Yes, the school is in serious trouble. The whole district is. The district lost accreditation, and the elected school board was replaced with a state appointed panel. I think of it as analogous to having sent in the National Guard. New superintendents keep being hired, then leave. Many teachers do not want to teach here. Some years ago, the district began recruiting teachers from outside the country, it was so hard to fill positions! One middle school teacher tells me that police have to be called to her school nearly everyday, but that these calls never hit the news. She herself was attacked by a student, slammed against a wall. My god, it is so pitiful.
Kids graduating from (or dropping out of) this school system are in the workforce already. If your town or county's schools are not as bad as this, please do all you can to keep them from falling so far. Please think of the consequences of your whole district having really failing public education. Really, if for no other reason, think of it from a self-interested point of view. Think how dependent you are on so many other people being able to read and reason. It affects the quality of care anyone you know in hospital or nursing home will get. It affects whether your mechanic can follow recall repair protocols issued by your car maker. It affects how crazily someone might drive on the highway, affecting how suddenly they decide that the sign directing them lright makes no sense to them, so instead they swerve left into your lane, hoping that exit on the left is the correct one. It affects whether they can understand instructions from their children's' pediatrician, not only so that
their children are well cared for in illness but so that they do not jeopardize
your own children's' health by coming to school sick, or having capriciously stopped a run of antibiotics, not properly treating lice, etc. How well kids learn to read and reason famously affects their ability to count change---think of what a universal complaint that has become! It affects levels of bureaucracy we encounter, as fewer people can be reliably authorized to make decisions, to apply policy in complicated or exceptional circumstances, or to even see where there is conflict in the logic of a bureaucracy. "I don't know. That's not my job. You'll have to ask one of the bosses."...There are just so many ways where having a lot of poorly educated people around makes life harder for everyone.
Today I feel sad about it.
Just so sad.