What about teaching?

Jay Weber had an interesting discussion on his show this morning on the paid sick leave proposal. His point, due to an editorial he read, was that it was not business's fault people have kids and it's not business's responsibility to help take care of those kids. It's a tough issue. I agree for the most part. But, what does one do when their child is sick and needs to be taken care of? I've often said the responsibility of children ultimately falls on none other than the parents. I still do. While I understand some people have put themselves in to a position of needing both parents to work, I don't think that passes the responsibility of your child's care on to someone else. Particularly government mandates.

Anyway, I have this same problem with schools. The schools seem to want to do everything for your child except teach them. Today's paper has a good indication of that.

Suspend fewer, MPS urged
Report rips discipline tactics; change promised

The first two paragraphs say it all:

A team of national experts has urged a major overhaul in the way Milwaukee Public Schools handles behavior issues in schools, saying MPS does not do enough to deal with problems short of suspending students and may have the highest suspension rate of any urban school system in America.

MPS
By The Numbers
26.4%

MPS students suspended at least once, many of them multiple times, during the 2007-'08 school year.

86,675

Total number of suspensions during the same school year, just short of the number of students in the district.

"District staff members need to mobilize to meet this challenge" of dealing with behavior issues in ways that don't involve suspensions but are more effective in improving both a student's behavior and academic work, the team said in a report to MPS officials.

Two things. One, this will mean more money. More "experts" to figure this out, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah.

Two, aren't the behavior issues with children, even as they apply to school, the parent's responsibilities? Why does MPS feel as though they must take on parental responsibilities? They want to feed them, psycho-analyze them, provide baby sitting . . . when are parents supposed to act like parents?

Why don't the schools just TEACH?

Personally, I'm sick of parents getting out of their responsibilities thanks to government. It's bad enough we have dysfunctional families, broken families, and abusive families. We need to emphasize more the role of parents in a child's life, not take it away. All of these "well intentioned" program do nothing more than make parents lazy. Rather than making them see how it is they are at fault, it allows them to blame everyone else for their child's behavior. That, and there's an expectation of provision. Be it food, day care, or dealing with behavior problems.

People need to understand that being a parent means you have responsibilities, and that those responsibilities are yours alone. It's not up to someone else to fix them.

Also, the schools need to stop trying to be parents. Just teach.