Honors Composition Essay #3: Argument

“Does Harvard make the man or does the man make Harvard?”

There exists a popular myth regarding Oklahoma’s charter schools. This myth states that charter schools take the most motivated parents away from traditional schools, and that these parents are the cause for the success of Oklahoma’s proliferate charter schools. This idea also implies that this action, if true, is detrimental to traditional schools. Children with motivated parents, charter school opponents say, will succeed no matter what school they attend. To follow this line of thought, if all of the motivated parents from three local schools moved to a single charter school, the community would be left with one successful charter school and three failing traditional schools. This myth states that rather than the school making the student, the parent makes the student, which in turn makes the school. This is fairly illogical.

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First day back after our two week 'summer break'!

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Making salt dough at Stacy's home. :)

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Today, we took a tour of the downtown firehouse. Two superhot supernice firefighters showed us a video on safety*, gave us a tour of the firehouse (including their sleeping quarters), and showed us everything on both engines.

*This video featured the, ahem, aristocratic Gilbert Godfried as the fire alarm, an 8-year-old Lindsay Lohan as the Kid Who Burned Toast, and Little Richard singing a safety song. I'm pretty sure it's the same video that I watched when I was their age.

Summer Art Classes

So there's been some interest in the art classes, which is great. Basically, we'll have either six long classes or twelve shorter classes on six topics, depending on the ages/attention span of the kids who sign up. The classes will take place during the day at the downtown branch of the Lawton Public Library. They will be free of charge, but each student will need to bring their own items*. The days and times will be determined once parents have responded.

Overall, they'll need a notebook/binder/art journal and a pencil so they can make their notes and sketches in one place, and an easel for most of the classes. That should all run about $15 or less. They will need a few items for each class, which generally cost $5.00 or less, without coupons.

The class overview is below. Feel free to contact me if you have any questions. :)

~Rose

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Fishing at Liberty Lake Park.

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We had a great time at the park today. :)

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We went to the park yesterday. Another homeschooling mom brought bread for the ducks, and was gracious enough to share. :)

Isaiah feeds the ducks.

The ducks follow him for food.

Brotherly love. :)

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We recently joined a postcard-swapping group, and we've been sending and receiving postcards from all over the US. When we receive them, we plot their locations on a map and read a bit about each state. This is our most recent batch of cards that we're sending out.

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I seriously love these new dry erase boards.

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Who invented fractions? Henry the 1/8th!

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Pioneer children!

So we spent most of Sunday at the Museum of the Great Plains. We're working on early America, so they had alot of good information and exhibits related to our current unit and then I let them loose in the science area. (The space set aside for the traveling, interactive area.)

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Fun times at Science Museum in OKC. :)

Myth: Charter schools take money from traditional schools.

So this is how it works.

Schools have two sources for funds. The first is local, which means a portion of your property taxes, any bond issues or sales taxes that you vote to go to schools, and any local fundraising efforts. (Think Box Tops for Kids and similar programs.) The second is state, which means both state and federal funds. These funds go through the State Department of Education and are dispensed to schools based on a complicated bit of math called ‘State Aid’ formula. In a nutshell, each student has x amount of money attached to them. X is determined by taking a base amount and ‘weighting’ those funds for students whom are lower-income, have disabilities, or a variety of other needs-based factors.

Charter schools don’t get to dip from both funds. Charter schools only receive state funds, meaning no local taxes, no bond issues, etc. For instance, we live in Lawton, so our property taxes go to Lawton Public Schools. Our children attend Epic Charter School, so our State Aid funds go to Epic Charter School. The take-away is that our charter schools receive less money than our traditional brick-and-mortar schools, not more, as some critics would have you believe.

Do charter schools take money from traditional schools? Yes, when they take students. However, the traditional school no longer has to pay for that child, and gets to keep the local funds. So not only do they not lose money on state funds, but they are able to spread those local funds among fewer students. A win-win for traditional schools, which is why almost all Oklahoma charter schools are run by traditional school districts. You might notice that these districts are happy with their own schools. It’s the other schools that are villainous.

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Snap circuits! Seriously, our unit on electricity rocks. :)

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So the tablet is a hit amongst all of the kiddos. It's reading Kipling's 'The Elephant's Child' to Ike right now. :)

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Fun times at the Museum of Osteology in OKC. :)

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After a long discussion of Veterans Day, the kiddos (including Melissa's two) are writing thank you letters to veterans.

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Tower lesson.

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Painting pumpkins. :)