EDU Trending: What Parents Want
Parents want their children to be successful. But parents’ definition of success and the goals to achieve it changed dramatically during and since COVID. Before the pandemic, most parents were dedicated to the proposition that high academic achievement and being accepted to a good college were their children’s ticket to financially successful, secure, and, therefore, happy futures.
Times have changed and so have parents’ priorities.
Two recent 2023 surveys were conducted to understand what parents want from their children’s education and how they prioritize their goals. One was distributed in the urban locales of Northern Manhattan and the South Bronx: https://www.the74million.org/article/my-humbling-education-in-what-families-really-want-from-their-kids-schools/?utm_source=The%2074%20Million%20Newsle The second took place in Beaver, Utah, a small rural town: https://www.deseret.com/2023/1/19/23560986/parents-top-priority-for-education
Different parts of the country. Different demographics. The only priority emphasized by NYC parents is safe transportation to schools in safe neighborhoods. Otherwise, the results and goals are remarkably similar. Parents in both cities want:
Students to be encouraged to pursue their interests and be creative and innovative
Students to learn to think for themselves and find meaning and purpose
Students to learn practical life skills i.e. teamwork, problem-solving, self-reliance, persistence
Character development to be a goal along with physical, social, and emotional well-being
Students to be supported in acquiring social and academic capital
Academic prowess alone ranks at or near the bottom on these surveys, and getting into college is no longer the holy grail. Instead parents prioritize practical life skills, the soft skills of personal and social development, personalized education, and after high school, educational and vocational options that align with children’s interests and career ambitions.
Parents are not presuming to dictate curriculum. They are asking educators to broaden their perspectives to holistically provide the tools students will need to thrive in a dynamic global society.
Likewise, a 2021 international study by Nord Anglia Education that included parents from China, North America, the United Kingdom, and Spain reports very much the same results: development of soft skills and social agency as well as academic achievement https://www.forbes.com/sites/nickmorrison/2021/12/09/creative-flexible-global-what-millennial-parents-want-from-schools/?sh=942b2f145636
Alina Adams, whose research was in the two NYC boroughs, shares an insight that applies to all: “…I learned that, before I spoke or wrote, I should first shut up and listen. I can only advise [those]…who make policy and…allocate funds to do the same. And then to act accordingly.”
News and Views: “Decorum” vs. People’s Lives?
This was the question facing the State Legislature of Tennessee on April 6, 2023, when they voted to expel two of three state representatives for showing a lack of decorum which brought "disorder and dishonor to the House". . . https://www.bbc.com/news/world-us-canada-65182502 What did these legislators do to earn such disciplinary action? They went to the well of the floor without permission. Why? Because they had repeatedly requested and had repeatedly been denied the right to be heard. https://apnews.com/article/tennessee-lawmakers-expulsion-d3f40559c56a051eec49e416a7b5dade
Never mind that they intended to urge the adoption of stricter gun laws, including a ban on assault weapons. Never mind that that their protest came in the aftermath of the March 27, 2023, shooting, less than a week earlier, at Covenant School in Nashville, when the killer, armed with a legally purchased AR-15 assault rifle, murdered three nine-year old children and three staff members.
Never mind that - in both state and federal legislatures - expulsion is an extreme measure usually reserved for members who have committed a crime. Lack of decorum does not qualify. Never mind that the Representatives Justin Pearson and Justin Jones, who were expelled, are Black, and that their colleague and partner, Representative Gloria Johnson, whose seat was saved is White. When a reporter asked why she had been spared, Representative Johnson responded, “I think the color of my skin might have had something to do with it.”
The shame of Tennessee is mind-boggling. Their state legislature is outed as racist. Citizens will need to decide how to deal with this fact whenever they have the opportunity to vote. Worse, racism disguised as “inappropriate decorum” was used as a distraction from the people’s demand for stronger gun control and a restriction on assault weapons.
Worst of all, Tennessee state officials showed a callous disregard for the three children and three adults killed at Covenant School and a complete lack of moral clarity in failing to stem gun violence, which is now the leading cause of death among children and teens in the United States.
P.S. They’re back! Justin Jones reinstated 4/10/23 and Justin Pearson reinstated 4/13/23 by the will of the people. Let freedom ring!
P.P.S. The first 100 days of 2023 saw 132 mass shootings in the U.S., including 13 in K-12 schools: www.gunviolencearchive.org How many more deaths will it take before elected officials do what the majority of their constituents demand; namely, pass and enforce stricter gun laws, especially on assault weapons?
Question of the Day: Changing Places
Which country singer-songwriter wrote “Walk A Mile In My Shoes?”
Johnny Cash
Joe South
Merle Haggard
Dolly Parton
Willie Nelson
For the correct answer, please go to the blog below.
From Me to You: The Center of You
We all have central places: The people, events, and physical spaces that give us roots and history, shape our lives, and sometimes profoundly impact who we become. We may bury them deep in the closet of memory, but they remain an inextricable force that invisibly steers our course, influences our choices. Sometimes they rise up and demand a reckoning. So it is for Audrey Zhou (rhymes with Joe), heroine of the insightful, disquieting, funny, tearful, and deeply moving debut novel by Delia Cai.
A successful career woman in New York City, Audrey, 27, is returning to her rural mid-western home town for the first time in eight years to introduce Ben - her white, wealthy, upper class fiancé - to her middle class Chinese immigrant parents. She dreads dealing with her chronically critical mother, facing friends whom she abandoned, and being in a town she had been so desperate to leave. During the one week visit, Audrey comes to grips with her past, makes shaky amends with those she hurt, and recognizes that she has allowed race and class to influence her relationship with her parents and with Ben.
She finally understands that she must reconcile the old Audrey with the new. Although the novel’s resolution is a little too pat, it does not matter. Audrey matters. For whoever you are, wherever you are from, whatever your story is, you will recognize yourself in Audrey and cheer as she begins to emerge self-aware, ready to claim her future on her own terms. A memorable heroine! A gem of a book!