Real solutions the district ignores preferring a photo-op instead (rough draft)

Kids need to take fewer classes and they need to be shorter and closer together. With the A/B block an absence, a test day or a holiday can create a four or five-day window between classes. A lot of these kids need constant reinforcement for the transfer of knowledge to take place and quite frankly for a lot of teachers the workshop model of teaching that the district insists we do creates a lot of down time. Ninety minutes is way to long for many of our kids.

A full load in college is 4 classes; kids at Jackson I believe take seven, six should be the most and at least one should be an elective.

A lot of those kids don’t have room for electives even with the seven classes but kids need a safe spot on their schedules; at least one class should be one that they picked. Remember a lot of these kids are marginally interested in school at best; we don’t have the kids we wish we did, we have the kids we do and we should plan accordingly.

As far as offering teachers that transfer to Jackson the opportunity to earn a masters degree, yeah that sounds great but what teachers are looking for is support and less on their plates, convince then that they will have disciplined and orderly classrooms and they will be supported by the admins and they will worry more about how they teach than their lesson plans and word walls then I believe our best teachers would go there willingly. Teachers here in the district are also often told not to write referrals or fail kids; they need to be trusted to do both when a kid deserves it.

We also need to bring back student accountability. Right now kids can take grade recovery for any reason, don’t show up grade recovery, make no effort grade recovery, act up in class and stop other kids from learning, why make up the class with grade recovery. Attendance, punctuality and behavior no longer count for anything.

Then did you know what the difference in curriculum is between the worst student at Jackson who isn’t interested in school at all and the best student who wants to be a doctor or an engineer is? There is none, we need multiple curriculums that along with academics teach, trades, skills and the arts.

We have solutions within our grasps but the district falls back on, more mentors and bribes for teacher; neither of which has been working.

Rigorous classes, disciplined hallways, student accountability and teacher and student buy in are what our schools desperately need and until we address those problems we will have our problems.