Apathy and Irresponsibility Have Created a Diseased Educational System

The educational system has a disease, a malignant, self-perpetuating syndrome, that affects us all. In California, the disease hides in the shadows of the looming budget crisis. We may treat the individual symptoms with tax raises or budget cuts, allowing ourselves to feel better for a while, but the disease will remain poisoning the body. The disease is people and their attitudes.

People administrate over people that teach people that are children of other people. In all positions lie manifestations of the problem: Apathetic people, irresponsible people, and ill-suited people.

Every child has the right to an education, but what about a child that chooses to waste a teacher's time? What should be done with them? They waste precious time and resources, taking for granted what others would treasure? These children are part of the disease. They hinder other children's studies and they tax a teacher's energy.

Then there are parents that refuse to require their children to behave in class? What do you do about them? A teacher can discipline a student everyday, but until the student fears their parents reaction they will not change there actions in class. These parents contribute to the disease.

What do you do about teachers and administrators that ought not to be in their positions? How do you keep someone from becoming a teacher who won't put in any effort outside of school hours? These types of teachers are more concerned with teaching as a job instead of a molding of a future being. They spend time earning new degrees so that they can be paid more, but it doesn't necessarily make them a better teacher.

How do you stop people from striving for administrative positions simply for the perks and pay raise? An administrator's first priority ought to be a child's education.

In a perfect world students would value what they were being taught. In a perfect world parents would motivate and discipline their children and support teachers. In a perfect world teachers would care about their students, doing whatever it took to reach and teach them. In a perfect world administrators would facilitate the work of a teacher, cutting out red tape and confronting problems head-on.

The disease comes from attitudes. Until students, parents, teachers, and administrators all care, nothing gets better. How do we change people?

I salute every administrator that claws and scrapes so that a teacher can do his or her job. I salute every teacher that cries or loses sleep trying to find ways to reach their students. I salute every student that behaves in class and strives so that their teachers' efforts are not in vain.

Sincerely,

An optimistic teacher