attention. It’s very important that we as publishers make sure we’re engaging kids in reading for fun. There’s an opportunity to use technology to engage kids. … We can have great content presented in a digital way.”

The concept of e-books is relatively new, but I really don’t think they will be going away anytime soon. There are several devices you can choose from now-of course, there is Amazon.com’s Kindle, Barnes and Noble’s Nook, and the iPad. I must admit that I am a little hesitant to buy one myself for several reasons- there is something so satisfying about the physicality of a books: holding it in your hand, turning the pages, the feeling of comfort being surrounded by books. Also, there is the price. It’s a little steep right now. The Kindle and Nook aren’t so bad, but they are soon to be on their way out as more e-readers become available. Right now the iPad Tablet goes for $546, or so. It’ll eventually go down-remember when CD players first came out? They were over $700. You can now get a portable CD player for $30 or less.

What it comes down to is this: if it gets them reading, I don’t see the problem. I’d rather have my kid reading an e-book than playing a video game or watching a movie.

Thoughts?

See the entire Kids and Family Reading Report here. Scroll down to the bottom for a PDF version.

The post Kids and E-Books: What Do You Think? appeared first on Imperfect Parent.

Of the colleges surveyed by Kaplan Test Prep and Admissions (which is part of The Washington Post Co.), 77 percent reported that parental involvement is increasing. As a result, 61 percent reported they were developing new programs for parents — special Internet sites, seminars and tours. Other schools “are cutting parents out of the admission process entirely,” Kaplan states in a release.

New programs just for parents? A ‘how not to hover workshop’? Sounds like a waste of money and a good way to give the kids a complex of some sort. Some parents are even going so far as to

…filling out applications for their children to calling the admissions office with questions, to even writing their children’s personal essays,” said Justin Serrano, president of pre-college programs at Kaplan.

Well, why don’t you just install a chip in your child so you can track everything they do. Better yet, GPS them! Tap they’re cell phones! I mean, really! Writing their essays for them? How are they going to learn anything if Mom and Dad do everything for them?

However, there are some colleges that set boundaries and do not allow the parents to hover, but talk directly and only to the student.

For more info and stats go here or here.

The post Helicopter Parenting Leaks Into College For Some appeared first on Imperfect Parent.

She’s suing the city of New York for $1 Million.

Alexa Gonzalez was led out of her school in the borough of Queens by police who had been called after she was caught scribbling “I love my friends Abby and Faith” and “Lex was here 2/1/10” with an erasable marker pen.

She claims she was then “dragged” out of her Spanish class by her teacher and an assistant principal to the dean’s office where police were called.

Her lawsuit also claims she was later handcuffed to a pole for two hours in an “enclosed room” at a local police station.

Lawyers for Alexa, who is suing for £657,000 [about one million US dollars] in damagers, and her mother are claiming excessive use of force and violation of her rights.

The post Girl Arrested For Drawing on Desk Sues…. appeared first on Imperfect Parent.

Rep. Jim Bird, R-West Jordan, is sponsoring a bill that would allow school boards to sell advertising space on the exteriors of school buses. He said the Jordan School District’s financial troubles inspired him to run the bill. The Jordan board decided last week to cut hundreds of jobs and increase class sizes to deal with an estimated $30 million budget shortfall next school year.

There are a few stipulations: No alcohol, tobacco, drugs, gambling or sexual material are to be advertised and it must be age appropriate.

Naturally, there are concerns about the kids’ over-exposure to commercialism and the ads causing too much distraction all around.

“Somebody’s reading an advertisement and not realizing that the bus is stopping,” said Bob Riley, executive director of the National Association of State Directors of Pupil Transportation Services. “We want them seeing one thing when they see a school bus, and that’s basically a yellow flag of caution.”

Childhood advocates Campaign For A Commercial-Free Childhood have spoken out on the subject as well, throughout other states.

What really irks me-amazingly-is not the fact that they are considering putting the ads on, but that they think the kids won’t actually pay attention to the ads.

One parent is actually quoted as saying:

“I don’t think they’d pay attention,” said Geurts, who has three teenagers and an 11-year-old in the Davis District.

Hate to say it, but Guerts’ statement seems a bit naive. Of course they’d pay attention. Kids pick up on everything.

However,

Parent Trissy Bawden, also of Bountiful, called putting ads on buses, “a seemingly simple way to get some money for education which is much needed.”

Her husband, Sam Bawden, said he’s not as concerned about his four young children being exposed to ads as he is about them suffering the impacts of school budget cuts.

“The education budget is a bigger issue in my mind than commercialization,” he said.

Read the entire article here.

The post Ads On School Buses? appeared first on Imperfect Parent.

He said eliminating 12th grade altogether would have saved $102 million.

If given the option to skip 12th grade that would save something like $60 million. Utah is certainly a state that could use some cuts here and there (especially when their state deficit runs to the tune of $700 million) , but I’m not sure cutting out 12th grade-cutting education– is the answer.

Are kids really ready to forgo Senior year?  J. D. Williams doesn’t think so-

J.D. Williams, student body president at West Jordan High School in Utah, told the Los Angeles Times that he’s against the plan.

“I need this year,” Williams said. “My parents are against it… All the teachers at the school are against it. I’m against it.”

Utah also wants to put ads on school buses to combat the state’s debt.

Neither idea is going over so well.

On cutting 12th grade:

“It is very shortsighted,” John Balden, president of the Utah chapter of the American Federation of Teachers, told ABC News. “Students don’t just play in 12th grade. They really do study. In higher education we find an awful lot of students unprepared for college. Twelfth grade is really a necessary grade.”

Many students actually use 12th grade to get everything in place and are thankful for the benefits the extra time provides.

What happens if Senior year gets the axe?

The post In Utah, 12th Grade Optional appeared first on Imperfect Parent.