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The War on Kids: The Definitive Documentary on the Failure of Public Education.
DaltheJigsaw
Mountain View Veteran
Comments
All the best,
Todd
So true. I believe we, as a society, have come to rely WAY too much on the state (government) to raise our children. People actually can learn a lot from just living life, but we think they should be chained to a desk all day in order to get information crammed into them. Learning is not a one-way activity. Learning is done by the child/person who also functions as their own teacher, not solely by an outside person we deem as the teacher. The teacher is only a part of the equation, and I think we rely too much on the teacher and we are not looking so much at the activity of the child and the entire process as a whole. Yes, they can learn many valuable things from a school. But, unfortunately, they can learn many hurtful things in school as well as NOT learn many things that they (and we) could benefit from them knowing, because parents (and society as a whole) think that the child is learning everything they need to know at school. We are selling them short by a long shot.
But, we also live in a world where 2 working parents is the norm, and in many people's eyes it is a requirement to afford everything they need to buy/pay for. I can't tell you how many parents hardly wait until kids start school so they are gone most of the day. Sad. Why have children if you can't wait to get rid of them?
What is terrifying to me is that now the government is suggesting compulsive preschool. So 4 year olds would be required to attend school. I want the child psychologists and parenting professionals and parents who are actually mindful to stand up and be the voice for these kids. No 4 year old should be mandated to sit in school. Yes, there are some 4 year olds that would be better off in school than at home, but we shouldn't take away the rights of the parents to make this decision.
@Karasti- you are right about our economics having a big role in this. How much more of our lives are we going to hand over to this system? We are giving it our consciousness and our children's consciousness-- for what?
My 2 oldest currently attend public school, by their own choice. I homeschooled my middle child for a time. Even though they attend school, we do a lot of enrichment activities at home and I will remove them from school for various activities and things. of course for them to get excused absences I have to prove where we were. Many times they'll get more out of a family field trip than they'll get in 3 months of school on the same subject. My youngest is 4. He is not in preschool or daycare, and I have not decided if he will attend school or not. On top of all the other arguments against school, I am not convinced yet that he will have adequate medical care while. He is a diabetic and requires monitoring several times a day, and our school does not even have a designated nurse. She splits her weekly time between 3 school districts. He's not remotely old enough to manage it himself, so, we'll see. I rather like that he is exposed only to what I allow, rather than conversations at the bus stop by a bunch of teenagers talking about the oral sex they received last weekend.
I was a school principal for many years. Do you know what our expulsion rate was? Something like .0025. Do you know what our suspension rate was? Something like .025.
And, except for heinous situations (such as bringing a gun or drugs to school), most suspensions and expulsions took place only after repeated efforts to deal with a student in other ways (ways almost often fought against by the parents).
Our school is in a very small district (we have about 400 kids K-12). While the expulsion rate and even suspension rates are low, those are hardly telling of discipline policy. Especially when the teacher has been there many years (some of them were my teachers when I was in school 25 years ago) they are given more free reign and questioning their methods only brings harsh reaction. In our school if a kid is standing outside in line to go back into the school, if they talk, they have to stand up against the brick wall for the entire next recess the following day, 25 minutes. Including in the winter. They still make kids stand in the corner in classrooms.
Plus there is this huge disconnect between the older teachers and the parents. The teachers just want you to release your kid to them and trust them blindly. They think because they have been teaching since the disco era, that they never have to change or adjust their methods. Regardless of how much we now know about dealing with kids who have various special needs, some teachers refuse to acknowledge that and change their ways. They just blame the parents. It's really hard to work with teachers like that. Just like for teachers I'm sure it's hard to deal with parents who think their kids can do no wrong. But there has to be a balance, and I personally have had a hard time with several old school teachers being unwilling to work with me. I can tell them very simple things that have worked with my son in his other school in the past, and they look at me and say "we don't do that here." Even if I offer to pay for materials or whatever. They just won't do it, and they apparently say no just because they can. Then, they are wondering why nothing they do works for half the kids in their class and why they are the bad luck teacher with the horrible classroom of kids.
Yes, it is true that the school where I spent the last half of my career was in an affluent neighborhood, but we also drew about 30% of our students from a corridor where there was relatively high crime, shootings at night, a fairly high amount of drug use, and an area where our students would tell me, "Don't come over here after dark Mr. Lynch!"
Yes, you are very right about teachers often having a tendency to not want to change their ways. To be honest, most teachers just want to teach the same way they were taught. I often struggled to get teachers involved in inservices where they could learn new strategies for discipline or teaching/learning. And unfortunately, even then too many didn't get it. They seemed to miss the concept that when we teach you a new strategy, it doesn't mean you necessarily throw out all the old strategies. Some strategies you might replace, others you might keep in your bag of tricks, and then as a problem emerges you try to match the most effective strategy to the specific situation. It should be very much like my doctor's appointment yesterday. I've got a small tumor on the outside of the kidney. Sounds scary, but the doctor is very confident that I have lots of time to safely delay the surgery until a convenient time. Then, there are 3 strategies the surgeon can use, and together we will decide which is best. Rather than the type of doctor who just says, "I prefer this strategy when I do surgery...period."
I really like a new phrase you've coined for me...wish I could have used it before retirement: "disco-era teacher"!
It appears to me that Greene's ideas are nothing new, but that he has done a good job of bringing together in a coherent package things that many teachers and administrators have been doing for years. It also appears that he gears his efforts toward students with more significant issues, rather than the typical kid who behaves fairly well in school...not that some of the same principles shouldn't be incorporated in dealing with all students.
But again, teachers and administrators need to learn an incorporate a wide variety of strategies in dealing with student behaviors. I've yet to see a single program or approach that works for everyone.
Yeah, there really is no one way, though there are so many kids that seem to have related problems that you'd think they could get a bit better about handling those kids differently than "normal" kids and then the ones who are farther outside those ranges on a case by case basis. Now that my son is in middle school, things are much better. Elementary school was torture for both my kids. I can't wait to do it with a third (if we do). I might just homeschool him until he's middle school aged.
Will I watch the whole thing when I have more time? Perhaps.
But the reason I might not is because while I agree there are some very serious and significant issues with the way our institutionalized (public) education is presented and enforced on children, I did not see one single example of any solutions to these issues and problems! And please, don't try to sell me "home schooling" as the solution.... I'm not buying that bridge, either.
So, show me what that 'new and progressive' school situation can look like.... show me the happy children, eager to go to school, learning in new ways, being socialized in a positive manner, and expressing themselves - all while learning the things they need to learn to be productive and successful in life.
Show me that school.
Show me how it works, what alternative discipline is employed when kids misbehave, how the teachers motivate differently, how the kids respond differently, how they each contribute to new and exciting ways to teach, and to learn.
None of these problems presented in this documentary are really new, so if the documentary makers aren't going to show how to implement (new or radical) solutions.... what's the point of bitching about the same old problems?
I mean - did I miss "the solutions" by not catching the first 40 minutes?
They also did not make it a point to force a child to take certain classes for years and years (and sometimes the entire school career) that they did not enjoy. They still met state graduation requirements, but they were much more creative in what ways kids could learn math, or physics, or whatever. My sister actually went to an arts high school her last few years of school. She is currently a 4.0 student in college, and she learned math and physics by taking astronomy and dance. Some kids learned by taking shop. You do not have to learn math by sitting and memorizing equations to do 5 page problems. There are better ways.
Homeschooling is, and should be, a valid option. It is not the only option, of course, But thankfully it is an option for parents who feel school is doing more harm than good for their kids.
Almost anything would be an improvement over what we presently have, which are schools that force children into an unnatural, unhealthy sedentary situation for hours at a time (we wonder why obesity and herd mentality has become such an epidemic?), depriving them of their time, curiosity, and autonomy, and feeding them syllabi that are centered around standardized, mass-market tests. Most distressing to me is that no one will dare to question the fundamental assumptions and conceits on which out education system is built: simple things like, why do kids even need to be in a classroom setting to learn? Why do they need to be in such a setting nine months out of the year? Who says that "reading, writing, and arithmetic" are cornerstones of a modern-day education? Why not, instead, focus on critical thinking skills in general, with emphasis on applicability across disciplines?
We've also de-incentivized teaching as a profession: what human being would want to subject themselves to such an oppressive environment, such low wages, so much irrational bureaucracy, and be around so many demoralized kids five days a week? No one, who has any other option, would do that! Our best and brightest move on to other careers which are more lucrative, or at least more conducive to sanity.
School has it's place, especially for older students who are refining their interests. But we do too much to tell them what interests are "worthwhile."
We consider the few people who live their dream to be the very luckiest among us. There is NO reason we can't all do it. Except we've all bitten hook, line and sinker, the story that is given to us about why we need to do things the "right" way. We've given more value to accountants than artists. To owning things rather than just being. We do more and more, we buy more and more and then we retire and don't know what to do with ourselves, don't know who we married, or what we enjoy because we filled 30+ years of our lives with something we didn't really want to do because we bought the line that we had no choice. That is what we teach kids. Working against it, is really hard.
I think you have no concept at all of the effort in progressive school districts that goes into teacher inservice, parental involvement, and so forth. I've been there for 3 decades and done it. I've been in school systems that were very status quo. I've been in school systems where you feel like saying, "Hey, slow down, let's get it right before we move forward even further".
The 7 hour day? As opposed to the 6.5 hour day? Let's see, if you keep a 7 period day, that will give you another 4 minutes per class. That's not going to make a real difference. And if you want teachers to work another hour a day, then you better shovel up an appropriate raise in pay.
Now, you mention quantity versus quality. That's a very valid point. Our school system has a student population of about 1 million students. How can it not be "quantity"? My school had an average class size of about 25 (I'm talking real numbers, not the fake numbers the study show). Now, the longitudinal studies you like so much show that class size affects outcome only when it gets up to about 40/class (BTW, I don't agree). So, want to reduce class size to 20? Okay, it's gonna cost ya! In my school that would have been at least another quarter million dollars...or $11 million for our school system (and trust me, that's an extremely conservative estimate...it's probably more like double that since I didn't include teacher benefits like health insurance).
We (and many, many schools) didn't cater to the lowest denominator. Yes, we had special education programs and regular ed programs. We also had two levels of gifted classes and a number of other special programs that were targeted to small populations.
The current obesity problem has nothing to do with school. Students are as active in school as they've ever been. The current obesity problem is what American life has become. Kids follow their parents. Quit blaming everything on schools.
Why not focus on critical thinking skills? I can't speak for all schools, but there are plenty of schools and curricula that do. Back when I was in high school we learned all the major battles of the Civil War. You rarely see anything like that any more. You're more likely to see discussions about: "Was the United States justified in using the atomic bomb in World War II?"
And your overall mantra seems to be -- why doesn't somebody do something. And you blame it on the educators (and I know, some deserve some of the blame). Instead, blame it on who really runs the schools, and make no mistake, it's the Boards Of Education who make policy and pass budgets, and they're elected by people just like you.
What I am "blaming" (or rather criticizing) is the system itself. We don't really question it because it's like water to the fish. Being in education as long as you have, you've no doubt heard about Finland's success. In Finland, students do not begin school until 7, they don't receive homework until their teens, their selection process for teachers is highly competitive (as, I would argue, it should be), they grant those teachers greater autonomy over curricula, cap science classes at less than 20, and spend less per child than in the U.S. What is going on here?
Finland's success is usually attributed to education reform they had undertaken from the 1970s through the 1990s. These were decisions that policy-makers in that country made based on cultural values on equitable access to education and diversity. To what extent is Finland's success contingent upon the children's internalization of those cultural values and not necessarily the education system? It's hard to say. Certainly, within the U.S., we see cultural attitudes towards education making an impact on students' test scores, as those from households in which education is valued perform better, on average, than those in communities where education was not valued as much. It becomes a bit of a self-fulfilling prophecy for kids caught in this cycle.
It is not likely we will see a broad-reaching reform here in the U.S. that would shake up the system that is essentially a great-great-great-grandchild of the 19th century British grammar school system. It would require a huge shift in our general attitudes towards education and comes with risks that few policy-makers are brave enough to hedge. We have enough money and information now to move beyond broken programs (coughNoChildLeftBehindcough, coughTeachforAmericacough) and towards implementing what is actually beneficial. We have more of the world's top research universities than any other country. We have greater access to technology than many other developed nations. There is no reason for us to be falling behind like this.
You talk as if there is some big brother out there in UncleSamLand who is dictating what American education is to be like. There isn't. Federal government involvement in running schools is far less than people imagine. In 7 years as a principal, I had one telephone call from the feds, and that was about a special education legal case. Meanwhile I had daily calls from school board members elected at the local level and superintendents hired at the local level.
American education is what American citizens want it to be. For good or bad. The vast majority of the funding for our school was local funding, not federal funding, and not state funding. The county council held the purse strings and decided -- ultimately -- what the annual school budget would be. Not the state. Not the federal government. And I will tell you, that in many states, schools are forced by local budgets to not follow state mandates.
I have watched knock-down dragged-out fights on school boards about teaching the fundamentals or going beyond, or arts education, or having or not having physical education, or on how much to spend on the gifted programs. Who's doing the fighting -- the elected members of the school board.
Go ahead, run for school board, then if you get elected try to find a consensus to change something significant. And if you do, then get the other 15,000 school boards in the country to agree.
One year in Thailand I was visiting some schools through the Thai Education Ministry. They asked me to basically state what the American government's policy was on primary and secondary education. I told them there was no national educational policy, that America's education policy was decided on a state-by-state basis. They were flabbergasted.
I welcome you to stop criticizing and become directly involved to initiate changes in our national educational system. You will fail. Period.
Also, I know that working in public education must be a very, very difficult arena. Any criticism I have for public schools (which I seem to be expressing a lot of these days) has NOTHING to do with teachers or school administrators, in general. I respect these people and the jobs they do (especially considering the environment and practices with which they have to work with) very much. Also, I think there is a huge difference between elementary education and high school education-- it seems to be a different ballgame, from my perspective as a parent.
@vinlyn again, not every state and every locale works like yours. In MN the schools do get money from the state. In 2011, we had a state shutdown over a budget war. In the end, they balanced it, in large part by saying "well we owe money to the schools, we're just not going to pay that for now to help the budget" leaving schools having to take out loans and pay interest on them. $700MM worth. Small school districts such as ours don't have the borrowing power that larger schools have, and cut all sorts of programs, and combined positions. For example our dean of students is also our elementary principle and also acts as one of 2 special education teachers. She is also in charge of the community ed program. She makes $40,000 less than her other midwest counterparts, and does 4 jobs.
State funding in MN is between $7000-11000 (average of just over $9000) per student. Mn pays 86% of the costs of educating students.
One example of problems we face locally. We live on a county line. The town my kids go to school in is in county A. The kids who live less than a mile away, have the choice to go to school in county A, which is a 5 mile drive. Or, they can go to county B school, which is the county they live in. Except that school is 2.5 hours away. Their property taxes go to county B's school. So, the taxes they pay don't even go to their own kids school. There are about 25 students who live in that area. So, all the money from their family's taxes, goes to help pay for a school the students don't even attend, leaving our school short the money for those 25 students.
This system is broken.
http://www.greatschools.org/students/academic-skills/1075-u-s-students-compare.gs
From that link:
Finland's stellar performance has drawn the attention of education and government officials around the world. These experts have uncovered many attributes of the Finnish educational system that are distinctive and contribute to the success of Finnish students. Some of these features are:
* The Finnish school system uses the same curriculum for all students (which may be one reason why Finnish scores varied so little from school to school).
* Students have light homework loads.
* Finnish schools do not have classes for gifted students.
* Finland uses very little standardized testing.
* Children do not start school until age 7.
* Finland has a comprehensive preschool program that emphasizes "self-reflection" and socializing, not academics.
* Grades are not given until high school, and even then, class rankings are not compiled.
* Teachers must have master's degrees.
* Becoming a teacher in Finland is highly competitive. Just 10% of Finnish college graduates are accepted into the teacher training program; as a result, teaching is a high-status profession. (Teacher salaries are similar to teacher salaries in the U.S., however.)
* Students are separated into academic or vocational tracks during the last three years of high school. About 50% go into each track.
* Diagnostic testing of students is used early and frequently. If a student is in need of extra help, intensive intervention is provided.
* Groups of teachers visit each others' classes to observe their colleagues at work. Teachers also get one afternoon per week for professional development.
* School funding is higher for the middle school years, the years when children are most in danger of dropping out.
****** College is free in Finland. *****
Imagine trying to get THESE changes in America! Americans want the best schools, and equal educational opportunities for ALL children regardless of location or economic status (which was the original idea for 'public education' in America) but it seems NO ONE WANTS TO PAY FOR IT. Therefore, education is never a priority, economically speaking. And change is always feared... especially if its a change towards other [gasp!!] European or socialistic ways!
Edited to add another interesting link:
http://www.ascd.org/publications/educational-leadership/may02/vol59/num08/Unequal-School-Funding-in-the-United-States.aspx
My 5th grader is gone from 7:25 until 3:25. He usually has an hour of homework, although sometimes it is more. He spends more of his day dealing with school than my husband works. Considering he is 10, I find that pretty ridiculous.
They have even talked about increasing how many hours students are in school! That's just crazy talk, considering countries where they spend more days at school still comes to FEWER hours of instruction than we have and they still outperform us greatly.
I agree. We want all the success without having to invest in it. Which is really sad.
There are 260 weekdays in a normal year. US kids are required to attend school no less than 180 days.
Year round school with 7 weekdays off every three months (4 times a year) would take away 28 weekdays, leaving an average of 232 school days left. Take another 10 days off here & there for special holidays etc, and kids are still gaining about 40-42 days per year in school.
They could then cut the daily hours down from 7-7.5 hrs to about 6 hrs with a full hour lunch/recess break. Homework could virtually be eliminated, (as it should be!) and curriculum can be covered at a more leisurely pace.
I agree with no 'accelerated' or 'gifted' classes, but I also disagree with integrating learning disabled into mainstream classes. That just simply does not work, IMO.
But what strikes me most about their attitude is that they take a far more compassionate and equitable attitude towards knowledge and intelligence: that is, the more gifted students don't feel themselves superior or deserving of privileges than their non-egghead peers. They will already benefit from their intellectual prowess anyway. School is designed to help those who are struggling to come up to a high standard, rather than reward those who are already gifted. In Finnish schools, students are given more individual attention, and those who are struggling get more attention than those who are doing well. And you don't have to worry about living in a "good" school district; the quality of education is similarly high across the board, whether you live in inner Helsinki or in the sticks. Yet, schools themselves are highly individual, with different focuses (environmentalism at one school, or the arts in another, or science in another, etc.), while still maintaining uniform quality.
In the U.S. we fear that placing all students in the same classroom would hold the brighter students back, but this does not seem to be a concern for the Finns I know. Because the Finnish system pivots far less on test scores, grades, and competition (and because the gifted students are not separated from their peers), I've found they have a greater sense of connection with their classmates. I don't think we can underestimate the effect compartmentalizing and fragmenting our student body has on our students: those in "regular" classes feel like they are deserving of less attention or rigor than their peers in AP classes. They don't benefit from regular interaction with their more gifted peers and, in fact, may grow to more ostracized from them. This is exacerbated when we have entire schools that are blessed with better funding or administration than others.
Free university also has a major motivational factor: when you know that, no matter how much your family makes, college is a real option for you, you are more motivated to try than if you have to bank on receiving student aid, scholarships, etc. Also, teachers are held in much greater esteem than in the U.S. They're paid better, and teaching is actually a popular option (though, as mentioned, it is competitive). The mindset of "those who can't, teach" that pervades the U.S. doesn't exist there because the standards of entry are so high.
We will probably never see anything like this in the U.S. on a large scale. However, we may see individual school districts implement more sane models. It may begin in the private sector, with private schools implementing Finnish-style programs with success, and public schools taking heed. We can't do that, however, until the culture of mass testing and the legacy of NCLB disintegrates.
I hear people criticize schools in general, as well as criticize standardized tests, for testing rote knowledge instead of developing a means for evaluating critical thinking skills. And, to some extent, that's a valid criticism. But I also believe that a strong knowledge base is required before you can be an effective critical thinker. So really, those two components are necessary. But true, is is difficult to test for critical thinking.
As far as teaching to the test, there are two ways that teachers do that, one of which is legitimate, and one of which is not. I remember back when I was in high school in New York State and taking Regents exams. The teachers would have us buy these little books of old Regents exams, and we would spend several weeks at the end of the year practicing answering actual Regents questions. In my view, that is not appropriate. It is teaching only to pass an exam. On the other hand, if a state first determines that its tests actually test information that is important, and teachers then incorporate that information in their lessons, I see no problem. I used to spend a great deal of time observing teachers teaching. It was extremely rare that I ever saw a teacher "teaching to the test", and if I did, we remedied that through the post-conference.
I have a theory that the high-stakes testing in education is really nothing more than consumerism finally catching up with education. A large part of consumerism developed back in the 1970s when American cars got so junky. That kicked off widespread consumerism in America. But think about what we did in America with education for so long -- we basically said to the teachers and the schools: "Are you doing a good job?" And of course, they would respond by saying, "Yes! Of course!". Somewhere along the line people began saying, "Wait a minute. Prove that you're doing a good job." The problem is, just how do you prove that? I'm not sure you can prove you are doing a good job across the board. It is difficult, at least in a standardized system that works with millions of students, to prove you are effectively teaching critical thinking skills. So we put our emphasis in teaching what might loosely be called "knowledge". It's a shame we haven't been able to measure the "un-measurables", but I don't think that means that you stop measuring what you can.
I personally believe that in order to measure whether or not students are learning critical thinking skills, that we need to do a better job evaluating teachers. Let me give you an example. When I took introductory physical geology in college, we had a class of 300 in a large auditorium. I learned a lot of facts, which was sort of okay -- it was a survey course. But the professor did all the talking. On the other hand, the professor who taught me how to think was a year later in the course geomorphology. We went on a field trip into central Pennsylvania and I asked the professor, "Did the glaciers get down this far?" He looked at me and said, "You've learned all the information you need for you to figure that out yourself. Now figure it out. And in 30 minutes I want you to come back to me with your answer and what you observed that come to your conclusion." Gee. And I did. And that's when I began really thinking. So one little trick I later used when I was observing a teacher was to take a look at who was doing the most talking in the classroom. If it was all teacher talk, I knew there wasn't much critical thinking going on by students. Unfortunately, there are many principals out there who, when they are observing and evaluating a teacher, are only measuring whether or not the teacher is teaching the way they (the principal) likes to teach. Principals and administrators need to go through rigorous training to learn how to effectively observe teachers.
It's nice that you have a reasonable degree of confidence in teachers and administrators. And my only complaint is when the public blankets education and schools and teachers and administrators with scorn. There are a lot of fine schools out there, and a lot of lousy ones, too. A lot of fine teachers out there, and a lot of lousy ones. A lot of fine administrators, and a lot of lousy ones. And so, our public criticism needs to be targeted and surgical in nature. To coin an old phrase, we need to be able to separate the wheat from the chaff in education...and right now, we're not.
2. A very good (though very traditional) rural high school in western NYS.
3. One of the worst high schools in western NYS -- so bad that the principal was featured on "60 Minutes".
4. A decent, though struggling suburban junior high in the Maryland suburbs of D.C.
5. A very good suburban junior high in the Maryland suburbs of D.C.
6. A good suburban high school in the Virginia suburbs of D.C.
7. A top-ranked middle school in the Virginia suburbs of D.C. (as assistant principal and then principal for a total of 20 years).
And, lama...my only real criticism of your original post on the issue was that it seemed that you lumped all schools together, rather than recognizing that there are some fine schools out there...and some lousy schools, as well. There's the whole spectrum, and I would just like the public to differentiate. There are some lousy parents out there. We all know some of them. But to say that parents are lousy is not accurate or fair.
I know that throwing money onto education isn't going to solve the problems that we have. But a few years ago I was sued as the result of an auto accident (and won), and here's I observed. The country court building was all marble, mahogany, lushly carpeted, upholstered seats in the courtroom, terrazzo floors, etc. And that's for the system that deals with criminals. Then I went back to my school of cinder block, vinyl tiles, pine furniture, and composition tables. And that was for our beloved children.
The tests they take in school, they actually dedicate an entire classroom week before each test to prepare and study for it so they do well. That is hardly a good measure of their actual ability to learn. They do literally teach to the test here, which is very sad.
Around 9th or 10th grade they start to do papers and debates and such in class that actually reflect their thinking patterns and their ability to truly absorb, understand, and reflect on information they are learning. They do not do that (here) prior to high school.
I think there would be less need for gifted/talented programs if schools were more flexible and allowed kids to easily leave school for random periods to take a community class, or whatever. Our school is getting a bit better with this, for example if a kid has a study hall last period, they can leave early to go to work, or do something else deemed of value by the district, with parents permission.
My problem with kids having to go to school year round is it basically makes them unable to hold summer jobs. If my son wasn't working during the summer, he would not be able to be in the sports he is in or go on the field trips he goes on. Those things are as necessary to his development as being in school and we could not afford it if he did not have a job. He works 30-40 hours a week in the summer, sometimes more, and on top of that he spends 8 weeks of his summer doing early morning summer practice for the ski team. So he is up at 5, works out (and they are really hard workouts) from 6-8 and then works from 9-4. He has learned invaluable things about life in having a job, opening his own bank accounts, having to get himself from point A to point B. Spending that time in school would not serve him well at all.
A good school and good teachers don't "teach to the test". It is not necessary if the test matches the curriculum and the teacher is teaching to the curriculum.
Yes, in your third paragraph you hit on the essence of what should be student evaluation. State standardized tests teach one aspect of learning. Teacher evaluation of students -- if done well -- test a different and equally important aspect of learning -- critical thinking and ability skills.
Traditional study halls are a waste of time and a product of poor scheduling. Many high schools have eliminated them entirely. After I retired, my middle school added a half-hour "study hall" at the end of the day, and from what I have been able to tell, it was a flop.
I am unconvinced that year-round school is the answer to the problems facing our schools. Note, I'm not saying it's a bad idea, but I've yet to see the evidence that it is the panacea many people believe it is. Is it more time in the classroom, or better time in the classroom that is needed. I think the latter. I do think there are too many school holidays, however.
With the testing, some of that is just a product of a small school. When I was in school (I went to school here as well) we didn't have geometry as a class. It was just kind of thrown into a few chapters. Imagine my surprise when I took the pre-ACT test and found huge sections of geometry that I hadn't a clue how to do because my school didn't offer classes on it. Our guidance counselors didn't even tell us it would be on the test.
I believe they actually changed the law that homeschoolers have to test. I could be wrong, I'd have to look. The parents are/were responsible for giving them but they did not have to report the results. The superintendent was allowed to request any tests or portfolios or report cards at random and you had to produce them. If a kid scored less than 50% on any test the parents were supposed to have them tested for a learning disability.