Public Schools Need Quality Parents

I am in agreement with Cindy Suman’s letter of April 17 (“Education Depends Upon Parents’ Support”). I am noticing that in my children’s school district, parents are fleeing their neighborhood schools because of a lack of parental involvement. At my children’s school, we are constantly told by the school administration and by parents from other, less fortunate schools that we enjoy a very high level of parental involvement. Even at our school, however, the involvement level is not high enough.

Parents who are involved, and even some who are not, complain that private schools can better educate students at a lesser cost per student than the public schools. My answer is that private schools can select their clientele. Not by race, religion or ethnic background; but by the quality of the parent. Quality parents produce quality students who fit in well in the private school environment. The public school has to take, and provide for, every student, whether the parent participates or not.

Another handicap that public schools labor under is that the school site has become the logical place to dispense needed children’s services such as before- and after-school child care, free lunches and breakfasts, trips to the Assistance League for needed free clothing and health care services. This confuses the school in people’s minds with a charitable institution that owes us endless, bottomless understanding and care.

This is why schools of choice or magnet schools are becoming so appealing. Parents are asked to sign a contract agreeing to ensure that their children attend school regularly, do their homework and obey school rules. (Pathetic that parents would have to be told that these are their responsibilities.)

Parents who do not live up to their obligations to assist their children to become productive students are asked to take their children elsewhere. This means that the remaining students and their teachers are able to concentrate on the job of learning.

Until the public schools enjoy the same kind of enforcement clout that private schools enjoy, public schools will continue to decline and to lose quality students and, even more important, qualified parents.

CHRISTINE M. HADERLEIN

Santa Ana