Essay About Current Problems And Public School System

Current Problems And Possible Solutions Concerning California Public
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What are some problems Heather Weidig
with our schools? English 1A
November 6, 2006
Current Problems and Possible Solutions Concerning California Public
Schools
The California public school system currently suffers from four
main problems. These areas of dysfunction are most generally
defined as follows: A chronic and widespread lack of textbook
materials for the student population; large-scale overcrowding,
concentrated especially in the schools of the states marginalized
communities; a growing practice of admitting underqualified teachers
into California classrooms to deal with existing instructor shortages;
and finally, a festering trend of ill-equipped and over-extended
teaching facilities. These are serious problems that will only cause
the California public school system to deteriorate further if attempts
are not quickly made to deal with each specific area of dysfunction.
To begin, as referenced in Just Schools Californias web page
article, “The Crisis”, many California public schools do not have
enough textbooks to provide students with the ability to take their
textbooks home with them. The simple threat this shortage poses is
that oftentimes, no textbooks for students equals no homework for
them in these subjects, debilitating students ability to fully
comprehend, practice, and display the new concepts they have
learned. As Just Schools explains, without textbooks, students miss
out on important information and the opportunity to learn more
through homework exercises and studying outside of school. They
are also less likely to do well on high-school exit exams and are illprepared
for college
Moreover, as California Performance Review notes in their web
page article “ETV14 Decrease the Cost of K – 12 Textbooks”, the books
the school system does have are often outdated and are heavily worn
for wear (which results for example in missing pages, making the
process of understanding the material much more difficult). To be
sure, as California Performance Review also declares in the same
article:
more than half a million students do not have text books
to use in class and approximately two million students
cannot take textbooks home to do homework.
According to California Performance Review, this pattern is due in
part to the cost of textbooks, a sum which represents a large portion
of school district budgets.
Next is the problem of overcrowding in California public
schools. In the same article by Just Schools is stated, “more than 1.5
million students attend critically overcrowded schools”. Logistically,
this makes learning difficult for the school systems students because
there are too many students for each to receive individual attention
from the school systems teachers, and students who have trouble
with the material in the classroom simply cannot get help from their
teachers. Worse still, some classes are so crowded that there are not
enough seats for all the students (Just Schools). The result of this, as
stated in the article “Ending School Overcrowding in California:
Building quality Schools for All Children” is :
Lunchrooms, libraries and an assortment of other spaces
are used for classrooms and attempts are made to
alleviate overcrowding by such temporary measures as
reorganizing – even shortening – school years, busing
children to other neighborhoods, and using portable
classrooms. (Colmenar, Estrada, Lo & Raya, 8).
Exacerbating this general trend, the pattern of overcrowding
falls disproportionately in areas where California students come from
marginalized communities; that is, students of color and students
from low-income families. This concentration of overcrowding
means that “children who attend overcrowded schools are less able
to learn, feel socially inferior and alienated, and are more exposed to
health and safety hazards ( Colmenar et al., 8)”, deepening existing
rifts between socio-economic groups in the state.
The third area of dysfunction lies with the trend of instructor
underqualification in California classrooms. Because there has been
an intense shortage of teachers in California, the state will now allow
underqualified teachers to work in the classroom. As a result there
are startling numbers of under-prepared, uncredentialed teachers
currently working