The Bridge Initiative

In case you missed it, at the Sept. 9, BOE meeting Mr. Thurmond rolled out the results of the work done at Harvard last July, The Bridge Initiative.* 

While there are obvious flaws in the plan, I want to state that I am an enthusiastic supporter of the Bridge Initiative. 

One of the things I know to be true is that parents are the primary teachers of children. Children learn what is important by observing the things their parents say and do. This applies to education. 

Do the parents read books and read to the children? Do the parents help with homework and enforce a bedtime which allows children to get 10 hours of sleep on school nights? Do the parents attend school functions and volunteer at the school? Do the parents make sure the children eat breakfast (either at home or at school) each morning?

My hypothesis is that many parents are not modeling the importance of education to their children. There are valid reasons for some, but for other I suspect it is because they believe it is the school's job to educate children and not theirs. They may not understand how powerful of a message this sends to their children. 

The results of this are students in classrooms who have not done their homework, are not ready to learn, are tired, and lack the motivation to do well in order to please their parents.

I support Mr. Thurmond's plan to reach out to parents and show them the importance of making education important in their families. 

*That statement is an assumption on my part. The plan is too good to have come from any of the district employees.