I am not trying to say that this one student “broke” the educational system in America. It has been broken for a long time. In general, there are students in government schools who want to be there and want to learn, and there are also students who are just going through the motions of attending school because they are required by law to be there.
Yes, sometimes good teachers can engage those “lost kids” with interesting or alternative teaching methods and draw them into the circle of students who actually want to learn. But sometimes those lost kids disrupt the entire classroom and prevent anyone from learning anything.
So what do we do? Give up on the marginal kids, the ones with a tough home life, the ones who might come to school just to get the free lunch? I don’t have any answers, and I don’ t think kicking out all the disruptive kids is the answer. I am just acknowledging that the government is trying to do more than it can handle. Pretending that it can service so many different levels of kids…from the learning disabled to the gifted and talented, to the ones who don’t want to be there, and the ones who might shine if given the right bit of encouragement…it’s a lot to ask of teachers and administrators.