Blog Entry 1 $5 Detentions
I recently came across a letter to the editor published in the Chicago
Tribune that discussed charging students a $5 fee as punishment in addition to
having detention when they receive four demerits in a 2 week cycle at a cluster
of charter schools in Chicago that belong to the Noble Street Network. I was so
stunned when I read this letter to the editor that I had to do some further
research into the scandal surrounding the charging of a fee when a student
receives a detention. After researching and finding out that these charter
schools have earned hundreds of thousands of dollars in the past few years from these $5
“fees” I was so appalled. I don’t understand how schools are allowed to charge
students a fee because they receive a detention; it seems so unethical to be
able to profit from a student’s bad behavior.
I think the idea of making students literally
‘pay for their actions’ is absolutely atrocious! These charter schools were
created to help people of low income families so that their students can get
the best education possible, and yet they don’t mind taking the families money
and even going to far as to set up payment plans for the parents of the
students. That money adds up quickly, especially when the students are given
demerits for the smallest infractions such as not having their shoelaces tied, bringing gum to school, failing to sit up or making eye contact,
When I think back to my own high school experience, I am reminded of the panopticon idea presented by Foucault. My high school had cameras in every part of the school, inside and out, so that students could be monitored at all times. We never knew when we were being watched, so that made us feel like we always were. There weren’t too many incidents of violence or extreme misconduct, which I think is attributed to the cameras being on at all times, similar to being watched by the panopticon. This method of discipline kept people in line most of the time and detentions were mainly given when a person had skipped to many classes, not for tiny things like bringing food to school or not making eye contact. If these teachers keep shoving detentions at students left, right and centre for the tiniest violations of school conduct, the student will lose all faith in him/her self and just give in to every detention and pay a small fortune in fees along the way. There is no opportunity here for the student to learn to behave on their own.
There are many negatives to this idea of charging a fee, including the fact that students at that age don’t really know the value of a dollar, so they may not mind paying the money in accordance with a detention. With the panopticon, the main idea is that the prisoners would think they are being watched all the time, and therefore would have to permanently change their behavior. These students do not feel like they are being permanently watched, they probably feel as if they just got caught at a bad moment. If students don’t see the value in earning 5 dollars and have the mentality that they can just pay the money and do their three hour detention, then go with their life without actually changing their ways permanently. I fear for the future of these students in another sense, because if they were ever to get in serious trouble with the law, they could have the mentality that they could just pay their way out and be done with it and not ultimately change.
I understand these charter schools think they are doing a
good thing by showing students that in the real world, if they had a career and
weren’t doing their job, they would be fired and similarly losing their
finances, I just think it is going to breed a different mentality in the
students and not for the better.
I would absolutely agree with your sentiments about feeling shocked when reading this article. The fact that many families of the children who are attending charter schools are suffering financial hardships, $5 to these families could mean a jug of milk or a carton of eggs. I wrote a review about the film Waiting for Superman, and in the film it really depicts the low income families who aspire to send their children to a charter school. Having seen the families in the film and followed their stories for charter school acceptance, it is disheartening to think of something like this coming along when the child has started at the school. The most disturbing piece of this whole process is that the grounds for detention are so trivial, that the schools are basically setting up the students to be granted detention.
ReplyDeleteWow! I do not even know what to say about this article. I have never even heard something like this before. I cannot even believe this! Yet somehow it does not surprise me. I agree with Eric, $5 can make a huge difference in a families life. By making the students "pay" for their actions is not trying to solve the problem at hand it is trying to sweep it under the rug. What happened to students and teachers talking after class about what is causing these detentions and have they learned from their mistake. In actual fact it would be unlikely the students are paying the $5 of course it would be coming from the parents. SO how is that going to fix any problems if it is not even coming from the students own pockets. Extremely shocking!
ReplyDeleteThanks for taking the time to read my review. Eric, you're completely right about it being disheartening to come all that way, just to lose money over trivial matters. That amount of money adds up. And Samantha, your point is exactly what I was trying to make about the $5 would not mean anything to a teenage because it would likely come from a parent, so they are not learning any lesson at all. Thanks for commenting, means a lot!
ReplyDeleteHaha I find this hard to even believe. Children of this age are not even old enough to have a job to pay for their detentions or if they are they would be making no more than minimum wage! Did you happen to read anything about what the school does with this money?? I know when I was in school I was constantly getting detentions for talking in class. Are there different prices depending on the severity of the behaviour? Also I wonder how they would work out the billing for a child who had been suspended haha. This seems completely rediculous and that the children are being taken advantage of. This could also effect the child's schooling experiences directly. If children are terrified of getting a dentention they may never ask questions in class in fear that if the teacher is cranky they will "owe" big time. I agree with the other posts in that having students pay for detention is not teaching them to correct their behaviour... if anything they are being taught that they can pay their way out of trouble.. an idea that no high school student should get stuck in their head.
ReplyDeleteThanks for commenting! It did say in a few of the articles that the money paid for the salary of the people who sat in on detention, but I found that hard to believe. And no, there are no different prices, it is set at $5, regardless of the action committed, but with the economy the way it is, I can imagine that fee may increase sooner rather than later. I agree completely with you saying that they are taught they can just pay their way out of trouble, without actually learning any lesson.
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