American Educational SystemEssay Preview: American Educational SystemReport this essayEarly education is just as equally important as later education in middle school and high school. The more knowledge that students learn earlier in their lives, the better they will do later in school and the world. In order to show that this is working, test scores need to be boosted. In order to do this, classroom sizes must me be lowered by lowering the student teacher ratio. By doing this, teachers will only need to pay attention to a smaller number of students and they in turn will be able to learn more at a faster rate.
When teachers get tenured they are guaranteed to be able to work till they retire. The short time it takes to become tenured isnt as big of an issue as the permanency of the tenure. Teachers get tenured then tend to slack off except when they are being inspected. This is what should really change about being tenured. It should only guarantee teachers a certain amount of time similar to a contract that pro athletes get, but with less zeros in the teachers check.
President Bush plans to grant over six and a half billion dollars towards the Head Start program. This program is meant to teach kids from birth through age 5 physical, emotional, social, and cognitive skills they will need to be successful in school and the rest of their lives. A question of whether kids should learn the alphabet and read, or if they should be taught manners and instructive behavior remains. Personally I believe the program should focus on a combination of both manners and educational instruction. One does not work well without the other anyway so it makes no sense not to have them balanced. By doing this, we give children that early educational advancement that is so needed along with basic manner instruction.
HARRIS, PAUL: Do you think the Head Start program is going to have big impact today?
CANDY P. HARRIS: My sense is that the impact it would have, based on current numbers, is pretty negative. I think a lot of schools have been seeing the problem this way, that if it were to go away, there would be just a number on top of all that.
HARRIS: President Bush, you’ve written four of five books on Head Start. How will your ideas be implemented into today’s classrooms, especially to include language proficiency in the school’s classroom programs?
JUAN GONZĂLEZ: Well, one of my biggest influences in the early days, actually, was that when I was in the first school in Arkansas, there were all kind of different, different ways in which we were able to take some kind of a “I want to do this now!” (laughter) approach to the school board or, you know, just getting to know each one of the staff members and making sure they really understood what it was about them and it worked well. We were very, very excited to get to the point where we actually felt that we were going to go toe to toe with each other in terms of providing a quality educational experience for our students.
[Inaugural: “My Brother, I’m Going to Teach You This, But You Don’t Want Some Me” by Karen Klempere, courtesy of the National Center for Educational Statistics.]
CANDY P. HARRIS: This is from today, the day after I took over here in Little Rock. This is a very special day for you. Thanks so much.
GONZĂLEZ: President Bush, will you have to change the curriculum as part of your national push for the Head Start program?
WOLF: I certainly understand that. It’s not easy. We must have a more balanced approach to educating our students.
I think there are some critical things we should be focusing on right now. First off, we have to go right back to the fact that all children who are on the Early Years Program, those who are currently on the Head Start program, are not as prepared for school or for life as they were when they were conceived.
Second, we have to create an environment that’s safe, that has both safety and a sense of dignity at the end of the day.
HARRIS: When I joined the American Academy of Pediatrics, I spoke to the chief public health officer last year. Dr. Jill Stein is the woman who says Head Start is an unnecessary public health policy failure. She writes a book called Healthy Heart.
The answer to Head Start is simple: It’s not a good program. Not by a long shot. Not just for kids. And we will continue to grow
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