Education begins with the parents

As the new school year approaches, there are many changes under way in both local school systems including a new superintendent and what could be as many as a dozen new principals and administrators.

As with any regime change at the school or district level, there are new ideas, new policies, new rules and new concepts.

While we wish our educators the best, we hope they don’t lose track of the most important component in the education of our little ones – the parents.

Despite what some may believe, no school or school system can truly rise above the level of importance assigned to it by its parents.

Unfortunately, there are too many parents out there who don’t think the education of their children is important.

Parents will ultimately determine the extent of their children’s success in school.

Parents who value education will make sure their children are dressed warmly in winter and don’t go to bed or to school hungry.

Parents who value education will make sure their children are completing their homework and will track their progress at school.

Parents who value education will read to their children or listen as their children read to them.

Parents who value education will limit television, video games, cell phones and instant messaging. They will make sure that their children complete their homework and finish their reading assignments.

Parents who value education will make sure their children have access to books from the public library and occasionally watch something educational and fun on PBS or the Discovery Channel.
Parents who value education will make sure that there are at least a few educational resources in the home – a dictionary, a computer-based encyclopedia or child-safe Internet.

Parents who value education will make sure their children behave in school.

A child whose parents take an active interest in his education is the luckiest kid in the world. He has been given one of the greatest gifts a youngster can have – parents who care.

He will have the best shot at life. The odds are in his favor.

Unfortunately, parents who value education could soon be outnumbered by those who don’t ... and it’s showing.

The cold, hard reality for administrators is that despite their best efforts and talents, apathetic parents will be the reason test scores are low.

Many of the students who fail to pass the state end-of-grade tests – or who fail to master their courses in general – come from homes where there is little or no educational infrastructure.
Sadly, the odds are against those youngsters.

Most of these students are from single or no-parent homes. They have more siblings than “ma” or “grandma” can handle.

There’s little money for books, magazines or even a functioning computer. Most of their parents were not able to go to college and many probably never finished high school.

For them, education is not the priority it once was if at all.

To these parents we say, “Get off your duff and do what is right by your children. Be the parent. You are the boss. Act like one. Do some of the things listed above to make sure that your child is learning in school.”

Before we continue to hold the schools accountable, driving off teachers and burying the rest in red tape, let’s see if we can hold the parents a little more accountable.

School should be more than an 8 to 3 babysitting service.