You Better, You Bet

I went on a second interview today.  I really don't know how to read this one.  It may have gone well, but clearly these days, my view of these things is a bit off.  Wait and see, I guess.

School conferences yesterday went very well.  Sara is Sara wherever we go apparently.  She's funny, smart and as always, this teacher loves her.  He's aware that the math here is too easy for her - on a math test all 4th graders took, she was the only one in her class to score above 40%.  She got an 88%.  The 4th grade teachers recognize there appears to be a hole in the system somewhere when the only kid to pass this test came from out of state - so he's going to work on getting her more advanced things to work on.  He only tests his students up to a 4th grade reading level and she aced that.  Which is good, because her reading has been my only area of concern in the past. 

Jacob's teacher mentioned that perhaps his choice in friends was an issue, but then she back-tracked to say that they are all good boys, who are very competitive in sports and academically.  But they are talking when they shouldn't be.  I know part of Jacob's problem is the fact that so much of what they are doing here is review for him that he's sort of breezing through the days.  But I also know that a lot of it is that he's just so much happier at this school.  He's allowed to be a kid here, when he really wasn't at the other school.  He gets lunch recess and another recess on top of that.  Each classroom has a coat room that connects with the class next door so there's no constant drama about sharing a locker and some idiot kid destroying your belongings.  There's no dress code so there's not the feeling of following the rules while other kids are blatantly allowed to ignore them with no consequence.  There's a lunchroom so he can eat and talk to his friends during lunch. 

Is it different than what he had before?  Absolutely.

Is it better? 

. . .

. . .

I'm hesitant to say "better".  It's better for him.  He's happier and believe me when I say, when Jacob is happier, everyone else in this house is happier as well.  (He takes after his mother that way.)

I'm not thrilled that so much of the work he's already done.  But the high school graduation rate here is 94% and where we came from it's 69%.  (Alpine graduation rate info found here: Utah Schools and the Kalamazoo graduation rate found here: Kalamazoo Schools.)  So even though some may argue that it's not better because it's easier, it gets these kids through high school and on their way to college. 

If you look on the Alpine School district site, you'll see also that the teacher:student ratio is 1:28.  And actually, I believe Jacob's class has 31 kids and Sara's has 30.  I believe back in Kalamazoo there were 25 or 26.  So it's a little bigger here, which I'm not particularly wild about either.  You can refer to an earlier post (found here: Track System) where I explain about the Track system and how that all works.  So I don't really have any complaints about that.

While I like their teachers here, I certainly wouldn't say they are better than the teachers we had back in Kalamazoo.  The teachers they had in Kalamazoo I loved - and still love.  Those teachers are fantastic educators, fantastic people.  I can't imagine a life where my kids hadn't had people like Mrs. Newton, Mrs. Pfau, Mrs. Cramer, Miss Crabtree and Mr. Caudill to teach, guide and love them.  And because that school required more commitment from the parents, I got to know these teachers better than I will here.  Because my kids are older here, I will have less and less regular contact with their teachers from here on out. 

So, is it better?

Maybe the answer is not simply yes or no.  Maybe the answer is yes, it's better now.  But Paramount was better then.   And maybe together, the future will be better too.