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Overall, some of the responsibility of student performance can be laid at the feet of the teachers but the bulk of the responsibility belongs to our society and most importantly the parents.

A given teacher might be with a particular student, but not solely, for 40-45 minutes a day. The overcrowded school systems interact with the student for only a few hours each day. The bulk of the student's "input" comes from our society and parents.

It is the involvement of, or lack of, the parents from before preschool and throughout K-12 education that makes the difference in all but the mentally challenged students. Parents who are actively involved in the children's education have children who excel, no matter the abilities of the teachers.

There are students who, regardless of adverse parental involvement, manage to be above average but these are few and far between. Somehow, someone was able to "turn on the light" for that child and they shouldered the responsibility for themselves. Perhaps it was a particularly gifted teacher or other role model but they can't reach all of the students.

It all begins at home... Lack of parental guidance and discipline fosters unruly, under achieving and uneducated children. Because this is multiplied over a large percentage of the population we have the children being caught up in drugs and gangs from an early age.

As a society we tolerate and condone this lack of personal responsibility that was instilled from the home environment. We have decided that we can no longer discipline an unruly child with corporal punishment or public humiliation. Instead, we send them home to the environment that is the root of their problem.

No, folks... It isn't the teachers... It falls squarely on the parents and the permissive society we have become.

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