In an effort to empower parents to have more of a say in their kids' education, Minnesota Republicans are attempting to pass a "parents bill of rights."
On Tuesday, Michelle Benson joined News Talk 830 WCCO's Vineeta Sawkar to discuss the bill and how she feel about the relationships between teachers, students, and parents.
"Parents are primarily responsible for their kids," Benson said. "In my opinion, schools and teachers are really important partners, but that requires a partnership. That means parents have a right to know what's going on in their children's classroom."
To share the other side of the discussion and shed light on the legislation from the eyes of an educator, Mark Wespfahl, a social studies teacher in South St. Paul, joined News Talk 830 WCCO's Paul Douglas and Jordana Greene.
"I do think a lot of it is political grandstanding," Wespfahl said. "With the parent's bill of rights… there's about five different bills, and frankly, about three of them already exist in state statute. They've just added a little bit more language."
The problem with that language is that it remains ambiguous, the social studies teacher said, adding that it does not clarify what it will exactly do. But, Wespfahl thinks it will do one thing for certain.
"What it's going to do, though, is create talking points for the next six to eight months before an election," Wespfahl said. "Create talking points immediately after an election and not really deliver much of anything that parents actually need or could use."
Part of the proposed legislation would make it mandatory for teachers to post their syllabus for parents to see, but this is something that Wespfahl says most teachers are already doing. He also added that a syllabus is a living document, having the ability and need to change throughout the year, meaning if something is modified, it's not to hide anything but rather because of the ebbs and flows of the classroom.
"One of the things that should be taken into consideration by the senators who drafted this is, state statute already dictates that teachers need to modify, differentiate, and adapt different lessons or learning abilities for different students," Wespfahl said. "We're doing that on a regular basis, to begin with."
The teacher continued saying, "In my 13-year career, I have had a handful of parents contact me and ask 'What am I teaching about?' or 'My son or daughter said this, I need clarification.' But in 13 years, I've never been asked to provide alternate materials for a child."
Related
Even still, Wespfahl said that it is already implemented into state statute that teachers can offer alternative learning methods if requested from a parent or guardian.
Wespfahl then mentioned the language in the legislation. In senate file 2909, it reads, "The legislature further finds that important information relating to a minor child should not be withheld, either inadvertently or purposefully from a child's parent. Including a child's health, well-being, or education."
"I frankly don't know what that means," Wespfahl said, reading the filing.
"It's accusing public school teachers of withholding information, but they won't say what information is being withheld or what exactly needs to be reported," the teacher said. "So things like that are added into some of these series of about five bills that make it really hard to defend or argue what you are actually saying. What are you for, what are you against? But it's a great sound bite."
As for the senators saying that information is being withheld, Wespfahl noted that he has all of his information available for parents, just like most other teachers in the state who use Schoology, their own websites, Google Classroom, Moodle, or any other online classroom.
"My information is there. Any parent can access it pretty much at any time," Wespfahl said.
When it comes to the legislation, the only thing that Wespfahl sees is people trying to use parents to build a platform for their political campaigns instead of doing something helpful for them and their students.
Related
