Wicked Problem Response

The New York City Public School system is responsible for educating and molding the future of the city. Unfortunately, the system is rather flawed, focusing more and more on changing their programs and teaching to meet standardised tests rather than teaching for the purpose of educating them and enriching them with art, music, and sports programs. The heavy focus on Standardised Testing teaches children to cram for stressful test, memorize information, and then move on to the next topic, often forgetting everything they previously learned. The standardized tests exist to measure students overall knowledge about particular subjects. Teachers are expected to force this education on students, according to standardized tests.procon, high scores ensure the continuation for federal and local funding and are used to reward teachers and administrators with bonus payments. The excessive testing undermines America’s ability to produce innovators and critical thinkers. Low scores in standardized testing can prevent a student from going in to the next grade level or lead to teachers getting fired and school closures. School systems are also often changing the way they work. In the 2011-2012 school year, New York City public schools implemented the common core standard, a system which cost the nation roughly $80 billion, only to change the system again and plan to have The Next Generations Learning Standards fully implemented by 2020.

School fails to ensure the quality of education because of excessive workloads and school funding cuts. Funding goes to the unnecessary changing of programs that simply do not benefit students and is taken away from stimulating programs. Low budgets also result in an unfair student to teacher ratio, often resulting in classes with one teacher and over 30 children. This makes it harder for the teacher to give individual attention to students who may need more help. It also puts the teachers at an extreme disservice, giving them incredible workloads and unsatisfactory pay. According to the Guardian Teacher Network, more than 80% of teachers said their school has made cutbacks. Teachers are forced to teach longer class and getting less help from support staff. Funding pressures on schools would mean less support for students.

Not only would funding issues support students less, it takes away their opportunities to engage in programs in the arts and sports. When the budget is not there, the arts are usually the first programs to get cut. The issue of art programs being cut due to budgeting is not a recent problem. A New York Times article from 1993 spoke about these issues. The article quoted Carol Sterling, director of arts education for the American Council of the Arts at the time, she said, “Arts education in the public schools is very much at risk of being eliminated if we are not more vigilant.” The article also states that children who don’t get an education including the arts would be just as disadvantaged as if they were missing math or another subject because of the lack of diversity of their education.

 

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