I am generally a believer of public education. I believe our hearts are in the right place... it's just hard to know how to fix things. I keep thinking if enough people can rally -- an influential policy-maker here, an inspiring student there, grounded research on "new learning" here, implementation of transformative discourse by that awesome teacher there -- then it can happen.

Right.

Right?

Lately, "right" feels truer as a question. Public education more recently has left me... sad, frustrated, discouraged.

I substituted in 4th through 8th grade classrooms in different schools these past few weeks, and attended two parent-teacher conferences. I was provided a script by one teacher: "tell the kids 'this', then 'that' - if anyone doesn't listen, write a referral." During "intervention" (i.e. specialized help) time with students struggling with math, I watched them walk in and get started with their routine: pecking away at buzzmath.com and Mobymax.com - bored, unegaged.

At the conferences, we were told your daughter is fidgety, unfocused, a daydreamer; but your son is a fabulous student who listens well.

I had to remove an entire class because of a student "meltdown" after a refusal to put a Chromebook away (I was instructed to have him put it away after the Dean-prescribed hour of playing games elapsed -- an hour set up to help him cope/settle in).

I was with a group of 25 7th graders that were being punished with two+ hours of silent reading time, while their rewarded classmates watched "The Goonies" and ate popcorn. At another school, a group of students were sent to watch the school spelling bee instead of attend class, because the neighboring teacher didn't think they were being set up for success by attending class (these four were having a "rough week"). The kids that came to class later asked the Dean if they behaved worse, could they be "punished" by watching the next spelling bee?

I hate to sound like such a downer, but the more intimate with the classroom I get, the more the failings of public education erode away a sense that meaningful change is possible.

I have a friend intensely committed to project-based homeschooling and she recently read and shared Homeschooling Deepens Silicon Valley's Rift with the Rest of Us. It's about how homeschooling parents (while the author says we can't necessarily blame them) are abandoning public education via DIY-ing, rather than committing to change in the public school environment. My friend went on a Twitter rant including:

So I know this week's update is about intersubjective meanings in education. And believe me I've been thinking a LOT about teacher/student relationships. The above experiences were all within the didactic premises, with the teacher as authority and the best students as "silent, bodily constrained, [and] undifferentiated" (Cope & Kalantzis, p44). Needless to say this week's reflections have left me... sad, frustrated, discouraged. So I ask: what keeps you motivated? And: can we really effect the necessary change?