Free Appropriate Public Education -- Adolescent imprisonment? Group Therapy?

Our laws in the U.S. guarantee that all children have access to Free
Appropriate Public Education (know as FAPE in educational jargon).
FAPE is the basis for all special education programs, but also could
be seen as reflecting the role of education in this country in
general. Questions could be raised about what Free and Appropriate
look like in reality. To a family in poverty, is it free if it
takes away an able-bodied person in your household from working full-
time? Is education appropriate if it either teaches to goals
outside your realm of experience (university level work if you are
only interested in a trade) or if it waters down curriculum based on
stereotypes and discrimination based on class, race, or gender?

However, the greater question is does access to Free Appropriate
Public Education have to mean mandatory education. Charter and
private schools have the option of expelling students who do not
participate in the education process and who do not keep up the
academic standards of the school. Public schools must accept all
students, even those who do not desire even the minimum of what
education has to offer. The popular response to this is to blame
teachers for not being engaging enough. However, what if the
student is not willing to be engaged? How would our classrooms be
different if students chose to be there? Do we devalue education by
making it mandatory for twelve years?

One example is the issue of academic ethics upheld by administrators,
whose main focus is on the numbers -- keeping students in school at
any cost, even if that means rewarding the helplessness that many
students have learned to use to manipulate teachers into passing them
despite failing to meet basic standards. And by basic, I mean having
the discipline to participate in class and to turn in work such as
writing a simple book review or even writing a paragraph that
sustains a thought until the end. My first year teaching, several
seniors in my class plagiarized their final papers, resulting in a
final failing grade and not being able to graduate. Obviously, these
students did not have strong grades to begin with. The
administration did not heartily back me up in giving the grades I
gave, seemingly afraid to take a stand against the parents of these
disadvantaged students. This week, a colleague returned the first
piece of work a student turned in for the year because it was
plagiarized. Rather than praising her for upholding academic
standards, one of the assistant principals told her she should at
least give some credit for the effort the student made in turning in
an assignment. What effort? Cutting and pasting from and online
review? This has little to do with engaging students and more to do
with the student's choice to continual resist the educational process.

Thus, for this student, and, moreover, for the other students who
must share the classroom with him, is this free appropriate public
education? Free implies choice, an option. Appropriate implies
meaningful. As long as students who have made it their sole purpose
to undermine education are allowed in the classroom, public education
will not be free or appropriate for many students in the U.S. With
over a hundred students to see a day, and with a wall of bureaucracy
to meaningful information about students, teachers cannot
realistically be expected to be social workers for every student.
Classrooms should not be used as group therapy. Teachers are trained
to guide student learning in a specific subject area or for a
specific grade level. This is nearly impossible to do if students
are allowed and enabled in undermining the educational community by
being required to be in school even if they consistently fail to
perform over several years. If education through grade twelve
remains mandatory, then administrators need to work to uphold
academic ethics and integrity throughout the school rather than
encouraging teachers to engage and to reward students for efforts
that are too little too late.

Perhaps this is extremist, but free and appropriate, from the
perspective in front of the classroom, often seems to contradict
mandatory education. Which bring us to the real problem: since our
economy cannot support even the work force we have now, we must keep
adolescents/young adults in school as long as possible, not matter
the cost.

I suspect I might contradict my own argument hear in the near future,
but I will leave it to you to do that in your comments . . . go now,
don't be like my silent students . . .. discuss and debate . . .