Young: A teacher trimphs over testing

A commentary posted in the opinion area of Austin American Statesman by John Young. This article is directed at the general public and especially the uninvolved parents of students. The article argues that teachers are not the only one to blame in the low performance of Kimball School System or schools across the state and nation. There are many factors in learning than just the teachers. The responsibility is shared by parents, lack of discipline, and skewed teaching process. The teaching process these days is focused on the standardized test. Also people tend to focus on the negative and see how bad an area is doing but there are also factors in how the school is performing. The low performing schools are usually the high crime low income areas and the high performing schools are the more wealthy areas. Society is already pointing the finger and the teachers and just blaming them instead of looking at the big picture.
I mostly agree with this article we need to better inform people about there children’s education. This article reinforces my view about standardized testing but also makes me take a closer look at what we should do to fix the problem of just pointing the finger at the teachers. We need someone to step up and fix this instead of just looking at others to do so. The teachers do have some responsibility but so do the parents and administration. Where are the parents at anyway? How involved are they? Now days the parents are so caught up in there own lives that they do not pay attention to how there children are performing in school, how do they actually know that there even going? We have this no child left behind act were schools are having to teach to this standardized test, which I do not agree with because all that we are doing is teaching to the test and leaving out important facts about the real world. We should come up with a new solution to evaluate teachers on an individual basis instead of the testing system we have in place.

Wrongly Convicted Rape Defendant Freed After 26 Years

Here is a story which I believe is work reading, posted by Dallas Morning News. In this article a man was freed after serving 26 years in prison for a crime he never committed. Johnnie Lindsey was freed in Dallas on the morning of September 19, 2008 because new DNA testing proved that he was not the rapist.
I was drawn to this article because people need to know that our justice system is not perfect. We are human and we make mistakes hopefully this will make people aware of the flaws in our justice system. How can we allow for this to happen to keep a prisoner hostage when they are innocent? I know that this article allowed me to be more aware and not necessarily believe everything that I hear even if it is on the news. For more information go to Dallas Morning News webpage