Science Fair Projects #rant #school

I have to grumble a bit.  We've had a (relatively) hard year this year at school.  Nothing we haven't (so far) been able to handle, fortunately.  Then you add on science fair projects.  I can see science fair projects for those kids that are motivated and like to do them.  Those that need extra grades to help out their grades, too.  But, for a general population student to be required to do science fair projects is a bit much (my opinion).  Not only does it add to the load for a student that is already struggling, it's a major annoyance to the parent who ends up having to help (and pay for supplies).

I understand the need for kids to learn all about scientific procedure.  I can see the need for them to see how these things are done.  However, requiring it of students that are otherwise never going to use it goes overboard.  Sadly, I can state that my child, who used to love science, has come to dislike it.  I can only hope that at some point in the future she ends up with a teacher who can possibly help her overcome the dislike.

Monday musings - School summary and hard choices

With the struggles we've had this year with school, we finally completed the school year. This past year I've had to watch my honor roll students turn into students with Cs and Ds. My son will apparently have to attend summer school to move up to high school as well. It's disappointing and frustrating on my part to know that I failed to keep them on track and doing better.

I found out at the last minute that his science class actually qualified to receive Carnegie credits by taking an EOCT. It caught me off guard only in that respect, it didn't change the effort (or lack thereof) that had been put into the class during the year. Both that class and his accelerated algebra class had EOCTs instead of finals. He did very well in Science and acceptably well in Math. Unfortunately, his efforts at EOCT weren't enough to bring his average up to an good level, so we did not accept the Carnegie units associated with them. I can only hope that he'll complete summer school well and get a fresh start next year at high school and be able to pull things out the way I know he's capable of doing.

As to my daughter, I have a hard choice to make now. As in, where will she be attending? I can put her back in GCA (I preliminarily put her on the enrollment list), I can leave her at GOC (her preferred choice), or I can send her to brick and mortar. I guess what we'll have to do this week is figure out what the best option is for her and go from that. I haven't been impressed by the teaching (or lack of) when it comes to math especially. She adores her language arts teacher and is fine with her social studies teacher. Her science teacher she has mixed feelings about. Personal feelings aside, though, I'm going to have to make sure whichever choice we make will give her the support she needs in her classes.

So I cannot call this year successful by any stretch of the imagination. It's a veritable stew of factors that created a disaster of a meal. I can only pray that it all works out with the choices that we make from here on out.

It's CRCT week

I hate CRCT week.  I really do.  Not only is it a big stress for the kids, it's a major stress for me.  Luckily for my kids, they're confident enough in what they know to not worry half as much as I do.  Then again, maybe they know I'll do enough worrying for all of us.  With my son in 8th grade, this is a major year for him.  The troubles he had earlier this year makes this even more stressful now.  I so look forward to getting this school year over.  It's been an experience that I really don't want to repeat.

Monday Musings

To Virtual School or to Brick & Mortar-
The deadline is upon me. I must decide whether or not I'm sending my daughter back to Gwinnett Online Campus in the next couple of days. I plan on trying the drive out to the new school location tomorrow. On a good day, the drive will be about 30 minutes. On a bad day, well, it's Atlanta. I also have to figure out what I'd do with myself while she's there. I will still be working, so I'll have to find somewhere to hole up and work. I don't see me driving out there and then back twice in a day twice a week. I know there are a few places I can probably set up, so I'll scout those out while I'm out that way tomorrow. I know my daughter's preference and I know WHY she has her preference. Honestly, I'm not sure it's enough to use yet.

Going to Church-
I'll be honest, I haven't been to church in several years. I was on a roll when the kids were younger until they got sick back to back and broke the streak. From there, I tried to convince my husband to go with me but he's generally a homebody after his work week. My kids see him and would rather stay home. I'd rather stay home with family, just because it's not often we're all together. I'm thinking this summer, though, that I may try visiting a new church. I'm thinking my kids are old enough to make that decision for themselves and come with me or not. I made some new friends when helping out at the Easter carnival at Luxomni Baptist and they were highly encouraging for me to visit. So, I may make that a summer goal.

Spring Break etc -
I'm on spring break this week, my kids go on spring break next week. So, I'm going to try to use this time to catch up on a few things around the house. My daughter and I have to prepare for the Color Run this weekend too. I'm excited to be able to go do it again. This year we're running with some fellow mom bloggers, which should make it that much more fun. Hopefully, I'll have lots of pictures to share on this one next week.

End of Semester 1

The new semester starts after the holiday and the old semester is gone. My kids and I survived the transition. I won't say this semester has been successful, it's definitely been stressful. In the end, though, my kids passed all courses for the first semester. Some of the grades I wonder about, but now that we have something of a clue as to what to do and how to do it, next semester should run better. I certainly won't get ambitious and say it will run smoothly. Somehow, with all the hormones in the house, I sincerely doubt that's possible.

I still have my issues with Gwinnett Online Campus, but I'm hoping it works its way out quickly. My son is focused on getting to 9th grade, he's really liking the idea of going over to GSMST. He knows what it's going to take to get to 9th grade from here, he knows what I expect of him. He's still working on coming to terms with what will be expected of him if he does go to GSMST.

My daughter, on the other hand, is loving getting the best of both school worlds. She loves being able to do work at home and then do what she wants. She loves being able to go to school for the labs and hang out with her friends. As much as she likes one of the teachers, though, I get the impression she's indifferent to them. She's thinking about what she wants to do for next year. We're holding off on a decision, though, until after this school year is out.

Monday Musings

So I've decided that while the school has definite issues to work out, at least half of my issues are my own. My main problem is that the school isn't exactly what it was advertised. Part of that is due to the lack of enrollment that they expected this year (at most around 85 students total for middle school), so they had to change some of what was originally planned. The variety of students they received within that enrollment, I think, is more than they figured as well. As such, with only 4 teachers for the entire MS, things just aren't happening.

I suppose that because my son has had such problems, it has colored my view against a lot of it. Though, hearing some of the other parents complain of the same thing, means it isn't just me. Most of those I'm hearing from, though, are also former GCA parents. We got used to one thing at GCA and expected a hybrid school (the one advertised) and didn't get it.

My son hit 8th grade hard, with teen issues already. Then having to adjust to an entire new system didn't help. From there top it with the problems the school is having in managing the students they have and it was a major catastrophe.

Math for my son has always been easy. From K-8 math, he blew through the material. At GCA, he developed bad habits that we're working to break. At GOC, he was finally CHALLENGED by the material. Given the attitude he started with, this was not a good thing. Add in the fact that he started the semester off taking a HS level math class and was expected to learn the material on his own (with no teacher support) built on the problem. The school has since started having one of the HS math teachers actually TEACH the lessons when he's on campus for labs, which is an improvement. It's not a fix, as that's only one day a week. You can't teach all of the material in one day, much less support the material they're learning. So, the math falls to my husband to teach when my son has issues. It was this that had us leaving GCA (partially) last year. Those that know me know why, but I'm not able to teach my son math. It's very counter productive for me to try. So, when GOC advertised that we'd have all the help we needed, the teachers would teach, not the parents, we fell into a trap. We're recovering, though my son's grades suffered in the mean time.

I'll give several of my kids' teachers credit though, they've always been upfront and have had no problem letting me know when there's a problem. Given the way everything else has gone, I appreciate they're taking the time to DO THEIR JOB and help me help my student.

So, I have an attitude problem and it's coloring most of what I see and do. It's gotten fairly extreme when it comes to my kids (particularly my son) and their school. I keep my mouth shut (mostly) to keep me from saying something I might regret later.

With the schools now offering open houses to prospective new parents, I'm not sure I can recommend the school or not. I'm not unbiased, I can't give a neutral review. For anyone that might be looking, I'd say take it all with a grain of salt and be willing to take on the bulk of helping your child learn. If you can manage that, then it may just work for you. For me, next year is all up in the air. My son will head to HS, my daughter will still be MS. I'll have some decisions to make, we'll see how those come out.

Friday Facts (Charter Schools)

With all the debate going on about the upcoming Charter School amendment, I wanted to present some information here for you to review. Just a note: I am not against the charter school amendment, I'm actually for it. I'm against a portion of the law that goes into effect when the amendment passes. It does not allow for true transparency or representation on the board that would do the charter school approvals. At any rate, for your review..

From the Georgia Public Policy Foundation

- FAQs about the Charter school amendment

- Financial Impact of Charter Schools

From Georgia Hope

- Fact vs. Fiction

- Setting the Record Straight

Of course, you can always read the bills themselves here:

-http://www.legis.ga.gov/Legislation/en-US/display/20112012/HR/1162

- http://www1.legis.ga.gov/legis/2009_10/sum/hb797.htm

The Educator's Room @educatorsroom

For the past couple of months, I've been writing/creating articles for a new web site/magazine called The Educator's Room. My articles are written from a parent perspective since I'm not a teacher. The articles that are hosted are written by educators and others involved in the education of our children from around the nation.

My most recent article is Virtual Schools: An alternative choice for parents. This being our third year using a virtual school for our kids, I wanted to make sure that more parents realize it IS a choice for them to make.

I've also been helping to work on the Pinterest pages for the group. It's been a lot of fun finding new information that may be useful to teachers or to parents who teach at home (whether using home school curriculum, purchased online curriculum, or public virtual school). With parents realizing they have to be more involved in their child's education, it makes a wonderful resource.

I highly recommend checking it out. Not just because I contribute, though I'd love for you to check out my articles and provide useful feedback, but because I believe it's a valuable resource. You can find us on facebook as well: https://www.facebook.com/TheEducatorsRoom

Getting Set for a New Adventure

I know school is getting ready to begin when I start getting phone calls from new teachers. I've also received log in information to the Gwinnett Parent Portal. I haven't been on that for 2 years. My children have switched over to the Gwinnett Online Charter for the coming school year. You can see some of the factors that we took in to consideration for the change here. My kids actually had a good bit of input into the decision process, so we can only be excited about the upcoming year.

To get ready for the start of school, I have cleaned my children's bedrooms and put in brand new desks. Their computers have been moved from the office to their bedrooms. This was as much for my sanity as theirs. This past year was a challenge to keep them focused on their work instead of each other. With my new job getting in the way, I wasn't paying attention to them as I should. We now have 2 days a week that we can meet up with their teachers as well as fellow students to get the help that I wasn't able (or available) to give them.

We attend orientation tomorrow to find out how things will work, get accounts set up, etc. Truly a new adventure in education for our household.

Charter Schools & Legislation

Given my support of charter schools (especially since my kids attend one), I have to speak out against HB 797 (which has already passed, but is pursuant to the constitutional amendment for charter schools being passed) and HR 1162. I'm not sure that those that support the bill have thoroughly read it through or thought about the implications.

"(b) The commission shall be appointed by the State Board of Education and shall be composed of a total of seven members and made up of three appointees recommended by the Governor, two appointees recommended by the President of the Senate, and two appointees recommended by the Speaker of the House of Representatives."

If I'm going to have a commission that oversees part my child's education, I want them elected, not appointed. It's too easy for posts to be given as a political favor, or for it to be divided on political lines. We live in a democracy which has too much bad bureaucracy already. Adding in this is not a good idea. We are having enough issues with making sure our kids are properly educated without having to worry about a commission that doesn't have to be transparent or be held accountable by their constituents.

I'm all for charter schools and would love to see more created. There has to be, though, a point where the people in a district have a voice in when/where/what for their schools. What most don't realize, though, is that the state ALREADY has the right to create 'special charter schools'. There is no need for a constitutional amendment to create a charter commission. --

Ga. Const. Art. VIII, § V, Para. VII

PARAGRAPH VII. Special schools


(a) The General Assembly may provide by law for the creation of special schools in such areas as may require them and may provide for the participation of local boards of education in the establishment of such schools under such terms and conditions as it may provide; but no bonded indebtedness may be incurred nor a school tax levied for the support of special schools without the approval of a majority of the qualified voters voting thereon in each of the systems affected. Any special schools shall be operated in conformity with regulations of the State Board of Education pursuant to provisions of law. The state is authorized to expend funds for the support and maintenance of special schools in such amount and manner as may be provided by law.

(b) Nothing contained herein shall be construed to affect the authority of local boards of education or of the state to support and maintain special schools created prior to June 30, 1983.

So, why is it that we need a commission to handle what's already there? So, in effect, HR1162 is just proposing a change to something that doesn't need to be changed.

Then there's always the question of finance. The economy is bad, we all know that. Just look at DeKalb and what they're going through because of bad management of money. I could wish there were an easy way to settle that issue, but there's not. In the mean time, we don't need to fix something that isn't necessarily broken. It just needs to be utilized appropriately.

So, I won't be voting to change the constitution of our state. I'd hope that you'd consider the above, as well as fully read both HB 797 and HR1162 before you vote next week on the democratic straw poll. Vote on the amendment is in November.