As a bit of background to this, I am a relative newcomer to politics. However, I have always been interested in working with children, even when I was a child myself. I am graduating college in May with a degree in Child Development, and I want to use that degree to politically advocate on behalf of children. I had been wanting to write out my policy opinions for a while, anyways, and I was motivated to do so over the weekend.
My husband and I had a conversation at a restaurant. It started as a conversation about affirmative action. We talked about how it was never meant to be a permanent thing. It was always supposed to be temporary... only in place so long as it was needed. There is an obvious flaw somewhere in the system. We know this just by the very fact that affirmative action is still needed. So how do we address this? How do we make sure that the professional workforce is more representative of the general population?
I believe this needs to start in the schools.
If the professional workforce is going to be more representative of the general population, then people need equal opportunities. The place for these opportunities to start is not in the workforce. By the time people reach the workforce, they have already received their education. Unless the place of business is going to give the employee continuing education, this is the end of their education. But, we all know that one has a better chance at a good professional position with a good-quality college education.
The basis for that college education is the schooling children receive early in life. We need to start improving the poor and under-performing schools. They do not have good quality teachers, and they do not have the funds to get the educational materials they need. We need to give these schools more funds, give good teachers incentives to work in these under-performing schools, and get good counselors in there. The most imperative part of the whole process is that the children build their self-esteem. Without self-esteem, there will not be performance, there will be failure. The failures will confirm everything that society has ever told them about being poor and/or a minority: You can't do it. These kids need to know that they CAN do it, and that there are people in place to help them achieve.
We have standards in place. The people who teach our children, no matter where they teach, must have college educations. So why are these things not in place already? Why are they not happening?
I argue that one of the biggest reasons this is not happening is No Child Left Behind. NCLB has turned children into standards and test scores instead of the unique individuals that they are. It forces teachers to teach to the tests instead of tailoring their curriculum to the students' interests and needs. Schools are afraid to do anything out of the norm for fear of failing the tests, because if the school's students do not make the grade, the school's funding is yanked. How does this make any sense? We have a missile defense program to send WMD's into space. We don't need WMD's in space. But we keep trying it. We keep testing it. It has failed every test it has ever been put through. But instead of taking away it's funding, we keep pouring billions of dollars into it every year. Why is sending WMD's into space more important than making sure our children are learning?
NCLB also makes it more difficult to make sure schools as a whole are making the grade. In an effort to mainstream children with disabilities and to keep schools from "cheating" their scores to keep from losing their funding, the bill states that only 5% of the schools students can have exceptions made for special needs. There are many schools, especially those in poor and minority neighborhoods, that have many more than 5% of their student population receiving services for special needs. So these children are being forced to take the tests with their "normal" peers and perform to their level. Not only does this not make sense for them, but think of the toll this must take on their self-esteem. These children are being made to do something that is beyond their level of development, and they are failing through no fault of their own.
The first thing we must do to make sure that all children have equal opportunities is to either seriously over-haul NCLB, or just repeal it all together. In its current form, it is doing more harm to our nation's children than good.
The next thing we must do is to make sure that a quality education is available to all children, and that education goes through college. There are many steps to take to ensure this happens.
First, the age that teens can work and drop out of school should be raised to 18 instead of 16, except in unusual situations. In that case, say the family is in extreme poverty and needs another income to survive, the 16 year old may obtain a work permit. This will ensure that most children will receive at least a high school education. However, even when a teen has a work permit, they should still go to school and work only part time during the school year. This will alert the government which families are in such dire need that their children must work, and then the government can step in and help with food, shelter, and clothing.
Second, funds should be available to make sure that every child can go to school. If school is not free, preschool through college, for every child, then at the very least funds should be made available for those who cannot afford it. In the system we live under now, the mantra is, "You have to have money to make money." Since one cannot get a good-paying, professional career without a good education, this becomes true even before children understand what it means. The poor can go to college now, but they come out of it very much in debt, so in the first years of their career, they are not making any money, while the rich who were able to pay for it out-of-pocket come out of college already getting richer. This is not equal opportunity. School should be available to all, without worrying about how they will pay for it.
Third, teachers should be required to take child development classes, to learn how children learn, and then teach so that they will learn better. For example, elementary school children should not be sitting behind desks listening to the teacher talk and doing worksheets all day. This is not how they learn. They learn through their senses, they learn through play. They are, in other words, kinesthetic learners. They don't learn one plus one equals two by seeing the numbers written out on paper. That is an abstract representation, and kids that age don't think abstractly yet. They learn by counting things in the environment around them. Let them build with blocks, let them take two bites of an apple, let them listen to two tones played on a guitar. That is how they learn, and when taught and tested in ways that they understand, they perform much better on tests.
Which brings me to my fourth point: standardized tests for elementary school children should not all be paper and pencil worksheets. Test them in ways that they understand. Build the skills they will need for the next grades, but don't force them into things that their little minds simply aren't ready for yet.
Also, teachers should have better compensation for the work that they do, and should not be prevented from or penalized for unionizing if they don't get it. What better or more noble work is there than to raise the future generation? These people are teaching our future CEOs, Presidents, doctors, police. We want them to be of the highest quality and we want to make sure they are fairly compensated for the work that they do. They should also get incentives should they choose to teach in inner-city or impoverished schools. Teaching in those environments brings a whole new set of challenges to an already challenging job, and yet those children deserve a good education as much as the rest. So, if a teacher is willing to take on those challenges, they should be given incentives to do so.