41% school dropout rate. 0% Death Rate

ttwtt78640 said:

That's nice, but how can these students be expected to survive the summer break?

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What are you talking about ?

Are you trying to change the subject when I provide proof that Michigan has a working program in place to provide free lunches
from our Michigan education program when schools are closed ?

You are the one who implies students will not survive the school year years if schools are closed and remote classes are used instead of in class learning.

BlueTex said:

I agree.. it's not the same...Ideally, we would take the steps to get this under control so kids can go back to the social interactions we had before. Unfortunately, in a lot of areas of the country we don't seem to have the determination to take the appropriate steps and get this under control. Where I live in Texas, our school district if offering two options, virtual and in person this fall. We had to commit to one or the other by today. We don't normally start till late August and there are just too many unknowns at this point so we chose virtual but are also looking at private school options but even that is up in the air. We are friends with many educators in the district and we worry about their health as well.

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Oh lord. Texas, yes. You folks in particular are going to be struggling. So is it a district by district decision to do the two-tier, either/or approach? Would you happen to know if the in-person tier is liable to change depending on on-the-ground developments?


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minnie616 said:

What are you talking about ?

Are you trying to change the subject when I provide proof that Michigan has a working program in place to provide free lunches
from our Michigan education program when schools are closed ?

You are the one who implies students will not survive the school year years if schools are closed and remote classes are used instead of in class learning.

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Schools are generally closed during the summer - do they still provide lunches then?

ttwtt78640 said:

Schools are generally closed during the summer - do they still provide lunches then?

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Ours does and so do many others. There's even a federal program for it: Summer Food Service Program

Casper said:

Thought the right liked home schooling, now it is bad?

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Conservatives like parents having the right to choose how kids are educated even if private or home schooling is completely unnecessary for the student. The reasons are idiotic for many parents.

KevinKohler said:

Not going out, not getting an education, not doing anything = not living.

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Much of Europe is getting back to 'living' because they did things correctly.

Trump bitching about schools not opening is like a 5 year old not understanding how he gets no dessert when he doesn't eat his veggies.

joko104 said:

Having the children go to school is the ONLY solution. Most parents lack the skill, knowledge, and economic ability to be their kid's teacher OR police their children when not at home - and are not willing to live in a car with their children waiting for next Thursday when the food bank might have more food for them.

Teaching kids to be anti-social, isolated alone, and having no regular study skills development is massively harmful to children.

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No it isnt the only solution. Its called being creative and finding other options.

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ttwtt78640 said:

Schools are generally closed during the summer - do they still provide lunches then?

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Why do I post links if you don’t look at them....


Yes, the Michigan Department of Education has a summer food program.

Copied from link I posted earlier:

“ Welcome to the Michigan Department of Education’s Summer Food Service Program (SFSP) site locator.


The SFSP was created to ensure that
children in lower-income areas could continue to receive nutritious meals during long school vacations,
when they do not have access to the National School Lunch or School Breakfast Programs.
Use the SFSP site locator to find a SFSP site near you. “

Department of Education - Grants Coordination and School Support Child Nutrition Programs

Fiddytree said:

It's awful and, for the most part, parents are understanding about how/why normal access to services is reduced. They don't want it to be capricious and they don't want it to linger on, and they wish things would go back to normal...but we're not in normal. I don't know about the data yet, but I am assuming ESY service requests greatly increased this year.

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Most ESY requests are part of IEPs. They arent just made for any child. Mine had his in before corona hit. He started today and the teacher is wonderful. He seems to really care and is very understanding. And my son is really starting to be able to read words, go through them easily.

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Fiddytree said:

Oh lord. Texas, yes. You folks in particular are going to be struggling. So is it a district by district decision to do the two-tier, either/or approach? Would you happen to know if the in-person tier is liable to change depending on on-the-ground developments?


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District by district.. Our district is not allowing switching except at semester end (the halfway point in the school year). They have said nothing about what will happen if the in person is shut down...

Blue Donkey said:

Conservatives like parents having the right to choose how kids are educated even if private or home schooling is completely unnecessary for the student. The reasons are idiotic for many parents.

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Even though it doesn't show so, you changed your post. I'm glad you removed your statement on what you thought the primary reason conservatives want parents to be able to choose homeschooling was.

What reasons do you think are idiotic for parents to make that choice? I thought I'd be able to post a decent link of researched data of such reasons but found it difficult to find a current, extensive one. Most of the search results were clearly biased (usually for), anecdotal, and had little empirical data. If you have such a source, I'd genuinely like to see it.

Still, my search results echoed what I know from the parents who have or are doing it (six families). The reasons are all over the place but none of them seem ''idiotic.'' Two have special needs, one has four kids with a first-responder parent so scheduling was initially their primary reason, and two more just had general issues with their school systems (either too fast or slow paced). Only one had a religious reason.

ttwtt78640 said:

You are misrepresenting the situation - read your own link and you will see that this allows open and licensed day care providers to give priority to those (self-declared) 'essential' workers and provides exactly zero state funding for/to them. It does not "offer" (provide?) anything other than a recommendation and some (user fee funded?) assistance in finding such a facility.



Here is the (embeded) "help" link:

Help Me Grow Michigan

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From the following:

At the state level, Gov. Gretchen Whitmer has issued a number of executive orders and directives in response to the COVID-19 crisis. On March 19, 2020, Gov. Whitmer issued Executive Order 2020-16 (COVID-19)

to address the short-term critical need for child care for essential health and other workers by authorizing regulatory changes that would allow employers and school districts to quickly establish temporary disaster relief child care centers. Provisions for disaster relief child care centers were extended in Executive Order 2020-51 until May 13, 2020. The Michigan Department of Education informed current licensed and license-exempt child care providers that for the period of March 16, 2020 to April 30, 2020, they can bill for currently enrolled children whether or not those children are still attending, are absent or the facility is closed. In addition, the number of hours that providers can bill for school-age children was increased, and redeterminations for child care subsidies were extended. On April 29, the governor launched a new Child Care Relief Fund to help child care providers stay afloat during the COVID-19 crisis, and ensure that child care is available when it is time for Michiganders to go back to work. Approximately $130 million is available for noncompetitive grants to cover providers’ basic operating costs during the public health crisis, and is available to child care centers, family and group homes, and license exempt providers.

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Read more:

Public Policy Response to the COVID-19 Outbreak in Michigan: CHILD CARE - MLPP

minnie616 said:

From the following:



Read more:

Public Policy Response to the COVID-19 Outbreak in Michigan: CHILD CARE - MLPP

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Yep, that past aid funding was extended until May 13, 2020 and reference is later made to an April 29, 2020 extension of $130M more in aid. Rest assured that $130M does not go far in a state with 10M people and thousands of childcare providers.

Fiddytree said:

I'm struggling to see your point. We can accept that the President failed to take his job seriously and hampered the efforts of the federal government to do so. However, he and we were still going to find ourselves facing lockdowns, which put people in precisely the same struggles that were already mentioned. Those same struggles were not the fault of families, as you had claimed. Likewise, you made online learning seem so uniform, so effortless, when it most certainly was not. It was not easy for the teachers who had to scramble to make courses in two weeks, it was not easy for the parents who had to still be on their game (either at home or out in the community) to get paid, and it was not easy for the students, many of whom were unengaged, stressed out, or were in need of additional services that would have ordinarily been provided in the school building or in the community but had little to access to them. Then there were scores of families who were economically disadvantaged who had no previous technology or internet access and were cut off of from their education, having to spend extra time trying to connect with district staff to find a workaround or have one provided to them by the district. I'm not saying individual schools or districts didn't screw up, because a number of them did. Trust me. We were working to try to address some of the systemic stuff we saw going on (a district that put up with nicer schools giving their kids technology, but same district was cool with a school serving a lot of poor people, giving them no technology and expecting those families to participate) in some districts and were aware of the homework pile-on other teachers put in the laps of families.

Is it any wonder that a lot of families said they had to stop? Is it any wonder a lot of families were reaching out for help? Is it any wonder that many districts and teachers said they were going to be taking it easy on students?

You're looking for a target to blame (first: parents, second: Trump) instead of seeing this for what it was: something extraordinary that was thrust on the American people with not enough warning and not enough capability to respond to it--even if the President and his administration got their stuff figured out.

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All online schools give computers. I would transfer this year to an online school, you can transfer online with never meeting a single person. At an online school, they are prepared for it. You don't have to take on the hassle of your schools lack of preparedness. Taking that on is a choice.

I think it would be way less stressful than going to a school with a half schedule so they can social distance, with masks on and temperature checks at the door. They can't leave the classroom all day, and teachers will be the ones switching so they can quarantine the whole class if a kid or teacher gets COVID.
How great will this be? Will this be less stressful for the child? Or is it the parents you are concerned about. When you have kids and these things come up it's your responsibility to deal with it, warts, and all.

There are pretty simple solutions for teenagers in this scenario. The small ones are the more difficult ones. That will take some effort.

Much less disruptive to transfer to one of the many online schools, and call it a year. A small period of adjustment. Plenty of kids already thrive going to online school. They have virtual recesses, lunches, and kids can join online clubs to socialize virus free.

I act like it's not that big of a deal because I've done it and it's not that big of a deal. Situations are what you make them. This one, compared to spreading and getting COVID isn't one of them. Trump is just making a mountain out of a molehill so he can have a working economy before his election. If you don't see the writing on the wall then fine, but don't try to sell it to me. I can clearly see it and it's b.s. The man is insane for blackmailing schools during a pandemic by withholding funding at a time like this. He should be FIRED, immediately!!

Fiddytree said:

Yeah, this is exactly the wrong way to do things. We spent a great deal of energy trying to temper those feelings among a small number state agency officials (including, for a brief moment, my state superintendent) this spring. And we're still working with them on this (of course, it's feeling stale until planning really kicks off).

The pandemic caused societal stress in several directions and put far more pressures on students and parents alike. Pulling the truancy card only increases the likelihood for breaking up families and furthering the school-to-prison pipeline. What use does that serve and what possible justification do we have in spreading misery during a once-in-a-century pandemic?

You're not going to get a "normal" school year during a pandemic. You're just not.

Here's what we taught state officials: just as you agree teachers need grace, families also deserve grace.

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I wasn't trying to be brutal. My roommates kid got expelled. He had study from home. He had to do his work. He wasn't allowed to just not do it because he didn't feel like it. I know the parents are distraught and now many sympathize with their kids teachers. And there's childcare concerns with parents going back to work.

But it sounds like some kind of "push" is in order.

We can't lose the educational time to simple disinterest. Incentives maybe?

Casper said:

Nope, 52 Years of applying myself, hard work, saving and investing puts food on my table and got me 100% debt free, maybe you can get there one day also, it maybe not.

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And you got that food from where? It was made available to you by an army of employees, working round the clock, despite you saying how stupid that is. You groceries are more important to you than the future of America's children.

Glad to see so many conservatives getting behind public education again. I'm sure I can count on all of your supporting major funding increases to see that kids can go to school safely, as well as improving the education they get while they're at school.

ttwtt78640 said:

Yep, that past aid funding was extended until May 13, 2020 and reference is later made to an April 29, 2020 extension of $130M more in aid. Rest assured that $130M does not go far in a state with 10M people and thousands of childcare providers.

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She did keep extending the program.

Beginning April 29, there will be a simple online application for child care providers to use at MDE Child Care.



Grants start at $1,500 for home-based providers and $3,000 for child care centers. Additional funds will be awarded based on the size of the provider, whether they are open and serving essential workers, and their quality rating.



In addition to this grant program, Michigan has also made important changes to the Child Development and Care program, commonly called the child care subsidy.



These changes ensure families can access the care they need and providers have some financial certainty. This includes continuing to review and approve applications; increasing the hours school age children can be in care; extending the deadline for re-determinations so families can continue to receive the subsidy during the crisis; and continuing to make subsidy payments based on the number of children enrolled in a program, not the number attending.

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Whitmer - Governor Whitmer Takes Significant Step to Make Child Care Affordable and Accessible for Families

SomeCents said:

Even though it doesn't show so, you changed your post. I'm glad you removed your statement on what you thought the primary reason conservatives want parents to be able to choose homeschooling was.

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That is because I realized my error very shortly after typing it. The "edited post" note appears after a certain amount of time passes. You must have been reading this thread at the same time.

It is true that for religious reasons some parents strongly oppose what kids learn at public schools, especially specific portions of health classes, and believe they, not teachers, should be teaching those lessons.

What reasons do you think are idiotic for parents to make that choice? I thought I'd be able to post a decent link of researched data of such reasons but found it difficult to find a current, extensive one. Most of the search results were clearly biased (usually for), anecdotal, and had little empirical data. If you have such a source, I'd genuinely like to see it.

Still, my search results echoed what I know from the parents who have or are doing it (six families). The reasons are all over the place but none of them seem ''idiotic.'' Two have special needs, one has four kids with a first-responder parent so scheduling was initially their primary reason, and two more just had general issues with their school systems (either too fast or slow paced). Only one had a religious reason.

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Some parents think despite not having education degrees or training, they can do a much better job of educating their kids than real teachers. How is that smart?

Blue Donkey said:

Some parents think despite not having education degrees or training, they can do a much better job of educating their kids than real teachers. How is that smart?

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Because some can. Many can't, but there are certainly untrained people out there that can do a fine job teaching their kids.

uptower said:

Sorry did you say home schooling has a 41% drop out rate?

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I'm sure if they dug deeper into that number by demographics you will find that the number of Asian students is significantly lower than 41% and the numbers of Blacks and Hispanics significantly higher than 41%.

My neighbor is high school teacher and he said all of his Asian students have participated in the online classes as well as requested MORE assignments. He said the White kids are pretty good overall. He doesn't have any Black students in his class (AP calculus), and the Hispanic students he has have had more issues with participation---many at this point likely to fail in fact.

SomeCents said:

emphasis mine.

Despite the not-so-accurate characterization in this thread's title, I believe your mom's observation to be true based on our kids' experiences this Spring. Few, if any, of their classmates even bothered to check in. One teacher was almost in tears that our child was literally the only one who logged in for her office hours. Luckily, our kiddo took advantage and literally got private Algebra II lessons to set her up for this Fall.

But I blame our District for much of the failings: teachers were instructed not to cover any new material and that any other "recovery" work was strictly optional.

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That does really affect a teacher. My oldest daughter had been always pressed by us to maximize her knowledge as diversely as possible. She has a very, very rare mental gift - not super IQ - but something else of little value is not fine tuned and developed - so we forced it always. We PUSH, REQUIRE each of our children to excel at what is each one's abilities and interest. For example, another one is in the slow-learn category. School is VERY hard. But as a young teen probably could build a house from the ground up with absolute perfect fine detailing. And loves doing it. So... to learn how to be the best of the best. Amazingly skilled. Forced to become so too. To bring in craftsmen to teach him even. Have him go on their jobs - cheap but paid. (All our children have to EARN their money. NO FREE MONEY.)

To interact with the teacher, to not just be there, not just get an A, but to learn from the teacher. Master all the teacher's skills and knowledge - and then go beyond the teacher. This could quickly evolve to a teacher-student relationship were a tad they both were teaching each other. Even listen close enough to spot misspeaks and inaccuracies, get it right, show to be listening Talk about teacher's pet! It was more than just a fantastic student, but incredible success. Not only did they write letters of recommendation, they made calls to the universities. One even went to talk to the dean of the department.

Not the top grade student - a mere 3.85 as opposed to one of those 4.65 adjusted types. But a KILLER resume' of actually success. 3 Science Fair wins - 2 in one year and it published in International Science Journals for a unique protocol study that changed water testing worldwide. Got the school (starting at 10th grade) getting corporate grants. WOW! Captain of winning science bowl team and on and on. We told all her teachers to "push her hard. We'll do our part." She hated it as an adolescent - but came to love all the POWER winning and successes bring, all the POWER mastering diverse knowledge including experience knowledge, mastering inter personnel relations with teachers etc brought her. In her last year of high school they even had HER teaching a class of sophomores - not just the subject, but HOW TO BE A STUDENT and WHY KNOWLEDGE IS POWER - the ONE THING no one can ever take from you. (Sorry, I brag on my kids A LOT!)

When she understand the situation was as an adolescent - telling us the teacher was making her redo a paper for the 5th TIME!!! No one else had to. It was like "I have to be perfect or something." Answer: "Yes, we told your teaches to do that. You paper isn't done until it's perfect. However many times that takes - and you have to work with the teacher to figure it out. Image a high school kid trained for year to write a paper with perfect grammar, punctuation, structure, word choice... all things us as parents could never do. We could only support the teacher. Probably around 10th grade she figured out she had greater knowledge and academic skills than us - but not life experience skills we each uniquely have - both being INTENSELY competitive people. Life is a competition. Fairness is irrelevant.

It really has to suck for a teacher when all the students act like they hate being there, have no interest and see the teacher more an annoying cop for which their challenge is to see what they can get away with - and get away with not doing. Parents that don't give a damn, other than the few who come on parent-teacher night - most to make lame ass excuses or bitch at the teacher. I would think it is only a matter of so many years stuck in a school with students like that before the teacher no longer gave a damn. Just go to work, endure doing the job, go home.

joko104 said:

In MOST societies, the concept was the older generation sacrifices for the younger generation, parents sacrifice for their children, advance the children.

But NOT in the USA. In the USA children are sacrificed for the old people. What do they care about kids when they become adults and trying to raise their own family. All that matters are old people. After all, why should they care about what happens to their children, grandchildren and great grandchildren after they die of old age. The USA only exists for them. So do the children.

Kids can't vote anyway so who gives a rats ass about kids in politics?

Sacrifice the children to save us old people! - the apparently majority opinion of the old people on this forum. Screw kids, save me!

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nope,the USA is like everyone else, the children(young men fight the wars)

parents do sacrafice a lot but socity is structured around middle age

KevinKohler said:

And you got that food from where? It was made available to you by an army of employees, working round the clock, despite you saying how stupid that is. You groceries are more important to you than the future of America's children.

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I have worked the the same industry, and it is a good thing people do it. Have I said otherwise or do you just have a chip on your shoulder?

Josie said:

Because some can. Many can't, but there are certainly untrained people out there that can do a fine job teaching their kids.

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Only if they are experts in every school subject. Most parents are not.

Home schooling is fine with me if real teachers with college degrees in education or school subjects come to the house.