(home)school in the news

Around here we typically only discuss the pro-homeschooling arguments, like this recent Washington Post article. Well, this week on the Diane Rehm show there was a pretty balanced discussion between pro-homeschooling reps from the HSLDA and some Stanford professor arguing for greater oversight of homeschoolers. Both sides raise some good ideas and it's a pretty good all around discussion. (Thanks to my attorney for sending the link.)

And, then, for another side of the story altogether, here's a link to a video highlighting some really interesting educational advances the Tampa, Florida school district is experimenting with. If this had been going on when I was in high school, I would have ran away from home just to go to school in Tampa! The video tries to explain the situation like it's controversial or something, but, they're just putting a negative spin on it.

Ok, yes I'm being completely sarcastic there. That link is to a news video describing three separate arrests in two weeks in Tampa of women teachers who were having sex with their 14-15 year old male students. That's THREE completely separate incidents in two weeks in one city. It apparently brings the total in Tampa up to 10 since 1995. I'm sure this is nothing new. It's very likely that women teachers have been seducing students since the 1870's and we're just now starting to pay attention to it. Just as male teachers have been doing the same thing (but in much higher numbers that hardly ever get media attention).

Other than the prevalence rate the only real difference seems to be that men get sent to prison and women get probation and told not to do it again. But, it makes sense. Judges don't like sending pretty women to jail. There are good reasons for this. I guarantee that if you're a judge and you send a pretty woman off to jail... she definitely won't sleep with you. Nothing turns a women off like incarceration! Probation on the other hand... totally different story.

And, finally (and more seriously), here's an article from an Arizona paper about some parents of autistic kids who are having quite a bit of difficulty with their local school district. The parents have organized and are trying to collectively encourage the school district to treat their special-needs children humanely and to, you know, educate them. Here's a good paragraph from the article:

District officials argue that the complaint process in some cases didn't end the way that parents would like, dismissing concerns about specific administrators who in one case denied a mother's request that staff members stop using physical force on her 5-year-old son.

The comments in the article are pretty interesting as well. Lots of fed up and frustrated parents and a few pro-establishment folks who feel that parents who complain too much when school staff use "physical force" on their autistic 5 year old kids are just a bunch of "whiners." It's like: Dude... you're kid's autistic. What'd you expect?

Well, that last bit was supposed to be more sarcasm, but there may be a point there. If you have a child with special learning needs and you send them to an average American public school... what do you expect? If you aren't rich enough to move to an affluent neighborhood or to put them in a private school you're just kind of screwed. Or, to be more precise, the students are screwed and the parents just have to put up with it.

So, I guess the overarching lesson is this: If your child is attending public school but is autistic or has other special needs... or if they go to school in Tampa... they're screwed.