LightningStrike 95 Theses on Public Education Taking Miami-Dade by Storm
Dr. Michael M. Krop Sr. High • 1410 Countyline Road • Miami, Florida 33179
LightningStrikeNews.com
January/February 2016 • Issue 4 • Volume 18
Martin Luther posted his 95 theses to reform the Catholic Church. The Lightning Strike collected their own theses from students and faculty in hopes of improving the public education system. Compiled by Michael Katz, Art by Juana Argiro
I. When today’s economic prospects are dim, the first thing we sacrifice is educational spending. Electives are always the first to go. II.
es
We must devote more resourcto vocational and arts programs.
III. Students should have the choice of a non-academic curriculum during high school to pursue interests rather than purely academic programs geared for college. IV. Students are not required to participate in
clubs or after school activities. If a student has no initiative or self-motivation, they will simply drift through the school system until it’s too late, simply because nothing more was expected of them.
V. Competition created by a lack of educational resources puts students in a mindset of competing, not cooperating.
VI. In Florida, every course taken by a stu-
dent online equates to $800 of funding their school doesn’t receive.
VII. At $8,433 per student, Florida ranks 41st
in per-student funding. Our students are our future - and it seems like we’re not investing too wisely.
VIII. Students are no more than I.D. num-
bers, and our test performance has become a direct measure of our intelligence.
portance that it has become the sole motivation for students’ learning. Teachers can no longer teach what or how their hearts desire.
XIII. There is not enough teaching and learning that grows out of humans’ search for knowledge, improvement, love and community. XIV. We spend more than 1.7 billion annually on testing and it’s costing us the passion that once fueled our learning. XV. Uniformity is demanded on standardized testing when opportunities afforded to students are unequal.
XVI. Financial incentives are put in place to motivate teachers to get their students to perform well on standardized tests, making it even harder for them to resist teaching to a test.
XVII. Testing starts as early as February and
lasts until the end of the school, meaning that almost every day during the second half of the school year, students miss valuable class time to take some form of a standardized test.
XII. Test scores have been given so much im-
ing from the surrounding areas, students residing in lower socioeconomic neighborhoods often end up attending schools that parallel the scarcity in their surroundings.
XXIV. Students in some schools take six
classes a year while others take eight - in the same amount of time. As a result, some students have a much greater advantage when applying to college.
XXV. Grades are a poor reflection of a stu-
dent’s capacity and potential, yet students are taught to think that grades define them because they are given such importance.
XVIII. Oftentimes teachers are pulled from XXVI. The structure of the system suffocates their classes to proctor standardized testing, leaving teachers unable to teach and students unable to learn.
XIX.
The legislators making decisions about our education work in offices all day school board members are not required to visit schools under their jurisdiction, and their isolation results in schools being run like machines.
IX. Curricula has dominated the school sys- XX. Education falls short when tem. Teachers have less and less of a say in what or how they teach, and labs like hatching it comes to preparing students chicks or keeping class pets are beginning to sound more like myths than part of a student’s for real life - we graduate childhood. able to calculate the hypotX. The quality of our education is based on the enuse of a triangle yet clueway it looks on paper. Everything we learn has been reduced to a benchmark, everything we less as to how to buy a house do placed on the ticking timeline of our cur- or invest our money wisely. ricula. XI. Not all students want to become lawyers XXI. Separating students into categories
or doctors, and cutting non-academic electives during tough times keeps students from discovering or developing their passions.
XXII. High school start times Budget and Policy Priorities found that 34 states are contributing less funding on a per in schools throughout the na- student basis than they did prior to the recestion begin at unhealthy times. sion years. Since states are responsible for 44 percent of total education funding in the U.S., The American Academy of Pe- these dismal numbers mean a continued crackdiatrics recommends that high down on school budgets, despite an improving economy. school start no earlier than 8:30, XXXII. Lack of funding leads to substitute yet only 14% of high schools shortages and classes left unsupervised when adhere to this suggestion. teachers must take the day off. XXXIII. Department heads are responsible XXIII. Since schools pull part of their fund- for splitting up classes left without substitutes,
such as regular, honors, gifted and AP causes students to resent each other because some feel inferior to others, and often those not in advanced courses don’t receive the same push that is needed to succeed as those who are.
creativity. Since we enter kindergarten, we are taught to follow rules, obey our teachers, not speak unless we are called on - we can’t even go to the bathroom unless we ask. When we spend so much time thinking and acting in accordance with the rules, it makes thinking out of the box more challenging than it already is.
as well as a myriad of other duties, leaving them with little time to teach their own classes.
XXXIV. Substitutes are also affected by the
lack of funding. Many states have banned substitutes’ unions, leaving them to the mercy of the state legislators.
XXXV. In Florida, substitutes are unable to work for more than 10 days consecutively, because if they would, schools would have to give them benefits such as health insurance. XXXVI. Many students who were deemed
ready to join the workforce and/or enter college by the public school system end up dropping out of college and entering menial jobs due to a lack of preparation.
XXXVII. Politicians dictate curriculum, funding, and in Miami Dade County, they have limited the amount of time attendees of school board meetings could speak.
XXVII. The pressure put on students to per- XXXVIII. Students, parents form well on tests leads to cheating, both by and teachers need to have a students and teachers. Either we cheat, or we’re bigger voice in deciding the cheated by a system that lets our grades dictate education afforded to them, our opportunities - there’s no way out of it. XXVIII. Studies show that crowded class- because no one knows what rooms hamper students’ abilities to learn, yet they need better than them. over 22 percent of schools nationwide are XXXIX. More parents need to be involved in overcrowded. education system - and not just to fundraise. XXIX. Crowded classrooms interfere with the Parents need to teach what teachers don’t have
high quality interactions, feedback, and relationship building.
XXX. AP and Honors classes aren’t regulat-
ed by the Class Size Amendment - a law that caps classrooms at 25 students.
XXXI. A recent report from the Center on
the time - or the energy - to: ethics.
XL. Most of today’s schools teach to auditory
learners - students who can sit down quietly, listen to a lecture without asking any questions or interacting with their peers - when very few students in fact are able to learn that way.
► see “ 95 THESES” on page 4
pages 10-11
More inside: • Controversy surrounding affirmative action - page 5 • FLVS takes money out of teacher pool - page 7 • What really goes into the drum line - page 12
• Valentine’s day confessions - page 15 • Hoverboards: the future of transportation - page 16 • Basketball team goes to regional playoffs - page 19