Seattle Times columnist Danny Westneat today answers the many critics who disagreed with his earlier column about parents who he characterized as "cheating" to get their kids in a popular Seattle public school. Westneat quotes Sound Politics and a comment posted by one of our readers
"This guy doesn't want anyone to use their brains, muscle, influence, money, talent — whatever — to try to get ahead in school, society and life," wrote a commenter on the blog Soundpolitics.com, where I was dubbed a "brainless apologist" for public schools who "completely misses the point."My exact words were brainless apoligist for "the unaccountable tax-extracting monopoly 'public' education bureaucracy", which "treats parents as nothing more than a captive source of revenue". The quoted reader comment as the one by "NYC transplant" on June 17, 2005 11:53 AM Posted by Stefan Sharkansky at July 08, 2005 08:17 PM | Email This
Why doesn't he do some research into Western Washington public schools before he starts flapping his mouth? What is he afraid of?
Why are the public schools flooded with non-english speaking "immigrants" in January of every year? Our tax money is being funneled into ESL (English Second Language) programs for illegal immigrants that the schools sneak in a few times a year...(That includes - our *Parent paid* tax dollars). How nice it would be to have that money actually spent on *American* school children! Perhaps they could even learn a second language! What a concept!
It's a game Westneat!......And parents are just doing what they can for their children to get as good of an education as the illegal immigrant kids currently are in the public school system!
Of course - this is only ONE of the MANY problems with public schools!
My advice to parents....Spend your money on private schools. If you can afford to rent an apartment in a quality school area - you can afford a private school. It would be better for your child and it would send a message to the public school system.
It's truly sad when American Parents have to resort to such measures to get their kids a quality education.....and parents, in this country illegally, are given the red-carpet treatment for their children with our tax dollars!
Posted by: Deborah on July 8, 2005 09:30 PMUnder Article IX of the Washington constitution (or at least courts' interpretation of it), all children resident in the state are entitled to a basic education at state expense, regardless of citizenship status. The problems with our schools are much bigger than the fact that children of illegal immigrants attend them.
Westneat, an enthusiastic, though ineffective, backer of I-884 last year, has made it pretty clear in his columns that there's not much wrong with public education in this state that he doesn't think more money will fix. It didn't take me long to realize that he has little that is interesting or useful to say. So my suggestion would be not to spen more time and energy on him than you need to. Treat him as the background noise that he is.
Posted by: jsa on July 8, 2005 09:51 PM
Westneat is an idiot.
Westneat does remind me of an annoying gnat! Consider my post a half-hearted swat!
Posted by: Deborah on July 8, 2005 09:57 PMFunny now--but wait till HIS kids get exposed to TB by an illegal immigrant student in a real-life case of 'tolerance.' Masks, anyone? How will he react to the toned-down, polite parent handout copy of the fact sheet from the Dept of Health?
Repeating my boring drone:
My city has a 6% 'poverty rate' per US Census. Yet my (public) school has a 30+ % usage rate of 'poor' families for free lunch, free breakfast, etc. Is that a 5:1 ratio? Is that "shrinkage" as retailers call it or something else?
Do the math. Look at the picture. Connect the dots. My yearly list of 'supplies' grows to many dozen extra items running $50-$60. I don't ever remember this level of supplies as a kid even from a private school (with no money) back east. So--who am I educating? The balance of the Third World?
Posted by: Jimmie-howya-doin on July 8, 2005 10:07 PM
NOW -- getting a little closer to the main topic -- as things have slowly been morphed by the socialist fascists in the school dept -- the busing system has become a way to transport 'gifted' or 'special(as in elite)' children to 'SPECIAL' ELITE schools -- I remember seeing a newspaper write-up re this a couple months ago - students were being bussed from way in the south end to way out to the north end -- i.e. - the bolshevics used the ruse of busing to ensure even education opportunity -- which morphed into busing for elitist's kids - to elitist schools -- typical socialist CRAP -- all for the local turkey administrators to KISS up to the US Dept. of Education
HEY -- A-holes - if your kiddo is too good/gifted/smart to attend a school with regular kids - get his/her elite little A$$ outta the public system and ante up your own bucks to send him/her to some private school for gifted kiddies -- get your damn socialist meathooks outta my wallet
Posted by: Bill on July 8, 2005 11:31 PMGet rid of the bussing, dump the ESL, make vaccinations mandatory, and implement a curriculum that actually teaches reading and math.
Posted by: Burdabee on July 9, 2005 01:08 AMI'm with you Burdabee - with the exception of mandatory vaccination. As the mother of an autistic child, I am among the growing number of parents who are questioning the safety and necessity of most of the vaccines currently pushed on children. None of the vaccines in the WHO's childhood vaccination program will protect our kids from TB, Menningitis, or the other nasty viral and infectious disease coming across our border daily!
Why should American children have to be subjected to the increasing risk of brain disorder, auto-immune disfunction and a host of other side effects of so-called harmless immunizations? Just to receive some false sense of protection against the disease that is being allowed into our country with illegals?
Mandatory vaccine is like putting a bandaid on a broken leg....or worse!
Like at Ballard High School, where they re-built the school to get rid of the old pipes so filled with lead that the water was not fit for consumption. My old elementary school was razed and rebuilt (albeit after I graduated) because they couldn't vouch for its structural integrity during an earthquake. Spending money for additional testing? Good idea. Paying extra janitorial staff to make the Garfield bathrooms usable? Good idea. Spending money for teacher raises? It is necessary when you consider the price of living in Seattle is well above the 20-30K/year starting teachers make here. In all things oversight is needed to prevent corruption, but the view that all the additional money will not fix a "broken system" is wrong. I spent all my years in Seattle School District #1 and it has given me a solid education.
In my 13 years of public schooling, every major problem I have seen to education has been caused by lack of funding, overcrowding, drugs or alcohol. None of my old schools (Whittier, Whitman, Ballard) had class sizes under 30. Ballard had 1700 students enrolled with 150 on the waiting list in a HS designed for 1400. Because everyone wanted to apply to this new school, Physics class was taught in a teacher lockerroom, French and Civics were in the teacher lounges.
My old high school suffers from a 24% chlamydia infection rate amongst FRESHMEN. 35% of seniors get drunk once a month or more and close to a quarter of the students use marijuana on a monthly basis. Not to mention the exploding rate of cocaine usage. These are reasons why so many students fail, why schools fail test standards, why crime is so prevalent in schools. Not because teachers are lazy, not because administrators are ineffective, not because foreign immigrants are stealing our money, but because people are not preparing their children for school.
If anyone wishes to send me e-mail, feel free. Free speech and democracy are wonderful things.
Posted by: Alex Peterson on July 10, 2005 04:13 PMI came from midwest private schools--run on a string. Cornerstone dated 1918. Buildings polished and still running well. Tuition paid for by parents and our own kid side jobs & sweat. Disclipline. Parents & teachers that kicked old fashioned arse. No games. No diversity. No sensitivity training. Class sizes ALL over 30+ all the time. Teachers got results. No one challenged them. Parents supported them. Cops? In school? Only if called for a very rare theft. Then, they used the nightsticks very liberally. And the police were respected as much as your parents. Because most of them WERE your parents.
Why have things changed so much? Liberalism.
Posted by: Jimmie-howya-doin on July 10, 2005 07:36 PMBut allow me to point out his shallow kiss-off, self-righteous argument, which essentially is that he’s more noble and honest by working within the state’s corrupt, broken system. Blah blah. Is it more correct and honest to raise moneys to try to fix a bad system? Nope. It’s attempting exactly the same sort of end-run that the parents who claim false addresses do: they’re trying to use their available resources (i.e. money) to work the problem. No difference. What about the parents who can’t raise $120,000? If you really want to play fair, Danny, the parents would have turned that money over to the state for them to spend on the schools.
I’m truly shocked at how short this guy comes up in everything he writes. He doesn’t even do the basic background work. Let’s look at how much the schools raise per kid (be it federal, state, wherever the money is raised): it’s about $10k per kid, right? That’s about what my kid’s private school costs me per year. And her school has programs for disabled kids, kids with problems, etc. It’s not everything to everybody because it can’t be. But it’s a good school because the money is raised and spent by the parents directly. And they also have a very sizeable endowment – again, because the parents care and they’re smart and they invest wisely (don’t even get me started on why the Dems are such idiots on social security).
Let's face it: the government should get out of the education business.
But Danny wants to take the high ground, and he uses his little opinion piece to try to have the last word. Again, this is why the STimes won’t last. No one reads it; no one cares. As long as they continue in their tradition of guild-ist, elitist, leftist hack typing, readers will continue to die off. And unlike elections, dead readers don’t support newspapers.