Why are Boston Public Schools so bad? (Cambridge, Somerville: appointed, real estate)

[stanley-88888888]

here's an anecdote I heard about the exam schools:
hundreds of years ago only affluent people could afford to be taught latin.
(in catholic church, the priest used to speak in latin up until the 1960's and only the affluent received the word of god).
latin was a way to make distinction among classes. those in the upper class could translate latin (boston latin/latin academy/cambridge rindge and latin/somerville latin) and those in the lower class could only speak english (boston english/cambridge english/somerville english).

eventhough there is no longer a latin requirement, this mite give perspective to the current state of the schools.

[Whatsnext75]

There are a lot of poor people in boston. Some of them are hardworking and still poor, some of them are just happy to collect welfare, smoke crack and are sorry they had children but have to send them to school. Sadly these are the people who use bps these days. There might be a few middle or even upper middle families who believe in public schools and choose to send their kids there but they are few and far between.

[Dm84]

Originally Posted by Whatsnext75

There are a lot of poor people in boston. Some of them are hardworking and still poor, some of them are just happy to collect welfare, smoke crack and are sorry they had children but have to send them to school. Sadly these are the people who use bps these days. There might be a few middle or even upper middle families who believe in public schools and choose to send their kids there but they are few and far between.

I have a few middle class friends who tried BPS. By 1st grade their kids were either in private school or they moved out of the city.

[Urban Peasant]

Originally Posted by stanley-88888888

here's an anecdote I heard about the exam schools:
hundreds of years ago only affluent people could afford to be taught latin.
(in catholic church, the priest used to speak in latin up until the 1960's and only the affluent received the word of god).
latin was a way to make distinction among classes. those in the upper class could translate latin (boston latin/latin academy/cambridge rindge and latin/somerville latin) and those in the lower class could only speak english (boston english/cambridge english/somerville english).

eventhough there is no longer a latin requirement, this mite give perspective to the current state of the schools.

Your explanation is almost but not quite. Boston Latin, the oldest public school in the whole nation, was not ever founded for rich people and among its long list of illustrious alumni, you can count far more working class lads than nobility. The Cabots, the Lowells, the Appletons, etc did not send their sons to Public Latin School. Boys from poor and struggling families like Benjamin Franklin (who eventually had to drop out altogether due to financial circumstances) did. Cambridge, Rindge, and Latin likewise has always been a working class school. The English High School, the oldest public HIGH school in the nation, offered Latin for a while as well but again has always been a primarily working class school. Moreover, you forgot to mention Boston Technical High School, now known as the O'Bryant High School of Mathematics, which is the third exam school and never taught Latin in its curriculum. So no, the teaching of Latin is not correlated with being upper class or high quality education. These are all mutually exclusive ideas.

[miu]

[quote=Guineas;38449751Why are Boston Public Schools so bad?
[/QUOTE]
Because their students are victims of bad parenting. It's not the schools' fault that their students don't care about doing well academically.

[snatale1]

Originally Posted by Guineas

Given the high degree of gentrification in places like JP and Southie, why are the schools (especially elementary and middle schools) still so bad? Do the people who live in JP have no young school-aged children or do they send them to parochial or private schools?

Here's the MCAS comparison between Curley Elementary in JP and Collicot Elementary in Milton.

"Gentrification" is the PC way of saying rich White people kicking minorities out of their neighborhoods, you know what people with money do? They send their kids to private schools (at least if they live in Boston), so it has no effect on the public school system.

Even if BPS decided they gave a crap about the kids one day (don't worry, will never happen) once people started failing left and right, the race baiting crybabies would claim their against the minorities and it would go right back to the way it is now. The reason charter schools do well is because they don't play the PC game, don't take excuses and will tell those groups to pound sand! Come to school, study, or fail and go elsewhere, no other options. Granted, that how most systems work outside the city.

[miu]

Originally Posted by snatale1

"Gentrification" is the PC way of saying rich White people kicking minorities out of their neighborhoods, you know what people with money do? They send their kids to private schools (at least if they live in Boston), so it has no effect on the public school system.

Even if BPS decided they gave a crap about the kids one day (don't worry, will never happen) once people started failing left and right, the race baiting crybabies would claim their against the minorities and it would go right back to the way it is now. The reason charter schools do well is because they don't play the PC game, don't take excuses and will tell those groups to pound sand! Come to school, study, or fail and go elsewhere, no other options. Granted, that how most systems work outside the city.

If the bad parents don't give a crap about their children, then it's nearly impossible to teach them. It's not a school's job to be a substitute parent. And the school day is not long enough to replace parents who aren't encouraging their children to take their schoolwork seriously and to respect their teachers.

My parents moved to Concord for the good public school system. However, it was not all about the schools there, not only did my parents encourage us to take our academics seriously (it was our job as their kids to do well in school) but also in the classroom I was surrounded by children who also took their schoolwork seriously and planned to go on to a good college. Not one of my classmates thought street culture was more interesting than going on to college. Not one of my classmates became teen parents. On the other hand, in a city public school, there are way too many students from chronically poor parents who don't think that being a geek is cool. And those students also become distractions in the classroom for any student whose parents want them to do well in school. And it's not fair to the teachers to have to deal with unmotivated students. It's a good parent's job to motivate their children to want to succeed in school, not the teacher's.

[semiurbanite]

You might want to go to the DOE website and look at those MCAS score after controlling for income (look at non-low income data for both towns). Here is a link that was going around recently regarding some Somerville schools - once you control for income, the MCAS score are on par with Weston and Wellesley.

https://drive.google.com/file/d/0B1O...ew?usp=sharing

[wolfgang239]

Originally Posted by semiurbanite

You might want to go to the DOE website and look at those MCAS score after controlling for income (look at non-low income data for both towns). Here is a link that was going around recently regarding some Somerville schools - once you control for income, the MCAS score are on par with Weston and Wellesley.

https://drive.google.com/file/d/0B1O...ew?usp=sharing

And as people point out to you every time you post this information about Somerville in other towns discussions of schools, you can't control for low income habits.

[semiurbanite]

Originally Posted by wolfgang239

And as people point out to you every time you post this information about Somerville in other towns discussions of schools, you can't control for low income habits.

Actually they haven't, this is a first, please explain! My kids have lovely friends in the Somerville schools from "low income" households, the Brazilians are especially hospitable and family oriented. But please, elaborate on your point with some examples, won't you?