[MouseWife]

I was a very involved parent. Of course, time available to volunteer was limited by having to take care of my other children. And, it all depended upon the teacher and how much involvement they wanted from me. And, most teachers don't want you in the classroom anymore after first grade, they just want you to make copies, check papers, etc. Not things I was there for, and, I felt they should be correcting the work to see where the students were at.

Our schools PTA are very poor. I was involved with many a project that previously had funding from the PTA and then they said they had nothing to offer.

I think the involvement that I had with the schools only made me more upset at the level of their education/treatment of the children later and why I pulled them out.

We have always contributed to the classrooms. In kindergarten, always a room mother. On fieldtrips, working with the students as well as helping the teacher when she needed help organizing projects.

One first grade teacher was very open to our help; we brought in pets for them to tend to, plants for them to grow, I made a 'store' for them to learn about money and math.

Even when we weren't involved with the PTA, we were involved with trying to make the school a better place. When the school tried to stop the trick or treating, we worked together to make sure it happened. {much better for the kids} When the budget called for cuts for the sixth grade activities, we fought for them as well as trying to find ways to get funds for them.

Wow, and ya know, other parents {those of kids not in your childs' grade} don't seem to give a care about anyone but their own grade. Never would they imagine that their child would be in that grade, eh? We seemed to end up fighting parents as much as the school for a lot of funding.

The other thing that we had issues with; when our children were sick and missed school, the disctrict would send out threatening notices. That really p'd me off because I couldn't help if they were sick. Perhaps if other parents kept their kids home sick so many others wouldn't miss school because they caught what they had?

{Homeschooled, my kids never got sick.}

And, on that note, when my kids were in grade school, I remember being told not to send the kids in if they had a fever within the past 24 hours {like say the evening before}. Or, if they may have vomited, keep them home. Now, they keep kids at school when they are sick. This can't be a very good way for them to learn and it is how the sicknesses are spread.