Instead of suspensions, MORE oversight
Hi all,
I'm going to propose a solution to the behavioral epidemic we have in the public school system in America. We have been using suspensions, both inside and outside, to try to encourage students to behave better, since 14 years ago when I started teaching. The problem with this solution is that students come to like inside, have days off where they are unsupervised at home when they have outside, and come back with no behavioral change. Here's what I propose. We need people who are trained as counselors, yoga instructors, philosophy, psychology, or some related field, one on one, to reflect and help students make behavioral goals before they can return to class. It needs to be one on one, and it needs to be by very well qualified folks, because they are dealing with the most fragile, most difficult, and therefore most needy students we serve. Few people want that job, so we have to pay better than a regular ed teacher. Students would attend regular classes with these folks, be pulled out of the regular classes when they need to be, and the person helping them shape their behavior would monitor their behavior all day and correct it when necessary. At the end of the day, the student would have to stay for an extra hour (or however long it took) to come up with a plan for the next day to be more productive. This extra oversight and extra behavioral work would continue until all the students' teachers agreed that the student had improved.
We won't implement this solution because it is too costly. But we should. With the resources we spend on this, we would save money afterwards. These folks would learn how to correct behavior before they ever get into legal trouble. This would save millions, if not billions, in these students' later lives. They would learn self control, which would keep them out of prison and on the right track for success in society. At the least, I think this is a goal of school - to create citizens who can get along in civil society. At the best, we create students who make the world a better place. Having someone show students how to reflect and become better individually could create both things.
Anyway, thanks for listening. It's frustrating to know a solution to a problem but not have the funding to fix it. We have a behavior tech at my school and this is much of what he does. It helps many students, but there isn't enough of him to go around. We need 5-10 of him, having individual conferences with students who are having a rough day. Some days, we need 30 of them. There needs to be a pool of these folks, being trained at conflict resolution, yoga, meditation, psychology, etc., who will be ready to be called to whichever school needs them, until the behaviors have been modified so that the students can get along with other students, teachers, and at the end, the world.
I'm going to propose a solution to the behavioral epidemic we have in the public school system in America. We have been using suspensions, both inside and outside, to try to encourage students to behave better, since 14 years ago when I started teaching. The problem with this solution is that students come to like inside, have days off where they are unsupervised at home when they have outside, and come back with no behavioral change. Here's what I propose. We need people who are trained as counselors, yoga instructors, philosophy, psychology, or some related field, one on one, to reflect and help students make behavioral goals before they can return to class. It needs to be one on one, and it needs to be by very well qualified folks, because they are dealing with the most fragile, most difficult, and therefore most needy students we serve. Few people want that job, so we have to pay better than a regular ed teacher. Students would attend regular classes with these folks, be pulled out of the regular classes when they need to be, and the person helping them shape their behavior would monitor their behavior all day and correct it when necessary. At the end of the day, the student would have to stay for an extra hour (or however long it took) to come up with a plan for the next day to be more productive. This extra oversight and extra behavioral work would continue until all the students' teachers agreed that the student had improved.
We won't implement this solution because it is too costly. But we should. With the resources we spend on this, we would save money afterwards. These folks would learn how to correct behavior before they ever get into legal trouble. This would save millions, if not billions, in these students' later lives. They would learn self control, which would keep them out of prison and on the right track for success in society. At the least, I think this is a goal of school - to create citizens who can get along in civil society. At the best, we create students who make the world a better place. Having someone show students how to reflect and become better individually could create both things.
Anyway, thanks for listening. It's frustrating to know a solution to a problem but not have the funding to fix it. We have a behavior tech at my school and this is much of what he does. It helps many students, but there isn't enough of him to go around. We need 5-10 of him, having individual conferences with students who are having a rough day. Some days, we need 30 of them. There needs to be a pool of these folks, being trained at conflict resolution, yoga, meditation, psychology, etc., who will be ready to be called to whichever school needs them, until the behaviors have been modified so that the students can get along with other students, teachers, and at the end, the world.
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