Writing Prompt Response

“The failure of public schools is not ruining society. The failure of society has ruined the public schools.”Copyright © 2005, 2006, 2007 by The IUP Writing Center.

This is a writing prompt from the 19th, but reading it reading now I’ve seen that it really does relate to my topic of school violence and school assessment in general. I’ve seen this point argued from both ends-especially the first part. People just feel like uneducated children are the cause for a lot of issues. If you think about it, it seems logical. People have to know how to think, work, and follow orders to make it in the real world and function in the work force. So, public schools are the ones to blame, right?

Well, the second part of this statement is what throws supports of the first for a loop. The society blaming the schools for their own failure, is actually the cause itself? It’s hard to bend your mind around it, really. I’ve been so used to hearing how it’s everyone’s fault involved with the schools (like the teachers and school boards) for the state they are in now. So what has society done that has caused the failure? When you think about it, what is a school? A place made up of kids who learn…but isn’t that place technically made up of society? They may just be children, but they belong to the parents who vote and work within society. Society pays for the public schools, as well as makes a lot of decisions surrounding them.

In short, society is what directly affects the public schools. And public schools directly affect society, whether it be in a smaller or larger way, is left up to you.