This is a sampling of The Education Report, Katy Murphy's Oakland schools blog. Read more atwww.IBAbuzz.com/education. Follow her at Twitter.com/KatyMurphy.
A story about the number of out-of-school suspensions -- and a blog post about legislative efforts to make changes to California's student discipline laws -- started a conversation among readers that continued throughout the week.
Livegreen: Keeping kids in school who commit crime is part of how Oakland creates a culture and environment of supporting ONLY those who fail. Meanwhile, the good kids, and especially the kids at the tipping point, are ignored ... Imagine being a kid trying your best in a school in a high crime area, and the ones who get attention or get away with things are the kids going down the wrong path? What does that reward system promote?
Of course we must try to help kids having problems (often through no fault of their own). But not at the expense of those who are trying to do the RIGHT thing, often with similar family circumstances.
Jesse James: You can do both. From my long experience with OUSD, the first response when a kid isn't easy is to get rid of him. Thinking through the myriad strategies that might be helpful to one child helps all the kids in your school/class/district. I do think that the high rate of disciplinary actions is
highly racial. I see it at my school all the time. The kids don't get paid; teachers and district staff do. Shouldn't they