My kid was born and life did a major flip.
I had a chance to work a few years in Spain and turned it down because I didn't want to miss her growing up. Same for a chance to work in England for 3 years. The same for a chance to lead a team of Indian software programmers, in India, before the software outsourcing really became an issue.
But I'm skipping ahead.
She was born. Within a few days, I set up to have money taken out of my paycheck to purchase U.S. Savings Bonds. From my upbringing, that was the smart thing to do.
Years later, I learned about mutual funds from a co-worker. After doing my homework, I decided to invest money for college into a mutual fund. The company even had a plan that would keep the funds in a small-cap, large-cap blend until I stated and then would start to transfer the money into a money market account.
SWEET!!!!!!!
[ As an aside, later, a family member who I looked up to, mentioned mutual funds in passing. "Mutual funds! Can't beat 'em! Been doing it for awhile now!"
He told me, then! Not before... Anyway...]
I told my friends with children the things I was doing to save money. Hopefully, hey are doing what they can. I know in one case, they didn't. But the parents can be trifling.
When it was time for her to attend school, she went to a private school. After 2 years, she was placed into another private school. She had a well earned reputation for talking too much. But a teacher suggested that she be put on Ritalin and that was enough.
She couldn't handle the class, in general, and she wanted more than just one kid put on that crap.
My daughter stayed in the second school through the 8th grade. During that time, I meet many Black parents, some single, who made sacrifices to send their children there. Some parents had no problem affording the school. One set of parents won private voucher money and was able to send both of their kids to the private school.
Before, they wanted to send both kids to school, but even with the father working 2 jobs, they couldn't afford to send both kids, so instead of making the hard choice, neither kid went to private school.
They did poorly in school and got into a lot of fights. Within 4 weeks at the private school, the daughters grades went up and the behavior improved. By the end of he first quarter, the boys behavior improved and his grades shot up. That's why I support vouchers.
Then came high school. We visited many private high schools, but my daughter wanted to attend a "academic magnet" public school. The school had 90% of its graduates continuing their education. Of the 90%, 95% attended 4 year accredited schools or military academies. This is a school that has a graduation rate of 97.5% for Black students. The attendance rate for Black students is 94%. The dropout rate is 0.9% for Black students.
I let her talk me into it, but I believe it was a mistake. She got a decent education. She took AP and IB courses. She encouraged other students and they encouraged her.
But the first day of school, she told me that I should show up to support the school because they wanted to cut the school budget and give the money to other schools. Why? Because the school performed well on the state assessment tests. She also didn't have an English book her first year because there were not enough books to go around.
The second year, on the first day of school she told me that the students are being asked to bring reams of copy paper to school because the school doesn't have enough. She also didn't have enough English books.
The third year, on the first day of school, again, not enough English books. The class size was increased. Plus there is talk of the school losing more money.
The fourth year, we battled the school board because they wanted the academic magnet schools to retain students who had not performed well in school. When that happened, the students were "sent back" to their zoned school.
We went to the school board meeting where the zone school representatives made speeches saying that the money for kids "sent back" does not come with them, so there is a strain on resources. The representatives of the academic magnet schools said it is unfair to keep failing students in the schools when the zone schools could do a better job educating them and getting them back on the track to graduate.
Then, the students who were "sent back" came up to speak. Wouldn't you know it, each student said they did well in middle school, went to the magnet schools and didn't do well because they didn't do the work required to do well.
My daughter was told that to get a C, you had to do about 2 hours of work a night. To get a B, you had to do about 3 hours of work a night. To get an A, you had to do about 4 hours of work a night.
She graduated with a 91.5 average. But her mother and I had to place our foot up her butt one quarter a year to keep her in line.
The U.S. savings bond money was used to purchase a very nice laptop. She has a partial scholarship at a HBCU. The money saved comes in handy.
She has friends who are in the military because they needed to get out of the city and they had no desire to go to college. She has friends in the military to "get money to go to college." She has friends in 4 year schools. She has friends in junior colleges.
I've asked and she's never been accused of acting white. She has been told that she's boug-hetto. (Bougie and ghetto).
She is still a work in progress.
The way I see it…environment means everything. So much , that as I watch my own children, products of divorced parents, go into a form of “schizophrenia” every time they come home from summer vacation with their father. They must change over from living in his “liberal, part-time parent” world…back to living in our “going to church every Sunday and Wednesday, live up to standards and expectations “ world.
I honestly believe, you’re striving for self-improvement is limited to the environment you are living in. Meaning, if you don’t get out every once in awhile and see something better…you can never want to be something better. Better not meaning more “upscale”, but rather, better than getting abused constantly; better than breathing foul air everyday; better than watching family and friends do nothing with their lives.
This is why I support school vouchers.
Vouchers provide parents an opportunity to change their environment.
Now, I’m not talking about total culture shock where I drop my kids into a class of “Blue Blood American Royals” that they have absolutely nothing in common with. But rather, into a school system where other parents care more about the technological resources of educational system than what new designer-brand of footwear to buy their kids.
My friends and family argue, “what about the kids whose parents can’t use vouchers because they don’t know how, or don’t have the transportation, or blah, blah, blah”?
I only wish I could pick up those kids and take them too. But I can’t. Everyone has a responsibility for his/her own kids. I can no more adopt all those kids wearing high price designer jeans their parents bought for them instead of calculators, than try to accommodate their heart-break complaints and keep my kids in schools that are not producing acceptable test scores.
So why would someone like me, making sacrifices everyday to afford a mortgage to move into a decent school district, under why parents who can’t do the same not want school vouchers?
I’m lost on this one.
Posted by: D.Marsh-Foy at January 19, 2005 04:48 PM