[jmatt]

I know a number of teachers and administrators, and caterping's comments ring true. It sums up what I hear over and over.

At this point it comes down to what is the low hanging fruit? Of these problems what are the easiest (and/or best value) to solve? The biggest change I've seen is the relationship between teacher/school and student/parent. That same problem is all too often described as a "student's attitude" problem. But really the school administration and parents are just as complicit.

We all had the same ornery students around when we were in school. Arguably I was one of them. The way I remember it is we just had a much shorter leash. So, in the end, I was forced to just comply and "play the game". Which was a healthy life lesson. If I was given the options that these kids were, I'm sure I would have exploited fuck out of it. And I can promise I never would have learned that sometimes you just have to jump through all the hoops and "play the game" to get things done.