American Public Education is Failing...and Getting Worse Every Year

[Hafar1014]

Then where do the kids go to school? Have their parents drive them 20 miles across town to their private school or ride a public bus?

Worst case they would ride a bus to another public school and that's not fun either.

You do realize that schools do not perform but the students in them.

I could go on for days telling you about Duval County's magnet school program in Florida and how moving the students to newer schools did not help one damned bit. I taught at a magnet school in Louisville, KY. Worst school in the state, before and after becoming a magnet school because the vast majority of the students did not change, meaning their bad habits spread to the good students we imported from other schools. It's culture and not the teachers. Summarizing, it just doesn't ******* work. Those kids in those failing schools will be failures in any private school, just like they were in the magnet schools.

When a business makes an inferior product we dont buy it and they go bankrupt. When the public schools make an inferior product democrats prop it up to support teachers unions. Our children suffer. School choice will force them to improve. Today the wealthy get a good education and the poor get screwed

Roughly 1.8 million students left traditional U.S. public schools between 2019-20 and 2023-24, with significant numbers shifting to private schools or homeschooling, while a substantial portion (around 34%) became "unexplained" or unaccounted for, though overall trends point to declining enrollment accelerated by the pandemic but rooted in falling birth rates, affecting younger grades most significantly.
Key Figures & Trends:

• Total Loss: About 1.83 million students departed traditional public schools from Fall 2019 to Fall 2023/24

 

[Unkotare]

When a business makes an inferior product we dont buy it and they go bankrupt. When the public schools make an inferior product democrats prop it up to support teachers unions. Our children suffer. School choice will force them to improve. Today the wealthy get a good education and the poor get screwed

Roughly 1.8 million students left traditional U.S. public schools between 2019-20 and 2023-24, with significant numbers shifting to private schools or homeschooling, while a substantial portion (around 34%) became "unexplained" or unaccounted for, though overall trends point to declining enrollment accelerated by the pandemic but rooted in falling birth rates, affecting younger grades most significantly.
Key Figures & Trends:

• Total Loss: About 1.83 million students departed traditional public schools from Fall 2019 to Fall 2023/24

Wrong.

 

[Admiral Rockwell Tory]

When a business makes an inferior product we dont buy it and they go bankrupt. When the public schools make an inferior product democrats prop it up to support teachers unions. Our children suffer. School choice will force them to improve. Today the wealthy get a good education and the poor get screwed

Roughly 1.8 million students left traditional U.S. public schools between 2019-20 and 2023-24, with significant numbers shifting to private schools or homeschooling, while a substantial portion (around 34%) became "unexplained" or unaccounted for, though overall trends point to declining enrollment accelerated by the pandemic but rooted in falling birth rates, affecting younger grades most significantly.
Key Figures & Trends:

• Total Loss: About 1.83 million students departed traditional public schools from Fall 2019 to Fall 2023/24

The inferior products are the students before they ever get to school. Have you ever heard the expression, "You can't make chicken salad out of chicken shit!".

I once taught in one of the top 20 largest school districts in the country. The economic background of that county varied from housing projects to gated communities. Guess which schools did better? People who lived at the beach or in the swanky southern suburbs always finished with A scores when it came to testing. Schools in the more medium and mixed income areas, in the suburbs east and north of downtown, like the school where I taught rated about a B or C score. The poor areas with most of the housing projects and for lack of a better word, ghetto, in the west and northwest were always D and F scores.

We started a magnet school program shortly after I start teaching. Inner city mostly black schools were closed and consolidated with the suburban schools. New magnet schools were opened in the same building. Guess what happened. The kids in the A school did not apply to the magnet schools. All of the smart kids in the B,C,D, and F schools applied for a lottery to get into the magnet schools. Those magnet schools quickly became A schools. Several A schools at the beach and southside of town dropped to B schools. The B schools dropped to C and in some cases D. The D and F schools remained D and F schools with more D schools slipping to F because you removed the few students keeping their score up.

Fixes were tried where kids in D or F schools could attend any school in the district and transportation was provided. School choice of any public school if you will. Many kids left home at 6 AM and rode a bus to school 90 minutes across town, but that was their choice. The schools spent millions on buses, drivers, and fuel to accomplish this. My school handled about 42 buses just for our school and another 15 for transfers to other high schools, including three vocational high schools. I know this because I substituted for the AP who was responsible for transportation. I did that for 4 years. 2 as a teacher and 2 as an AP.

Guess what impact it had on school scores? Not a damned thing!

Now you might think my musings are just that, except these were results of a research project I did in graduate school. Of course I received an A is the course.

My results were this: Poor students (financially) are simply just poor (academically performing) students. Their income dictated their academic ability.

 

[Hafar1014]

Wrong.

You have to prove your point

 

[Unkotare]

...

I apologize for the length of this article, but it is a good explanation of how bad our public education is...

YOU don't know anything about education, so you should stop posting here.

 

[Hafar1014]

YOU don't know anything about education, so you should stop posting here.

American academic scores have been trending down for over a decade, accelerating significantly due to pandemic disruptions and long-term pre-COVID declines, particularly in reading. Key drivers include learning loss, school budget issues from the Great Recession, and widening achievement gaps, with only minor signs of recovery in math.

Key Points on Academic Decline

• Long-Term Trend: Scores were falling well before 2020, not just as a result of the pandemic.
• Major Drivers: Disruptions to schooling, family economic instability, and potential structural issues in education.
• Subject Areas: Reading has shown little sign of recovery, while math shows minor improvements.
• Impact: The declines have led to wider achievement gaps.

 

[Unkotare]

Covid was a disaster. In general, we are still recovering from all that "remote learning" bullshit. Keep that in mind the next time you read some jackass going on about AI replacing teachers and such.

 

[Hafar1014]

Covid was a disaster. In general, we are still recovering from all that "remote learning" bullshit. Keep that in mind the next time you read some jackass going on about AI replacing teachers and such.

The answer is school choice and vouchers so parents can choose where they send their kids to school.
People are voting with their feet.
Public school enrollment dropped by over 1.2 million students between 2019 and 2023, falling from a peak of 50.8 million to roughly 49.5 million, accelerated by the COVID-19 pandemic, lower birth rates, and shifts to homeschooling or private options. Further declines are projected through 2031.

Key Details on Public School Enrollment Declines

• Total Loss: More than 1.2 million students left the public system between fall 2019 and fall 2023.
• Pandemic Impact: The 2020 drop was the largest single-year decline since WWII.
• Where Did They Go? Stanford research indicates disenrolled students moved to private schools (14%), homeschooling (26%), or were unaccounted for, alongside declines due to population shifts.
• Future Projections: Enrollment is expected to continue falling, potentially dropping below 47 million by 2031.
• Regional Concentration: Declines are heaviest in the Northeast, West, and Rust Belt, with states like California, New York, and Oregon seeing significant drops.
• Unexplained Losses: Studies suggest a significant portion of "missing" students are not accounted for in traditional alternative schooling data.

 

[Unkotare]

The answer is ...

Any time someone starts a statement like that ^^^, it's a good time to stop listening.

 

[Hafar1014]

Any time someone starts a statement like that ^^^, it's a good time to stop listening.

Especially when you cant answer

 

[Unkotare]

Especially when you cant answer

I didn't see a question.

 

[Hafar1014]

I didn't see a question.

Why are millions of children fleeing the public school system

 

[Unkotare]

Why are millions of children fleeing the public school system

They aren't. Their parents are choosing to take some students out in favor of private schools or home schooling.

 

[Hafar1014]

They aren't. Their parents are choosing to take some students out in favor of private schools or home schooling.

Millions are a littel more than some. That tells you they are rejecting the public schools. The schools in democrat cities are the worst. If you live in a community like mine the public schools are great but everyone cant afford that

 

[Unkotare]

... That tells you they are rejecting the public schools. ...

Maybe some are. Maybe they watched the same YouTube clips you have. Parents are free to make whatever choices they can afford/manage for their children, of course.

 

[BS Filter]

Any time someone starts a statement like that ^^^, it's a good time to stop listening.

Why don't you offer a rebuttal instead of sticking your fingers in your ears like a dumb monkey.

 

[Woodznutz]

American academic scores have been trending down for over a decade, accelerating significantly due to pandemic disruptions and long-term pre-COVID declines, particularly in reading. Key drivers include learning loss, school budget issues from the Great Recession, and widening achievement gaps, with only minor signs of recovery in math.

Key Points on Academic Decline

• Long-Term Trend: Scores were falling well before 2020, not just as a result of the pandemic.
• Major Drivers: Disruptions to schooling, family economic instability, and potential structural issues in education.
• Subject Areas: Reading has shown little sign of recovery, while math shows minor improvements.
• Impact: The declines have led to wider achievement gaps.

The mind is a giant sponge soaking up information every waking moment. If it's not soaking up necessary knowledge, what is it soaking up?

 

[Unkotare]

Why don't you offer a rebuttal instead of sticking your fingers in your ears like a dumb monkey.

Complex problems don't have simple answers. Only a simpleton thinks so.

 

[DStar777]

Why are millions of children fleeing the public school system

They aren't. Their parents are choosing to take some students out in favor of private schools or home schooling.

As of 2024, approximately 3.7 million students are homeschooled in the U.S., representing about 6.73% of school-age children, up significantly from pre-pandemic levels. Meanwhile, in 2021, about 18.1% of U.S. students (roughly 14.4 million) were enrolled in private schools. Homeschooling rates nearly doubled from 3.4% in 2019 to 9% in 2020.

Google Search

Looks like millions to me.

 

[Unkotare]

6.73%. Wow.