School closures/delays?

Larry Walker24 said:And that’s exactly why I’m sitting here in 5th grade losing my mind because these kids can barely read—let alone read anything worth mentioning. It happens because teachers, feeling the heat from pushy parents, take the easy way out and just hand out passing grades to kids who are clearly drowning. And boom, you've got your "problem" students showing up in middle school.

😲 It seems like things in the US education system might be even more of a mess than parents realize.

What’s the point of giving him a 3 if he’s only reading at a "satisfactory" level? And if she gave him a 2, that would be "adequate." Theoretically, someone reading at a 2 shouldn't even be struggling in 5th grade, right?

What does reading at a 1 even look like?

We didn't have grades from first through fourth grade, so we just managed fine once we hit fifth grade; I don't recall any massive shockwaves back then.

It honestly feels to me like they’re demanding way too much from kids in the upper elementary years these days. By fifth grade—if not even sooner—they're expected to put together projects, give presentations, and conduct actual research, which is stuff we barely touched on in high school and didn't get serious about until college.

Basic fundamental knowledge is almost entirely ignored when it comes to grading. You should have to study just as hard for second grade as you do for fifth, but if you miss a single point, suddenly you're looking at a C or a D.
That’s how we were taught, and it wasn't until we were in university. I have no idea which schools are handing out failing grades to everyone, but in my district, they certainly don't hand out grades for free. In fact, the grading is actually harsher than what anyone would reasonably expect based on actual knowledge.

The core issue here is that any kid in the American school system who starts struggling with reading comprehension or keeping up with lessons in those early grades should be immediately flagged for speech therapy evaluations through the school district. Instead, it feels like everything hinges on whether a parent is willing to accept that there might be an issue in the first place. On top of that, you often run into the hurdle of having to $200 pay out of pocket for private assessments because waiting for the official school evaluation can take forever...

Jacob Lopez2 said:We didn't have grades from first through fourth grade, so we just managed fine once we hit fifth grade; I don't recall any massive shockwaves back then.

It honestly feels to me like they’re demanding way too much from kids in the upper elementary years these days. By fifth grade—if not even sooner—they're expected to put together projects, give presentations, and conduct actual research, which is stuff we barely touched on in high school and didn't get serious about until college.

Basic fundamental knowledge is almost entirely ignored when it comes to grading. You should have to study just as hard for second grade as you do for fifth, but if you miss a single point, suddenly you're looking at a C or a D.
That’s how we were taught, and it wasn't until we were in university. I have no idea which schools are handing out failing grades to everyone, but in my district, they certainly don't hand out grades for free. In fact, the grading is actually harsher than what anyone would reasonably expect based on actual knowledge.

Exactly, Cepin40. Just look at the book reports where they ask seven questions like, "Connect the author's biography to the socio-political context of the era," and so on.
We truly only dealt with stuff like that in high school. My friends who went to vocational schools never had to do it.
I'm not sure if this is the case in every elementary school, or if this is just the standard curriculum for reading assignments. Back in my day, you would just write a bilješka o pisac.
And there are plenty of examples like that across a whole bunch of other subjects.

Honestly, if you just scrape those book summaries off the internet, you aren't really solving anything.
Most kids don't even bother reading them in the first place.

wanderingbadger77 said:Honestly, if you just scrape those book summaries off the internet, you aren't really solving anything.
Most kids don't even bother reading them in the first place.

There isn't really any copying involved—not when there’s a test or an essay prompt that asks for a specific detail you simply couldn't have plucked from a summary. In her class, everyone actually reads; I can see from the parent group chats that a whole swarm of parents are reading along with them, too.

Well, that’s honestly the whole point of why the questions are framed that way—you can't just copy-paste your way through them. And I think that’s exactly why they bother reading them in the first place... because you actually have to think, you know? You can't just regurgitate some textbook answer.

Michelle Nelson4 said:The core issue here is that any kid in the American school system who starts struggling with reading comprehension or keeping up with lessons in those early grades should be immediately flagged for speech therapy evaluations through the school district. Instead, it feels like everything hinges on whether a parent is willing to accept that there might be an issue in the first place. On top of that, you often run into the hurdle of having to $200 pay out of pocket for private assessments because waiting for the official school evaluation can take forever...

You don't actually have to wait that long just for an evaluation, and the public school medical staff can issue a referral (and honestly, they should). There shouldn't be a need to pay out of pocket for private specialists.
Actual treatment is a whole different story 😢

If a school identifies a problem and recommends an evaluation, but the parent doesn't follow through, the school is required to notify the relevant NASA office.
Often, they don't bother because, besides the awkwardness of confronting the parents, it just means more paperwork for them—especially if the child eventually needs an adjusted curriculum.

It’s a similar situation with preschools; they’re supposed to detect issues, refer the parents, and notify NASA if the parents don't take action... they tend to be a bit more proactive, but unfortunately, the kids who most desperately need those extra screenings and treatments are often not even enrolled in preschool programs.
So they just head straight into elementary school without any prior support or treatment...

Susan James said:You don't actually have to wait that long just for an evaluation, and the public school medical staff can issue a referral (and honestly, they should). There shouldn't be a need to pay out of pocket for private specialists.
Actual treatment is a whole different story 😢

If a school identifies a problem and recommends an evaluation, but the parent doesn't follow through, the school is required to notify the relevant NASA office.
Often, they don't bother because, besides the awkwardness of confronting the parents, it just means more paperwork for them—especially if the child eventually needs an adjusted curriculum.

It’s a similar situation with preschools; they’re supposed to detect issues, refer the parents, and notify NASA if the parents don't take action... they tend to be a bit more proactive, but unfortunately, the kids who most desperately need those extra screenings and treatments are often not even enrolled in preschool programs.
So they just head straight into elementary school without any prior support or treatment...

I guess it really just depends on where you're living. Out here in the more rural parts of the country, you can end up waiting months just for the processing alone before you even get seen.

The real headache here is that you’re forced to step outside the school system entirely. It would be such a game-changer if there were a speech therapist available right on campus—someone who could perform an evaluation based simply on a teacher's observation without needing a formal referral first. Ideally, they’d be able to catch those subtle, early warning signs, rather than just stepping in once a major issue has already surfaced.

Michelle Nelson4 said:The real headache here is that you’re forced to step outside the school system entirely. It would be such a game-changer if there were a speech therapist available right on campus—someone who could perform an evaluation based simply on a teacher's observation without needing a formal referral first. Ideally, they’d be able to catch those subtle, early warning signs, rather than just stepping in once a major issue has already surfaced.

Amen!

There isn't much left to say...

There are other factors at play, obviously, but this alone would be a lifesaver for kids in the system. And don't even get me started on psychologists. Right now, we’re basically fighting an uphill battle against severe conditions that are already taking root.

But here we are, watching them roll out this "new reform" that has absolutely zero connection to reality. Eventually, you just learn that the only way to survive is to work the system from the inside while teaching the kids how to effectively flip it the bird.

If you ask me? Heads should roll. We need a total overhaul for anyone who thinks managing a poultry farm is fundamentally the same thing as running an education system. At least with chickens, you have to maintain specific standards in the production facilities; with kids, you just shove them into a room, turn on the lights, and tell them they have enough space to peck at whatever low-grade feed you decide to toss their way.

remember what that esteemed Secretary said about hiring psychologists...

Sarah Hall53 said:Look, speaking from my experience as a teacher—and I say this with all due respect to both sides—I’m really against pushing school start dates back for no reason, but I’m just as much against rushing kids into enrollment earlier than they're ready.
You can actually see the fallout when they hit 7th grade and hit the wall with science classes like physics and chemistry. At twelve years old, most kids haven't quite developed that capacity for abstract thinking that these subjects demand—mostly because that cognitive leap usually doesn't happen until they're around thirteen. So, you end up making everything unnecessarily difficult for them, turning what should be learning into a total nightmare of frustration and "why am I even doing this?!" moments.

If we define "pushing kids into school" as anything that goes against what professional educators recommend, then yeah, count me in as an opponent of that. I actually know someone where the struggles started way back in the first grade.

But honestly, I think your whole argument misses the mark entirely, and there isn't any actual research out there to back you up. If that were true, the top students in every class would naturally be the oldest ones, but that's just not how it works in reality. It wasn't like that over 20 years ago when I was in Elementary School and high school either—I was right on the edge of the age cutoff, and while some kids were younger than me, the ones who crushed it in Elementary School moved on to prep school, and even the youngest kids in those advanced tracks were absolutely killing it, just like some of the older kids. There was no correlation; some of the youngest and oldest were at the bottom of the class, too. Even looking at my son's class now, he's the top student and he's one of the youngest, followed by a kid who is exactly a year older, and after that, it's just completely random. There's zero connection between their birth month or whether they started school at 6 and 4 months versus 6 and a half.

By that same logic, I could probably make a wild claim that parents who push for a later start date are basically inviting puberty to hit in 5th grade, causing kids to lose that childhood drive to learn and respect authority, which leads to grades tanking.

To me, it feels like a total reach to suggest that American schools are full of kids struggling in certain subjects simply because their parents missed the window to enroll them earlier.
The truth is more mundane: average kids tend to get average grades. If they're failing English, it's usually because they aren't reading enough, and if they're struggling with math or chemistry, it's often because they just don't have the aptitude for those specific disciplines.

I said ON AVERAGE.
which basically means there's always going to be those outliers—you know, people who just don't fit the mold—on both ends of the spectrum, so we could honestly spend all day arguing over anecdotal stories if we really wanted to.

Sarah Hall53 said:I said ON AVERAGE.
which basically means there's always going to be those outliers—you know, people who just don't fit the mold—on both ends of the spectrum, so we could honestly spend all day arguing over anecdotal stories if we really wanted to.

Generally speaking, the notion that kids can't handle chemistry or physics without fully developed abstract reasoning is a flawed one. It’s also a terrible message to send to parents, suggesting they should delay school because children might find those subjects easier later on.
There isn't some magic line where abstract thinking suddenly switches on.
If you consider that—aside from brain development—it grows through experience (from sensory input to formal education), then by delaying school, you might actually be robbing them of the chance to develop that very reasoning. You aren't waiting for them to catch up; you're just stalling their growth.

Honestly, leaning on the word "average" is pretty weak. Abstract reasoning varies wildly from person to person; it’s shaped by genetics, early childhood development, life experience before starting school, and everything they learn once they're actually in the classroom. Some kids just hit those milestones faster, while others follow their own timeline.
Using "averages" as a reason to delay schooling is just a poor argument.

Not to mention the blow to a child's self-esteem. I remember seeing kids head into first grade feeling like absolute superstars because they were ahead of the curve—maybe even a bit more physically mature, too. Then, they start to struggle because, believe it or not, they aren't being given the stimulation or the foundational skills they need. They end up being perfectly "average," but they watch their peers—kids who couldn't even read a simple sentence at the start of the year—suddenly fly past them because their cognitive development was supported rather than delayed.

Look, there are valid reasons to delay enrollment.
Plenty of them.
But worrying about whether a kid can master chemistry in middle school isn't one of them.

I didn’t say we absolutely have to delay things because of that. What I meant was that we shouldn't be pushing kids into early enrollment—which, honestly, seems to be the trend with everyone around me lately.

Michelle Nelson4 said:The core issue here is that any kid in the American school system who starts struggling with reading comprehension or keeping up with lessons in those early grades should be immediately flagged for speech therapy evaluations through the school district. Instead, it feels like everything hinges on whether a parent is willing to accept that there might be an issue in the first place. On top of that, you often run into the hurdle of having to $200 pay out of pocket for private assessments because waiting for the official school evaluation can take forever...

I went down to my local elementary school, which has about 500 students. They actually had a speech therapist last year, but she was let go because the Department of Education decided they weren't going to fund her position anymore.
We went to the "public" clinic just for a basic screening. Now, we've been sitting around waiting for actual therapy sessions for 15 months.
Everything is broken; it doesn't matter where you look.
Kids are struggling with articulation, spelling, and even basic syllable division, yet the district keeps hiring PE teachers or whatever those recent openings were.

You honestly wouldn't believe it, but there are actually parents out there who flat-out deny their kid is struggling with reading or writing. Like, they just refuse to see it. In our district, we have a speech therapist right there at the elementary school, and the teacher—straight up from the start of the second semester—began referring kids over to them. I’m talking about first graders here, which is wild if you think about it. Some of these parents went absolutely ballistic, acting like it was some kind of personal insult, all because their kids are technically "good students." As if being a straight-A student somehow makes you immune to learning disabilities, right? What even is that logic?

Honestly, even in our local preschools, they won't let kids get speech therapy if it's offered. It’s just one more thing that makes sense to no one. I can't say I'm surprised anymore by any of this.