thank you guys for staying up late with us we have a great show here on the factor on insert along with some great guests tonight now America's education system is suffering we know that many are concerned about the drop in enrollment now take a look at these numbers according to the National Center for Education statistics enrollment Dro between fall of 2019 and fall of 2020 going from 50.8 million to 49 4 million students in that time frame joining us to talk about it parent David settle and e
ducator aretta Murray glad to have you all he on the factor on S so arnetta when you see these numbers do they jive at what you're seeing on the ground in the trenches as an educator um you know I was thinking about that and I don't see it as much um I know things have changed but I don't see those numbers being as drastic but that happened in I think it was in Alabama those numbers came from that but I'm in Houston I don't see those numbers uh being that dramatic as well and do you think with w
ith the classes that you teach and and the students that you teach it would be reflective of society as well and and tell the the viewers your students um I'm a special ed teacher most of my kids are I do in-class support so my kids look just like regular kids they just need some help um basically they have emotional disturbance and are they have problems with reading or some type of math concerns but for the most part no I don't see that of I wish they would miss school but they not missing sch
ool hell but they comeing to class so no that's I don't those numbers I must be her own boss no I don't see that though not at all not at all I'm being honest I I don't see those numbers and and David your thoughts about this report and yeah yeah do we see and obviously we see at HISD they have to go out each year and find students who have just kind of Fallen off the roles right right and I've been a part of that right I've taught in public school in HISD I've taught in private school right so
I've seen the both ends of the spectrum and I've been a part of some of those house calls right where we're losing numbers and attendance is down and they're having us as teachers during our breaks want to go knock on some doors Hey where's Little Johnny where's so and so and um you know we got to make sure that those numbers are there and what do you hearing when you knock on those doors if you get an answer exactly if you get an answer what are you hearing from parents or students who may come
to the door and like why aren't you in school yeah it's it's a combination of things uh you know when I was teaching on the southide it was more so you know just economic struggles right Mom just had a baby or there's this happened and that happened and it was right after CO as well you know it was fears of going back and being you know entering into the population and worries of getting sick and things of that nature but you know another thing too we've seen a lot of students leave public scho
ol going to Charter or and or private right I did that with my own kids like we left Public School enrolled them in a private school so it's not like the kids are disappearing they're going somewhere else and and we've known that Governor Abbott has pushed for you know vouchers and that would be private schools Charter Schools but there was a time when Charter Schools blew up yeah but we don't hear about them so much anymore well you know why because Charter Schools they had a lot of issues and
concerns you know that and they wasn't as highly regulated as it is with the public schools so that being said again from his vantage point he's seen that unfortunately I have not seen a lot of absenteeism I'm just being honest because maybe the school that I'm at is a different uh and and sometimes parents it's he said the Southside and maybe just you know again I'm just being honest and then sometimes the parents he said it clearly we can't too damn honest to we can't even get the doing too mu
ch I'm sorry but I'm just saying no no no we can't even get the par answer the phone um so what do you do and then it's just so many variables that I think we have to sit down as a society to restructure our educational system period.com and so do you get parents who as you said are not really responsive and how difficult does that make it for you as an educator if the parent doesn't care or I don't want to say not care but it's not responsive and I and I understand a lot of parents are struggli
ng finan a lot of parents are dealing with a lot of mental issues it's a lot going on in our society so we as Educators have to go and take extra steps to make sure that kid is okay because we don't want that kid to be a statistic that's if you have a good caring teacher but a lot of times we have to understand what the parents are going through finances they're trying to make ends of meet they're doing the best that they can but when we can't you want answer the phone when I call you that's a p
roblem Meet Me Halfway when your child is failing that's when I hear from you but I shouldn't I should when I tried to call you ready to cuss you out how you know and I'm not that's real and nobody wants to talk about that but can I say this and I've done unfortunately our different Representatives have decided to Target what education and it's a it's it's just destroying us bit by bit so it's a lot of factors that we got to work on now David you chose to take your children the private route is
that the future or do you think Public Schools must exist absolutely public schools have to exist it's just a necessary thing that we have to have in our society I think private schools just give us more options right you know you get a chance to actually explore different things if if the public school isn't meeting your needs and you have the means to put your kids in private school go for it but I know people who have the means and still encourage you know still have their kids in public scho
ol as well it's just to each its own I do believe this though the absenteeism when we were growing up and I don't have any data to back this up but I know we didn't have choices right we was going to school whether we whether we wanted to or not whether there was Co whether it was raining or snowing like we were at school and if we didn't show up it was some problems but let's be honest some sometimes these kids were skipping they're skipping a lot they're skipping a lot so you we got to look at
all the factors you just can't it's not just one issue it's multiple of issues absolutely we want to thank you both for joining us here thank you I swear for Lord I pray you got a job no you're good I am I am I ain't going to say nothing job
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