Schools offer cars for good attendance

[proud2BlibKansan]

MEAD GRUVER
Associated Press

CASPER, Wyo. - Sixteen-year-old Kaytie Christopherson was getting ready to do her homework on a Friday when she got a call that made a big improvement in her life: She had won a brand-new pickup truck for near-perfect school attendance.

And not just any truck, but a $28,000 Chevrolet Colorado crew cab, in red, with an MP3 player. Freedom comes standard.

"I take it everywhere. To work, school. I don't know, anything I do, I have it out with me," the high school junior said. "I pay attention to where I park it, though."

Public schools commonly reward excellent attendance with movie tickets, gas vouchers and iPods. But some diligent students like Kaytie are now hitting the ultimate teenage jackpot for going to school: They have won cars or trucks.

more . . .
http://www.kansascity.com/mld/kansascity/news/breaking_news/16132807.htm

[MiniMandaRuth]

1. Good for her... but I have one problem....

What about awards for good grades? Hell, you're getting an education... why do you even need a car? Why should you get an award for something you SHOULD be doing.

[Kutjara]

3. Excellent point.

An enormous proportion of the world's population lives in poverty and has no access to education. Aside from clean water and adequate food, education is the thing most highly valued by the striving masses. Yet here, where education is available on demand to most of the population, we have to bribe kids with shiny consumer goods to 'endure' it.

It's a sign of the times, I guess, but it does make me feel a little sick.

[Lydia Leftcoast]

12. Very excellent point

There's a book called Coming Home Crazy by Bill Holm, a writer who now lives in Minnesota. The book is about his time teaching in China, and it's arranged thematically rather than chronologically. In one chapter, he tells about his Chinese students, who were so eager to learn and who would get so engrossed in the literary works they were reading that they'd follow him back to his apartment to discuss them.

He then contrasts them with the students he encountered at a state college back in this country. They acted completely bored and whined about every assignment. All they were really interested in was their social lives.

I think there's a lot of that going around in affluent Western societies.

[antigop]

5. One problem with awards for attendance

The kids go to school even when they are sick.

Our school district gives exemptions from exams for perfect attendance. Consequently, kids go to school sick. Sickness is an excused absence but counts against perfect attendance.

It stinks.

There should be exemptions for good grades.

The problem is the school district is compensated by the state based on attendance statistics.

[havocmom]

6. One wonders how much better off all would be if sick people DID just stay home

It's all about the $$, not what is best for students.

And the bit about bribing kids with lavish awards for doing what they are suppose to do is just insane.

A car for showing up? Geez, THAT goes a long way to prepare kids for life :sarcasm: to the ninth power.

[proud2BlibKansan]

14. A better way to improve attendance

is to raise the compulsory attendance age to 18. Why do we let kids drop out at 16?

[tammywammy]

52. I agree with rewards for good grades instead of attendance

Sick kids need to stay home.

When I was a senior in high school, I developed a bulging disk in my back two weeks into the school year. I missed quite a bit of school, because my legs/back would hurt so much and it was painful to sit in those hard desk seats for an hour and a half straight, with only 10 minutes in between. Yet I still kept up all my grades that whole year (A & B student). Actually I think I missed more school than is allowed, so technically they could have made me stay another year, but the schools seem to understand if you have an actual documented medical problem.

If students are sick, they should be encouraged to stay home. The last thing you need is the entire school getting the flu, a cold, etc.

[proud2BlibKansan]

9. Great point

[loyalsister]

51. This is a bad precedent.....

These are children of the future who will offer tax breaks for not speeding.

[Earth_First]

2. *sigh*

I guess I'll just dig a little deeper when the school/property taxes come around next time.

This isn't to say that I am against rewarding behavior that is certainly deserving, however movie tickets, gas cards, etc. that is fine. $30,000 trucks and cars crosses that line, IMHO.

:: one foot in flamesuit ::

[fishwax]

7. the schools don't buy the car

In most cases the car or truck is donated by a local dealership, and the prizes typically are awarded through drawings open only to students with good attendance.

It's not going to raise your property taxes.

[sam sarrha]

4. you would have to offer a bail of weed and a bag of crystal meth to get most of em to just show up..

[fishwax]

8. Perfect attendance is overrated

People who are contagious shouldn't go to school and get other people sick.

And this also doesn't seem like a great way to keep people from dropping out, since there's a big difference between dropping out and showing up every single day. And if a student gets sick and misses a day, the motivation is gone and they're free to drop out. Why not a drawing for somebody in the graduating class?

[proud2BlibKansan]

10. They are allowed one day absence

[fishwax]

11. Ah, I see. But I still don't see the point n/t

[proud2BlibKansan]

13. It is a dumb idea I agree

[The2ndWheel]

15. Good little boys and girls

As long as you stay within the confines of the structure we've built for you, we'll give you a little something to make you love it.

[mondo joe]

16. Because it would be wrong to encourage education?

[The2ndWheel]

17. You call that encouraging education?

[mondo joe]

19. Attendence is part of getting an education.

Or isn't it?

[The2ndWheel]

21. For standard mass education, yes

So you give the kid who best mirrors that a few toys which came about because of standard mass production.

Not saying it doesn't make logical sense in that context, but it doesn't encourage education.

[mondo joe]

24. If you encourage all kids to improve attendence you increase

class time and encourage education.

Ain't nothing wrong with toys.

[The2ndWheel]

25. No, you encourage their want, desire, and expectation of toys

[mondo joe]

26. LOL - like anyone needs their wants encouraged.

But even if you did, if you also increase their exposure to literature and math and history, that's the trade off.

I like toys. I like education. One doesn't detract from the other.

[The2ndWheel]

28. Depends on the want

[mondo joe]

29. I'm just not Puritan enough to condemn wants, or to think toys or fun

are contrary to education or intelligence.

[The2ndWheel]

30. I never said that

I said bribing children doesn't encourage education.

[mondo joe]

31. And there are studies that indicate attendence is linked to performance.

If you would like to argue that performance does not reflect education, please proceed.

[The2ndWheel]

32. Fair enough. The only reason kids go to class is by being bought off

I also see nothing wrong with that. Do I get to pick my car, or is it chosen for me?

[mondo joe]

33. Getting them there is half the battle.

You can research the contest details.

[The2ndWheel]

34. The other half is used up keeping the battle going

You don't need school to learn. You need school to increase our ever increasing large scale society. To what end, I don't know. But if you didn't have everyone in the same mindset(or, fewer and fewer ways of seeing the world), you couldn't get anything done.

[mondo joe]

35. Then your fight is with schools, not this contest. NT

[The2ndWheel]

37. Now it's a contest?

Set up by some outside corporation?

I thought it was about the odyssey of the mind? Which, by the way, actually made elementary school fun.

But the school is doing the contest.

[mondo joe]

39. It's a drawing open to students who are eligible. Attendence factors into that.

And if you think all kids think school is fun or an odyssey of the mind, you're on crack.

[The2ndWheel]

41. I don't think that

And Odyssey of the Mind was a program you tested into.

There is a reason we have to bribe kids to go to school, they're time stables.

Have to give credit to whoever it was that hit the space key too soon in a similar discussion I was having a few weeks ago. Thought it was the perfect phrase to describe school.

[mondo joe]

42. If you don't think schools educate, then of course you won't think attendance

matters.

But to people for whom schools do matter, attendance matters. Both because it gets the kids exposure, and because it maintains funding for the school.

Or maybe you don't think funding of schools matters either.

[Orsino]

23. We'll give you a BIG something.

A huge, lumbering gas-guzzler completely inappropriate to your needs.

[peacebaby3]

18. Gee, I feel the same pissed off feeling I had while in school!!!

I would maybe miss a few days during the year, but have straight A's and at the end of the year the C- students would get an award for perfect attendance and I got nothing. I did learn as I got older that I was really the winner, but it was hard to truly comprehend when I was a child. I've always thought this was really an idiotic award system.

Do I still sound bitter?!?! :rofl:

[PVnRT]

20. Now we give out awards just for showing up

A new low. Next, do we give kids awards for thinking about doing something?

And if you read more into the article, you find the real reason that the school is more focused on attendance than grades - they get more money.

[proud2BlibKansan]

46. Do you expect schools to operate on NO money?

I agree this car deal is a bad idea. But I will defend the need for increased funding. NCLB is an unfunded mandate that has put extreme financial pressure on school districts. They didn't properly fund education BEFORE this insane law and we are in very dire straights now.

Maybe you have some better ideas for improving attendance or increasing revenue??

[enki23]

22. yeah. to hell with the sick kids.

little slacker losers. and the ones with shitty home lives. and the ones who get bullied.

[mondo joe]

27. Fucked? Are they worse off than they would be without this prize being offered?

[Horse with no Name]

36. I think this stinks

Because it is going to reward one child and then the others who didn't "win" are going to be very disappointed and disillusioned.
She got a car for doing what they all did.
Now--the real contest?
Give a car to the teacher whose class averages the best attendance and reward the students with a field trip to a really nice place.

[proud2BlibKansan]

38. I like that idea!!

Wish you were on our school board. LOL

[Horse with no Name]

40. It comes to the point

That students have to go to school.
Teachers don't have to teach.
I would see this as solving many problems.
Teachers would be more motivated to teach. Motivated to make things more interesting so that the students enjoy learning and going to school.
It gives the kids a chance to do something great for a good teacher and rewards them as well. With a field trip AND a good education.
I would think it would boost teacher retention.
Not so sure you would want me on your school board...I have a problem with most school administrators and how they handle their issues,lol.

[proud2BlibKansan]

43. I hate most administrators

so we would probably get along just fine :)

One year my school district offered a $300 bonus to teachers with perfect attendance. That is the only year I did not miss one day of school. LOL

My principal does give field trips to classes as rewards for attendance. And to kids. The year Polar Express came out, she took all the kids with perfect attendance to see it. And she paid for it out of her own pocket.

This car thing is just completely over the top though. When I think of what a school district could do with the money they would gain by selling that donated car . . . :grr:

[mondo joe]

48. If the dealer gives the car for this purpose it would be illegal for

the district to sell the car for another purpose.

In addition, by using the car to boost attendence the school improves its finiancial standing. (From the article "Districts have a lot to gain and little to lose by holding car drawings. The vehicles are usually free. And in Wyoming, even a one-student increase in average daily enrollment means another $12,000 in state funding for the year.")

[proud2BlibKansan]

49. I understand the funding dilemna

I just think a car is a bit much. And it only goes to one kid. What about all the other kids who have perfect attendance?

[mondo joe]

50. Well I think they can understand the principle of a drawing.

I really do.

[Jed Dilligan]

44. I often tell my college students

"In the real world, the only thing you are graded on is attendance" LOL

But seriously, this truck should go to an excellent teacher.

[LizW]

45. Wow.

I know it sounds strange, but I am impressed that the school is doing something to encourage attendance. We have the other problem in my son's school. They dismiss at the drop of a hat, and every week it seems like there is some "special schedule" that cuts classes short. Today they're getting out early in order to "clear out the traffic" for tonight's (7:00 p.m.) state playoff football game. I kid you not.

[proud2BlibKansan]

47. WTF?

Is this a public school? That is nuts.