A Highly Opinionated Post About Education

I am so stoked right now. I found out that the charter high school that I work at has a charter elementary school right next door, and that although they do a lottery drawing to admit students, teachers get first dibs. So Henry can go to kindergarten there! This is oh so fabulous for many reasons. For one thing, Henry can be right next to me at work, which makes parent conferences and other such things so much easier. Also, it will be a piece of cake to get him to and from school since he will just come with me (our local kindergarten has very short, very inconvenient hours, and I would have to find someone to pick him up every day if he went there). But those things are all just the icing on the cake. The MAIN reason that I am so excited about Henry attending this school is to get him out of our neighborhood. So this is probably the point where you are nodding your head and thinking, "Yeah, the public schools are going down, neighborhood schools are dangerous, it's best to get the kids into a better school." Our case is quite the opposite. We live in one of the most expensive neighborhoods in the country. We have beautiful streets, a safe and clean environment, and "Blue Ribbon" schools. Most people would kill to have their kids grow up here. And I am so, so incredibly grateful to have this life, but I feel like I have some perspective since I was raised poor. And that is what I want for my kids - perspective. I don't want them growing up thinking every person is blonde, white and drives a nice car. It would be nice if they actually knew what a minority was, and more importantly possessed some social awareness.

Now don't get me wrong. I am not sending Henry into the trenches or anything. This charter school is one of the best in the country. They could easily fill it with a bunch of rich kids, but they do a zip code lottery to ensure socioeconomic diversity. The curriculum is much less structured, and really encourages kids to be creative and think for themselves. I am convinced that the purpose of at least half of American classrooms is to beat out at a young age any creative thought or free will. I have heard tales from my friends whose kids are in kindergarten here about their parent conferences. The teachers are more concerned with whether the kids are doing proper "brush stroke" when they make letters than anything else. For those of you who don't know, here is the proper brush stroke for the letter "M":

Put pencil in top corner. Make a straight line from top to bottom. Pick up pencil. Place at top and make the first diagonal piece from top to bottom. Pick up pencil. Make second diagonal piece from top to bottom. Pick up pencil. Make last line from top to bottom.

They practice this for HOURS. And some kids make the most beautiful little letters you have ever seen, but if each stroke is not done from top to bottom, they get an "F." I think after about two days of this, Henry would decide that he wanted nothing to do with school. And I can't say that I would blame him. I have been wondering how on earth I was going to bite my tongue through the next decade of teacher conferences where some teacher is telling me that my child doesn't make letters properly or can't sit still and be quiet for an hour ( what five year old can?). Now I don't have to! Yay!

Sorry this is so boring. Honestly, I will try to make the next post funny!