Parents are the Customer

On this blog, we've discussed two different classroom management programs, Whole Brain Teaching and Make Your Day. Both these systems are totalitarian, top-down, and punitive. In both cases, we've seen teachers who claim it's wonderful.

For instance, District to Keep Make Your Day Program reports that a school board unanimously voted to retain "Make Your Day". In a survey, 95% of teachers agreed with the statement, "I find the Make Your Day program is fair and reasonable for students". The superintendent is quoted as saying that 90 percent staff approval is a good benchmark for the district.

In the meantime, over 30% of parents disagreed with the statement that Make Your Day is fair and reasonable! As anyone who has tried to organize dissent against the school system can tell you, that's a very high percentage. But, the parents, as usual, were not listened to. The best they could get was a promise to "integrate positive feedback" into the program.

Who is school for? It ought to be conducted for the good of the kids who attend, as overseen by their parents. Kids are mostly too young and impressionable to form their own judgements, and too completely intimidated (or profoundly depressed) to speak out. It is up to parents to keep watch and advocate for their kids.

To use a business model, schools provide a service, which parents buy for their kids. The parents are the customer. As one of the "Make Your Day" parents says, “If it were me looking at a job I was doing, I’m giving myself 90 percent across the board, but my customers are giving me 60s. That’s not OK.”

Anti "Choice"

No, I'm not bringing up any controversial political or moral issues. I'm talking about "choice" as the word is used by snake-oil classroom management peddlers today.

Here's an example from the "Make Your Day" program, which I learned about on Suburban Chicken Farmer's blog, Bon Mot. (Thanks, SCF!) "Make Your Day" is the usual classroom-coercion model, featuring punitive "Steps" that are used if a kid gets out of line.

For instance, in an atrocious list of kindergarten (!!!) steps, we see a child being punished for asking another child for a pencil when he should have been listening to the teacher. As we see the child progress from step 1 (sitting isolated in a special chair) to step 2 (isolation with his back to the class), we are told, "Choosing step doesn't mean I'm a bad kid, it just means I need help making better choices."

As if it wasn't cruel enough to punish the child for a completely trivial offense, the "Make Your Day" folks proceed to mess with his mind. On some level the child knows perfectly well that he never "chose" to be punished, any more than he "chose" to be stuck in this godforsaken kindergarten class. But the teacher says he did, and his own parents might even sign a paper saying so. What does it all mean?

It means that progressive ideas like respecting the child have gotten just far enough that a management system that openly used coercion and punishment would not sell well. But a system that uses coercion and punishment disguised as "choice" can sell very well indeed.