The work of Paul Greyson at York University shows that, when controlled for income, public schools are equal to or better than private schools in university placement and graduation.

Mr. LIttle, my question is why are the lower income children suffering?
People with better incomes are spending money on tutors (I can remember both sending my children to tutors and working hard to get my children through curricula that wasn’t being taught at school). 
So, Mr Little, why do teachers insist on movie days, field trips,  assemblies, etc over teaching in the classroom when studies such as Paul Greyson’s say that the lower income children are suffering?

Whose income, Mr. Little? The schools’, or the families?

If the family income, are you implying that socioeconomic status is a factor in how well students perform?  If so, then why should public, or any schools, take any credit for performance?  What I mean is, why should family income be an input factor or independent variable in educational outcomes? A priori, that is?  Why is it that public school fans and employees are always on about it, while private schools, and aftermarket agencies don’t discuss these matters as a rule?  Do you see Kumon or other successful agencies bleating about it?  The emphasis on control should be on the many independent variables or inputs by the MASSIVE and MASSIVELY FUNDED, public system whose income NEVER, EVER gets adjusted according to results, and whose teachers’ collective bargaining agreement stipulates that teachers are NOT to be evaluated on the results achieved by their students, or by comparison with the results of other teachers’ students.

It is by now, quiet well established, that a homeschooled child can achieve a university placement and perform well at university.  And homeschooled children, Mr. Little, are more than just ANECDOTES.  There is now enough longitudinal data to establish homeschooling as a viable, successful and vibrant alternative to public schooling.

Graduation from high school does not indicate academic or practical skill necessary to cope with life.  Ask employers.  Ask literacy guilds.  Ask Universities about the abilities of incoming students.  In other words, what can these students actually do, by objective standards?

Moreover, what has happened to an incoming cohort of university freshman by the time their class graduates?

Movie days would need some interesting justification however field trips, assemblies etc would be supported by the vast majority of parents.

On every square mile of the Earth, the poor do worse than the middle and wealthy classes and it is an absolute iron law of school success in every school jurisdiction on Earth. The poor have missing fathers, chaos in their lives, lack of summer and holiday enrichment, poor nutrition, more need glasses, dental care, they move more often, they have no place to study, they are sometimes surrounded by criminals, etc. In the USA they actually get less funding than the burbs, the experienced teacher flee the inner city because they have been physically threatened, their tires slashed for giving failing marks, the classes are constantly disrupted, they need security guards in the worst cases. I have been there in the worst of Americas schools and seen the guards with firearms in open holsters. I have worked in Canada’s worst schools. If you don’t understand this, you just have no clue why the poor do worse.

Homeschooling is an overwhelmingly middle class situation. Kumon math as well. Charles and Bev need to do some research on who is successful and who is not in schools, it is 99% class based. Deny it if you want to look like a fool.

Charles and Bev need no advice on how to research. I would suggest that you sir need to continue to parrot the usual lines because you’re lock-step answers stand as the best reason yet for Ontario to move to more choice within and outside the system AND to do so at the mere request of the clients….students and their families.

Keep up the good work. We can only be grateful that being retired you hold no influence over the future of Ontario education. Parents on the other hand are just beginning to realize that they have choices and thanks to groups like SQE are becoming more educated by the day.

Nobody is worried notasheep. Through my newsletter that gets well over 32000 hits per month I have never had a larger audience. It goes to every school in Canada, public, catholic and private. It goes as an eblast to MPPs school trustees, teacher union officials, education professors, parent activists, education journalists and many others.

I’m doing OK thanks.

“Charles and Bev need to do some research on who is successful and who is not in schools, it is 99% class based.”

Interesting.  It’s all about social class; so all your talk about spending, certified teachers, political control, phonics, report cards, unions, salaries, malcontents and cultists: all of it is just blowing smoke.

And you represent, in this class warfare, the controlling class, the class wanting to retain and extend control, to ridicule and insult those who oppose you, without reference to the facts of learning and teaching. 

All of it for a measly 1 (ONE!) percent influence over the outcome for the actual students?  That’s worth $15,000 per year, per student, to the system, and total control?

99% class-determined?  Doesn’t that suggest the students are likely to be equally as ignorant, or equally as educated, without the intervention of the public education system?

Two of your examples of why public education is better are that it keeps out phonics and that supposedly the vast majority are overwhelmingly satisfied with the system.  Perhaps it’s more that they don’t have the time or resources of A-team folk like you, with the training and money to run political interference on parents trying to get something of substance from the system.

You call yourself an academic but your language has a bit of a bullying tone to it.

To repeat what I wrote earlier, your lack of willingness, or perhaps simply the ability, to engage or even acknowledge realities outside your political world, suggests that as a teacher you would be more likely to graduate bigots, ignoramuses and dare I say, cult-like thinkers, than scholars.

Thank God there are real scholars out there still, like Malkin Dare, who without the vast resources at their command such as you and the school bureaucrats enjoy, offer their help and their findings and their practical tools, without charge, without expectation of reward, without conditions, without access to the public trough, without political influence, too dedicated to teaching and learning and the honorable heritage of both.

I note you devote a lot of time and effort to your media enterprise.

I commend to you the former way of life, Mr. Little.  A world of joy, of discovery, of satisfaction, of contentment, of integrity—all of these await you simply by dropping these life-draining, dry-as-dust political ventures and devoting yourself to what real educators are doing in the world today.

You will save both yourself and your hearers.

Since social class is pretty close to the ONLY issue in education, the reforms I advocate are the best ones to mitigate social class disadvantages, class size eductions, improved teacher training, ECE, free tuition, focus best teachers on weakest schools…...