public schools vs. choice

"I am a public school employee. I am one of the few public school employees that I know of that believes in choice."

That's not true. Many, I would guess most,
public school teachers support public school
choice and homeschooling.
And have nothing against choosing private schools.
The problem is govt $ to private schools or to
home schoolers.
That's the crux of the argument as far as I know.



"usually competing companies will be more efficient and desiring products that are more in line of public desires. I think that if schools had to compete for the best and brightest, then our teachers and curriculum would be forced to improve."

I agree on the first part.
The second I am not so sure of.
MA has public school choice for students.
It is not a competition for "the best and
brightest" as much as free choice for any
interested or upset parent.
It to the best of my knowledge does not effect
hiring and firing.
And curriculum is still outlined by the state and
controlled at the local level

"If we had to compete, the incentives to be the best would be there. These incentives are not currently in the school system."

MA has the best test scores in the country but
public school choice isn't usually brought up.

"I tell my students that competition usually brings out the best in people!"

I'm not so sure about that.
No more or less than cooperation.
Both can and are good, both are bad too.
Tell them this.

"Governments need to learn this lesson and allow parents to make the choice of public school or homeschool."

Other than CA, which will overturn its decision
I think, is there any state that doesn't allow
the choice of homeschooling?
(FWIW, CA has not stopped homeschooling either but could)

"I have liberty to teach "alternative" points of view. When I teach about evolution, I also include intelligent design in my unit. I teach it from the scientific point of view, not the religious point of view."

Why?
ID is not legitimate.
Is there scientists teaching ID in India, China,
Japan? Or is this only in Christian countries?
(I honestly don't know)

Perhaps I should be teaching alternative views
on the Holocaust in my history class?
I mention Holocaust denial, but don't "cover" it.

Different views are fine, but they should be
based on evidence in the discipline. But ID
by and large, like Holocaust denial, has been
discredited.

There are plenty of valid counter arguments
to evolution - ID is not one of them.

From Judgment Day transcript, the missing link
between creationism and ID:

BARBARA FORREST: In cleansing this manuscript, they failed to replace every word properly. I found the word "creationists." And instead of replacing the entire word, they just kind of did this, and got "design proponents" with the "c" in front and the "ists" in the back from the original word.

NICK MATZKE: So the correct term for this transitional form is "Cdesign proponentsists." And everyone now refers to this as the "missing link" between creationism and intelligent design. You've got the direct physical evidence there of a transitional fossil.

http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/nova/transcripts/3416_id.html
http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/nova/id/

"That's not true.Many, I would guess most,
public school teachers support public school
choice and homeschooling."

I teach in Alabama and my experience has not been as positive as yours.
In the system where I teach, anytime we get homeschooled kids, or a child that left our school is brought up, the negative comments about homeschooling are vast. There are very few who would openly support homeschooling as a choice.

"The problem is government $ to private schools or to homeschoolers. That's the crux of the argument."

To a point I would agree, that is a big part of the argument. Another argument that I have heard is simply a bruised ego. I have heard the comment, "You can't teach unless you have such and such degree," on a number of occassions.

"Other than CA, which will overturn its decision
I think, is there any state that doesn't allow
the choice of homeschooling?"

You are right, CA is the only state that has outlawed homeschooling, but the overall idea of big brother gaining more control over individuals is what I was getting at. The less governments intrudes, the better things are.

"Why?
ID is not legitimate."

I disagree. There are many scientists who advocate for intelligent design. Dr. Burt Thompson, for one. There is a good DVD called "Unlocking the Mystery of Life" that makes a very good scientific case for intelligent design.

I have a MA in history so I am aware of what your are speaking, but holocaust denial and intelligent design are not akin. There is very much historical evidence that proves the holocaust happened. There is also scientific evidence of the world being designed instead of things by chance evolving into highly specialized creatures. In the movie referenced above, one of the cases that is used is the flagellar motor on certian one celled organisms. The flagellar motor has a design. WAtch the DVD. He does a better job explaining it that I could.

whether any non-Christian scientists in the field
say from Asia go in for it or not?

(not omitting the possibility that a small group
of scientists could be right, but . . . feel
most are doing it out of religious belief not
scientific)

I watched the special, but more for history than
the science and, of course, how it relates to the
Scopes Trial which I do teach. The special and
reading I've done before and since make me not
believe in ID.
But, I believe in God. Also, believe that
science will never prove there is or isn't a God.

There are definitely more negative feelings
attached to homeschooling, not that many do it
in MA. I think there is probably a big difference between schools in MA and AL. My
brother taught 2 years ago in a suburb of
Atlanta and was semi-shocked on the difference
between kids' skills.

Are members of your staff against public school
choice?

The ability of a student to choose which school
they want to go to (they have to provide their
own transportation)?


"You are right, CA is the only state that has outlawed homeschooling, but the overall idea of big brother gaining more control over individuals is what I was getting at. The less governments intrudes, the better things are."

That was a court decision that neither the
governor nor the head of CA DOE support or wish
to enforce, so I believe it will be overturned.
On the homeschool front it is growing fast by %
and has been for 10+ years, so if that tells us
anything big brother is watching over us less,
not more. I predict this trend to continue.

Johnny
Waski the squirrel has a blog on TH and he is
a science teacher. I think you guys might have
a lot to talk about.

http://squirrelscience.blogtownhall.com/

Put this in the never can be too careful file:

Call me paranoid, many people do, but I would not put up my school email address on the blog.
A word to the wise.

Good luck

"Are members of your staff against public school
choice?"

Most are, but one or two are not. I think differently than most people who are in the faculty. Without going into the details, a couple of years ago several students went to the public school in the next town and most of the faculty got their feathers ruffled. They thought since they were zoned here, they should go here.

I will check out Waski the squirrel's blog. Thanks

"Judgement Day: ID on Trial" was on again last night and goes on to
question the "design" of a flagellar motor from the scientist whose
study they use to prove it.

DAVID DEROSIER: This is a structure found, for example, in Yersinia pestis, the bacterium that causes the Bubonic plague. Look at the similarities. Now, this structure doesn't rotate, but it still has to extend this structure, which is equivalent to the rod, the driveshaft here. It has to extend that, because it needs this little channel. It's like, sort of like a syringe. So the virulence factors that are made inside the cell, which is down here, can be exported, pushed up into this hole and exported out through this long, kind of, needle, perhaps into a cell in your body or mine, and thereby create misery.

NARRATOR: And it turns out the two structures look similar for a reason. The syringe on the right is made of a subset of the very same protein types found in the base of the flagellum on the left, though the syringe is missing proteins found in the motor and, therefore, can't produce rotary motion. It functions perfectly as an apparatus for transmitting disease.

DAVID DEROSIER: So if we think about what it means to be irreducibly complex, the argument is that if you take away even one of these proteins, that the structure cannot function. And yet here is a structure that functions, that is missing several of the proteins, and yet here it is, a working, viable organelle of the bacterium. So indeed, the structure is not, in that sense, irreducibly complex.