UMC parents in low income schools

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Farms and ESOL parents might participate if their kids’ free stuff depends on it... maybe.

Lol. "Sorry Larla, you don't get breakfast today because your mom didn't volunteer for the zoo field trip." Do you have any idea how ridiculous and cold hearted you sound??

That's extreme... A more likely scenario is "We had to make a decision between letting the STEM teacher or the ESOL teacher go. And Larla, since your parents really have not been involved in any school activities and have not made an effort to advocate for the ESOL teacher, he is gone"

Is this a joke? I sincerely hope so. If not you’re a seriously misguided and uninformed individual.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:
So this is what I don’t understand. They travel thousands of miles to come here to escape a toxic culture in their home country only to continue to live by this toxic culture here in the US? I’m sorry for their struggle but heck, they sky has just opened up for them with opportunities galore! Why continue to live defeated lives when they have attained freedom? Let’s empower them and challenge them to live better lives. I have been where they have been and it angers me to see them waste opportunities. They might as well have stayed put in their home country. Sorry to anyone I offend but it offends me when immigrants waste their freedom because there are so many others who couldn’t make it here that would’ve loved these opportunities.

This statement is so laughable. We are talking about PTA participation for crying out loud. What makes you think that their disinterest in it is a sign of being defeated. Trust me, for them, coming to this country, being able to live here is priceless. The fact that their kids are getting a US education so that they can have better lives than them is the ultimate dream. They don't see it as toxic at all. They could care less about PTA meetings.

Neither of you guys understand immigrants.

We come here, mostly because of we can earn more money here. That's it. Culture? Sky opening up? Priceless? US education?
What are you talking about? You really think everything is heaven here compared to other countries?

So you are affirming the assertion that immigrants are just here to take, take, take from Americans, without any loyalty or buy-in to American ideals. But we should welcome you with open arms, so that we can spend $200,000 to educate each of your children.

You got a terrible attitude about work if you think people who com here for better pay are "take take take"

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I am not White. I am educated, middle class and very involved with the PTA at our high FARMS school. I have found that I can work to bring opportunities to the school only through the PTA framework. The school will not allow any other way as a parent I can be involved. Infact, they will create roadblocks. However, once I am working as a PTA person, the school knows that they cannot put in roadblocks. As long as I am bringing enrichment opportunities to the school that are appropriate, accessible and equitable, and I raise the funds for those programs the school cannot stop me.
And yes, the school will get their pound of flesh by making us do the staff appreciation events and other community events that furthers the Principal's agenda as well, before they give us access to the community etc. It is positioned as a mutual scratching of backs, instead the volunteers are used to the full extent by the school. The burnout rate for PTA office holders is huge. It is a thankless job for no personal gain.

I am the “been there” parent. Even if I wanted to advocate for my child, I would have had a very hard time doing so.
Afterschool stuff needs to be affordable for all, and appealing to many. Unless of course I want to run a club myself.
There were levels in English language and arts, but the range of abilities was much broader than the 3 levels. So my child was not too challenged.
There were free afterschool activities but NOTHING for lower grades except art (where 30 kids K-5 sat together and the full price was $15/class, no thanks)

There is nothing really useful in this system for a child whose parents can afford paying for high quality extracurriculars.
But yes, lower income kids get free access to activities often organized by higher income parents. It’s a one way street, unfortunately.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Farms and ESOL parents might participate if their kids’ free stuff depends on it... maybe.

Lol. "Sorry Larla, you don't get breakfast today because your mom didn't volunteer for the zoo field trip." Do you have any idea how ridiculous and cold hearted you sound??

That's extreme... A more likely scenario is "We had to make a decision between letting the STEM teacher or the ESOL teacher go. And Larla, since your parents really have not been involved in any school activities and have not made an effort to advocate for the ESOL teacher, he is gone"

Is this a joke? I sincerely hope so. If not you’re a seriously misguided and uninformed individual.

I am the original poster of this thread.
This is exactly why some parents don’t care for the PTA- they know their freebies are there to stay. Middle class is the first in line to lose any meager perks of the public school system.
What I would support is separate ESOL classes, self contained. At least that way other kids can learn at their pace. Not the 30 mins per day pull outs. Or no ESOL at all. It’s wasted money.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I am not White. I am educated, middle class and very involved with the PTA at our high FARMS school. I have found that I can work to bring opportunities to the school only through the PTA framework. The school will not allow any other way as a parent I can be involved. Infact, they will create roadblocks. However, once I am working as a PTA person, the school knows that they cannot put in roadblocks. As long as I am bringing enrichment opportunities to the school that are appropriate, accessible and equitable, and I raise the funds for those programs the school cannot stop me.
And yes, the school will get their pound of flesh by making us do the staff appreciation events and other community events that furthers the Principal's agenda as well, before they give us access to the community etc. It is positioned as a mutual scratching of backs, instead the volunteers are used to the full extent by the school. The burnout rate for PTA office holders is huge. It is a thankless job for no personal gain.

I am the “been there” parent. Even if I wanted to advocate for my child, I would have had a very hard time doing so.
Afterschool stuff needs to be affordable for all, and appealing to many. Unless of course I want to run a club myself.
There were levels in English language and arts, but the range of abilities was much broader than the 3 levels. So my child was not too challenged.
There were free afterschool activities but NOTHING for lower grades except art (where 30 kids K-5 sat together and the full price was $15/class, no thanks)

There is nothing really useful in this system for a child whose parents can afford paying for high quality extracurriculars.
But yes, lower income kids get free access to activities often organized by higher income parents. It’s a one way street, unfortunately.

I'm curious - what high quality extracurriculars from which vendors in particular would you want to see in your school? Specific company and program. What is stopping you from being the after-school activities coordinator at your school and bringing in those particular vendors and requiring them to offer scholarships to lower income students at your school? I ask this as someone who has managed after-school activities at my child's school for many years and walk the walk.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I am not White. I am educated, middle class and very involved with the PTA at our high FARMS school. I have found that I can work to bring opportunities to the school only through the PTA framework. The school will not allow any other way as a parent I can be involved. Infact, they will create roadblocks. However, once I am working as a PTA person, the school knows that they cannot put in roadblocks. As long as I am bringing enrichment opportunities to the school that are appropriate, accessible and equitable, and I raise the funds for those programs the school cannot stop me.
And yes, the school will get their pound of flesh by making us do the staff appreciation events and other community events that furthers the Principal's agenda as well, before they give us access to the community etc. It is positioned as a mutual scratching of backs, instead the volunteers are used to the full extent by the school. The burnout rate for PTA office holders is huge. It is a thankless job for no personal gain.

I am the “been there” parent. Even if I wanted to advocate for my child, I would have had a very hard time doing so.
Afterschool stuff needs to be affordable for all, and appealing to many. Unless of course I want to run a club myself.
There were levels in English language and arts, but the range of abilities was much broader than the 3 levels. So my child was not too challenged.
There were free afterschool activities but NOTHING for lower grades except art (where 30 kids K-5 sat together and the full price was $15/class, no thanks)

There is nothing really useful in this system for a child whose parents can afford paying for high quality extracurriculars.
But yes, lower income kids get free access to activities often organized by higher income parents. It’s a one way street, unfortunately.

I'm curious - what high quality extracurriculars from which vendors in particular would you want to see in your school? Specific company and program. What is stopping you from being the after-school activities coordinator at your school and bringing in those particular vendors and requiring them to offer scholarships to lower income students at your school? I ask this as someone who has managed after-school activities at my child's school for many years and walk the walk.

Cost, I guess?

[Anonymous]

We have around a 50% FARMS rate at our school. I have organized clubs with private vendors. There is a minimum enrollment they have to have to be profitable to run the club. If you can't get say, 10 or 15 paying kids, then the club can't be offered. We have many clubs offered and then cancelled for low enrollment.

You can request the vendor provide a scholarship but if the club enrollment is low, they won't be too enthused about it. They certainly won't provide free club enrollment to any FARMs kid.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I am not White. I am educated, middle class and very involved with the PTA at our high FARMS school. I have found that I can work to bring opportunities to the school only through the PTA framework. The school will not allow any other way as a parent I can be involved. Infact, they will create roadblocks. However, once I am working as a PTA person, the school knows that they cannot put in roadblocks. As long as I am bringing enrichment opportunities to the school that are appropriate, accessible and equitable, and I raise the funds for those programs the school cannot stop me.
And yes, the school will get their pound of flesh by making us do the staff appreciation events and other community events that furthers the Principal's agenda as well, before they give us access to the community etc. It is positioned as a mutual scratching of backs, instead the volunteers are used to the full extent by the school. The burnout rate for PTA office holders is huge. It is a thankless job for no personal gain.

I am the “been there” parent. Even if I wanted to advocate for my child, I would have had a very hard time doing so.
Afterschool stuff needs to be affordable for all, and appealing to many. Unless of course I want to run a club myself.
There were levels in English language and arts, but the range of abilities was much broader than the 3 levels. So my child was not too challenged.
There were free afterschool activities but NOTHING for lower grades except art (where 30 kids K-5 sat together and the full price was $15/class, no thanks)

There is nothing really useful in this system for a child whose parents can afford paying for high quality extracurriculars.
But yes, lower income kids get free access to activities often organized by higher income parents. It’s a one way street, unfortunately.

I'm curious - what high quality extracurriculars from which vendors in particular would you want to see in your school? Specific company and program. What is stopping you from being the after-school activities coordinator at your school and bringing in those particular vendors and requiring them to offer scholarships to lower income students at your school? I ask this as someone who has managed after-school activities at my child's school for many years and walk the walk.

I tried to be the coordinator. The problem was that the principal wanted to pay for all the kids enrolled into an activity. He wasn’t sure which activity he wanted (probably one sport and one stem activity).
I didn’t get to the stage of talking to vendors, but I am not sure they would have been interested since not many kids would sign up.
Also, I would have to do all the scheduling and coordinating, whereas at the new low farms school there is a whole committee that does it (and I am not even enrolling my child anymore since he is at an offsite aftercare).
It is so much easier when you are not shouldering the whole burden.

[Anonymous]

I still stand by my very unfortunate discovery that there isn’t much for a UMC family in a high farms school.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I still stand by my very unfortunate discovery that there isn’t much for a UMC family in a high farms school.

Me again.
To add, it is good to have UMC families in a school (for admin and teachers and farms families). I say, let them (us) have what is good for their kids. It’s a sort of a trickle down approach.

[Anonymous]

I'm curious - what high quality extracurriculars from which vendors in particular would you want to see in your school? Specific company and program. What is stopping you from being the after-school activities coordinator at your school and bringing in those particular vendors and requiring them to offer scholarships to lower income students at your school? I ask this as someone who has managed after-school activities at my child's school for many years and walk the walk.


I tried to be the coordinator. The problem was that the principal wanted to pay for all the kids enrolled into an activity. He wasn’t sure which activity he wanted (probably one sport and one stem activity).
I didn’t get to the stage of talking to vendors, but I am not sure they would have been interested since not many kids would sign up.
Also, I would have to do all the scheduling and coordinating, whereas at the new low farms school there is a whole committee that does it (and I am not even enrolling my child anymore since he is at an offsite aftercare).
It is so much easier when you are not shouldering the whole burden.

These are small vendors that run on slim margins. I doubt any of them can afford not to charge the majority of kids just because its a low income school. The small number of non FARMS parents would need to donate more money to cover the low income kids. The so called wealthy parents in schools with low income kids are not so wealthy that they can afford to subsidize all the low income kids. Honestly, for most of these parents if they were a little wealthier they wouldn't be living here or they would be in private schools.

It just practical to expect that this small group of parents will be the financial providers for the rest of the school.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I still stand by my very unfortunate discovery that there isn’t much for a UMC family in a high farms school.

What do you want there to be?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I still stand by my very unfortunate discovery that there isn’t much for a UMC family in a high farms school.

What do you want there to be?

NP here, I'd want:

- quality integrated STEAM program with robotics
- language programs other than Spanish
-body movement and coordination programs
- Cooking
- Dancing, singing, theatre
- chess or scrabble
- Gardening

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I still stand by my very unfortunate discovery that there isn’t much for a UMC family in a high farms school.

What do you want there to be?

NP here, I'd want:

- quality integrated STEAM program with robotics
- language programs other than Spanish
-body movement and coordination programs
- Cooking
- Dancing, singing, theatre
- chess or scrabble
- Gardening

As after-school programs, you mean?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I still stand by my very unfortunate discovery that there isn’t much for a UMC family in a high farms school.

What do you want there to be?

I would want a fast paced curriculum, a large group of kids my child could relate to, a wide range of enrichment events, a large group of parents to help organize things.
Money were not as big a problem as lack of someone to put them to use (organize).
There was some free enrichment, I have to be honest. But not as much as at the new school.