Back to school season begins the new hope that a leadership change will somehow resolve more than a generation of decline for Kansas City Public Schools.
A massive exodus, struggles with accreditation and continued violence within the walls of KCPS buildings have precipitated the overall decline of Kansas City's urban core and provide very little hope for the future.
Today, a massive Summer gathering featuring a great deal of happy talk starts the new semester.
Check the roundup:
KSHB: New school year, new superintendent for KCPS
Newspaper: Thousands greet the school year and a new headquarters for Kansas City Public Schools
Fox4KC: KCPS students kick off school year with district’s first Summerfest
All of this theatricality, propaganda and deception under the guise of optimistic reporting might impress the uninitiated, but WE ARE INITIATED and when it comes to so-called good news about a public education turnaround most locals have seen it all before . . . Heck, we've studied the sitch closer than the last movie where Cameron Diaz was a bonafide hottie and showed a great deal of skin and acting skill.
But the question still lingers and deserves forthright community discussion rather than more unquestioned pronouncements . . .
WHAT HAS REALLY CHANGED?!? IS THE KANSAS CITY PUBLIC SCHOOL DISTRICT HEADED FOR A TURNAROUND OR JUST ANOTHER LESSON IN ONGOING FAIL?!?!
The only notable change-up occored in another low-turnout election and a last minute write-in campaign aligned with the efforts of Mayor Sly James which earned a few positions on the school board. Still, fixing Kansas City Public schools remains a Herculean task that most local and statewide officials don't want to address. For better or worse, the last guy who really wanted to shake things up moved out of town and changed his name.
And all of this has inspired our playlist for tonight . . .
As always, thanks for reading this week and have a safe and fun Saturday night.
The simple answer here is NO.
ReplyDeleteThere isn't going to be a lot of change this semester but that doesn't mean we shouldn't try.
The only thing worth agreeing with about this post is the connection between the school and the neighborhoods. We need to start thinking of schools as infrastructure and this is another are where KC is neglecting a community resource. More money might not be the answer but more government oversight and community involvement could be a start at a solution. The fact that a lot of the school board was elected in a write-in campaign shows that most people are disengaged.
American public education in general is in bad shape. KCMo is just doing worse than most but look out in the suburbs with shawnee administrators making so much money while they talk about cuts and you'll see that the public education in the usa is suffering.
ReplyDeleteThere's more homeless kids than last year.
ReplyDeleteIt will be terrible as usual. When you have "parents" that don't care and dropped out at 15 to have kids, they have kids that don't care either. The beat goes on in da hood. Until black people value education, hard work, and personal responsibility nothing will change for them. Throwing more money at them won't solve any problems, the change has to come from within. Unfortunately, that will never happen. In 200 years we'll be able saying the same things about them but they'll probably be even worse and it will be nobody's fault but their own. Of course they'll blame everyone else except themselves.
ReplyDeleteI agree that those who drop out of school to have kids at a young age are just continuing a cyle of poverty but that's not just a black problem. Look around KC and you'll find most whites caught in the same system.
DeleteIf there was only some kind of program to help these urban youth.
ReplyDeleteInteresting how people take the bait year after year for decades.
ReplyDeleteThe only way to save the students is to break up the district and start over. There is no use trying to fix it. These new superintendents just end up making it worse.
ReplyDeleteI aint no never sent my babies to school b4 laber day and I aint doing it now
ReplyDeleteRich kids get teachers while poor kids get computers.
ReplyDeleteIt doesn't matter if they had the best teachers on Earth, it would still be a colossal failure. It all starts at home. Drop-out "parents" that have no expectations of their kids other than go to jail and be on welfare their entire lives supercede anything a school can do. In 200 years we'll be saying the exact same thing about black people and they'll all be true.
ReplyDelete759 hit the nail on the head. Will KCPS be Blue Valley, not likely. But can it and should the community continue to work to improve it, hell yeah.
ReplyDeleteThere is no better eco devo tool than schools. Johnson county only exists today because of that. Once KC gets out of the rat race of gimmicks and just focuses on schools as neighborhood infrastructure, then it will improve.
9:01 Is very correct!
ReplyDeleteParents can barely keep up with their rotten criminal children much less the politics behind what goes on in the school district. Teachers are still underpaid and undervalued while infrastructure has been an issue for years. The curriculum has gone straight to Hell and there will be no positive change to any of the above anytime soon.
ReplyDeleteIt was nice.
ReplyDeleteYou know it is bad when people don't even run for the positions on the school board. In other cities, those are hard fought positions that generate wealth and/or political power and privilege. The KCSD can't even do that right! Who benefits here? Not politicians, not teachers (they don't want to be there), not students, and that leaves only the parents who get tax free babysitters and a free lunch for the kiddies. If something offers no benefits to a vast majority of the people it affects, it needs to go.
ReplyDelete