Public school in brooklyn

amother

Olive

Wed, Oct 04 2017, 10:39 am

amother wrote:

I actually meant in 9th grade; that was an error.

Experiment meaning what? Holding hands? Playing tag? Even if a child has a boyfriend, they’re certainly not old enough to cross the street without holding tatty’s hand to see that boy.

Yes, holding hands, kissing, hugging. For Jewish children, that is not something we want even a seven year old doing with the opposite gender. Don't downplay it. It's still wrong.

No. They haven’t. The average first time age is 17. Not much before we’d marry. Please back that up with facts that prove it’s common, not newsworthy because it’s rare.

Absolutely. There are many. As another mother wrote, 17 is AVERAGE. I heard so many children talking about having done it. In fact, "virgin" was thrown about as an insult. There was one girl that I knew who was a staunch Baptist and she told everyone she would never even kiss a boy before marriage. She was held as the oddity in school.

I've never met anyone from a gang background in any school/ job ’ve worked at. And that includes inner city Newark, where gangs constantly mark the streets. Whether they were taught at public/ private/ charter/ yeshiva. pity the area you lived in.

I've lived all over, from hick towns on the west coast to northern states, to inner city Denver. And yes, in Denver, kids would show up to school with one pant leg rolled up, one down, and walk with a swagger. The color red was even banned in our school because one gang called themselves "the bloods," and there were gang fights breaking out in school. Alternatively, I've been in super high class schools and Gifted and Talented programs. In one of them, in the seventh grade, the teacher had a whole discussion with the class about how p*rn is demeaning to women and he would never watch it. I had NO CLUE what that even meant. Seems everyone else did though...

And again, with hazing, etc., the point I was trying to bring out is that these people are not being raised with concepts like ahavas chesed, avoiding lashon hara, etc. It is a cold, cruel world. I remember when someone new walked into class for the first time and one of the popular kids looked and said, "Hey, you're sh*tty looking." That's common talk in public school. No concern at all for others' feelings. It's just not a part of the "chinuch."

A Jewish child, who we assume is hoped to grow into a loving, caring, mitzvah-doing individual, will face incredible challenges in public school; everything from s*xual temptation to challenges with kashrus, yom tov, middos development and beyond. Why would any child in this generation want to hang tight to Yiddishkeit after being tempted in so many areas with the haskama of his own parents? If a parents sends a child to public school, it is essentially as if they are saying, "it's okay to be exposed to all these things." Some kids will remain strong, but I venture to guess that most won't, when faced with the combination of temptation of the "forbidden" and the nature of a child to want to explore his world as well as be part of his peers.

Sending a frum child to public school is placing a stumble block before him. A huge one. And then telling him to climb over it and become a great Yid despite the tremendous effort involved.

Fascinating.

I attended what would be considered an inner-city public school, where a scant majority of students were people of color. No gangs. My siblings attended a different inner-city public school with similar demographics. No gangs. Nieces and nephews, suburban schools. No gangs. Friends' kids. Various city public schools. No gangs. Do gangs exist in schools? Sure. But I don't think that the OP is going to send her kids to schools where that would be likely.

Of course, my problem with little kids referring to each other as "boyfriend" or "girlfriend" isn't that they eat lunch together (never seen them so much as kiss at a young age), but that we are secksualizing that which is not secksual.

As to bullying, please read a few threads about what kids in Yeshivas have to put up with. Not to mention what their parents need to put up with, being forced to dress in a certain manner in order to have their kids attend schools.

amother

Olive

Wed, Oct 04 2017, 10:40 am

Mommyg8 wrote:

I understand that this happened in the Jewish schools as well. Unfortunately.

But in the public schools this is considered standard and normal (I.e. it's literally everybody), hopefully in the Jewish schools it is not considered normal, and is not AS prevalent.

Its not considered standard or normal at public schools.

Mommyg8

Wed, Oct 04 2017, 10:54 am

amother wrote:

Its not considered standard or normal at public schools.

Not according to the article I read, I referenced it above - The Atlantic, November 2014.

amother

Olive

Wed, Oct 04 2017, 11:00 am

Mommyg8 wrote:

Not according to the article I read, I referenced it above - The Atlantic, November 2014.

According to this article, only 7% of teens sext.

https://innovativepublichealth.....ting/

The study that you're referring to includes texts like "I think you're hot" as sexting

http://time.com/2948467/chance.....ting/

And no article says that "literally every" public school teen sexts.

dancingqueen

Wed, Oct 04 2017, 11:00 am

https://www.guttmacher.org/fac.....ealth

Since people were having trouble believing the losing virginity at 17 stat mentioned above.

Mommyg8

Wed, Oct 04 2017, 11:08 am

Okay, so according to that study, 44% of teens had had s*x by 17. That's almost half.

I'm still wondering how they got these numbers. They obviously didn't check everyone, so how did they get the information - self reporting? How many of these respondents lied? Just wondering.

Mommyg8

Wed, Oct 04 2017, 11:10 am

amother wrote:

I was not talking about s*xting, actually. The behavior that I read about was sending n*ked pictures of themselves to their boyfriends, which then was sent around. This is illegal wherever you are (I think, I could be wrong), but it was so prevalent that the article I read was quoting law enforcement officers as scratching their heads on how to deal with this, because obviously, they can't put entire classes into jail.

And yes, I am aware that this happens in the frum world as well. But definitely not at 15. At least not yet.

Mommyg8

Wed, Oct 04 2017, 11:24 am

I just wanted to add... I spend some time in the last few years taking college courses at a community college. The most common word, used in conversation, as overheard? f***. The most common phrase? f****** b****. I know that some people are ok with that kind of terminology, but just giving you a heads up.

Also... no article is going to discuss the prevalence of p*rn, because that IS considered "normal". Again, I am one one of the more "delicate" imamothers who don't want my kids to exposed at all, but that may not be your reality. Again, just giving you the heads up.

nicole81

Wed, Oct 04 2017, 11:42 am

DrMom wrote:

Actually, that's what MEDIAN means, not AVERAGE.

Anyhow, as public school graduate, there are cliques and groups in public school (as I imagine there are in any school), and some are sxually active and some are studious and never go out and some are jocks and some are music geeks, and some belong to various groups, etc etc etc. It depends with what kinds of kids your child hangs out.

Just a few of things to add as a public school administrator and mathematician...

Firstly, "average," while typically used to refer to the mean, can, in actuality, refer to any measure of central tendency. Referring to the median as an average value is perfectly legitimate.

Secondly, the New York City Department of Education is the single largest school district in the United States. It's more than overly simplistic to describe "public school" as a singular experience or with sweeping generalizations. There are some terrific public schools in Brooklyn. There are also some mediocre ones. And plenty in between. If your child is in elementary school, you will have to send to your zoned school, or you can apply to a gifted and talented program or charter school. I recommend researching your zoned school. There is plenty of public information available regarding each school's quality of education, safety, and learning environment. If you are not satisfied with your zoned school, then do similar research regarding charter schools. Any nonsectarian school you send your child to after coming from a religious school will require a big adjustment, but at the very least, you should want to make sure that the education they will be receiving and the environment of the school (by DOE measures) is something that you would want for them.

I personally had an amazing experience with NYC public schools. But this is completely irrelevant, as are everyone else's experiences, because the real question is what is your zoned school like? And if you're not pleased with those options, are you willing to do the legwork to find better options?

Thirdly, there are some modern orthodox families that send to HLA Charter School, which currently serves K-8. You might want to look into this as an option. Also, you said you send to a school that is reasonable with finances, but it might be worthwhile to look into Be'er Hagolah. You might find that they will work with you more than your current school, if you are interested in trying to keep your children in a Jewish educational institution.

MagentaYenta

Wed, Oct 04 2017, 12:30 pm

Absolutely. There are many. As another mother wrote, 17 is [b]AVERAGE[/b]. ..[/quote]

It's a pity you didn't stay in school long enough to know what average really means.

Mommyg8

Wed, Oct 04 2017, 1:03 pm

MagentaYenta wrote:

Absolutely. There are many. As another mother wrote, 17 is [b]AVERAGE[/b]. ..

It's a pity you didn't stay in school long enough to know what average really means.[/quote]

Actually, as the previous poster pointed out, average can refer to the median as well.
I just did this in my college level statistics class.

marina

Wed, Oct 04 2017, 2:01 pm

amother wrote:

thank you so far for the responses. I appreciate it and it's making me feel better.
Another question, did your kids ever get picked on for being Jewish or anything along those lines? I would guess in NYC there is a lot of tolerance, but still.......
My oldest who was in PS several years ago in NJ at the time did get bullied a lot bc he's Jewish.

TIA

bullying based on religion is considered or should be considered to be a very serious legal matter. Parents have received six figure settlements for anti-semitic bullying.

iriska_meller

Wed, Oct 04 2017, 2:36 pm

If you are in Brooklyn, I would consider a PS with a large percentage of Muslim kids. My kids spent a year in one such school and I noticed that kids from Muslim families tend to have similar values in terms of food restriction/dress/separation of genders/no halloween or xmas. They are also very academically oriented.

WhatFor

Wed, Oct 04 2017, 2:38 pm

amother wrote:

Alright, time to chime in....

I've been in multiple public schools due to family relocation, and in each and every one I have seen such depravity. I've had great teachers and a good education, but the nature of public school is to be very open and permissible to a fault.

In public school, it is NORMAL for children as young as 7 to have "boyfriends" and "girlfriends" and experiment with other-gender physical contact. By the age of 12 or 13, many children have already "done it." .....

Now let's talk cruelty:
In public school, you have children coming many various backgrounds, often times gang backgrounds, in which they've learned that being the roughest, toughest is the way to succeed. Even the "better" kids often have a clic-ish mentality that looks down upon anyone not uber pretty, muscular or rich. Children have no problem to verbally abuse other kids on a daily basis. Of course, there are good kids too, but those are usually the ones that are being abused!

Ever heard of phasing? Just to give you an idea of what "accepted" mentality is the minds of many American teenagers. (This applies specifically to college, but teens know about this as well, and many have tried it.) In order to become part of the "in-crowd", wanna-bes have to go through phasing, which can be anything from having their heads submerged in a bucket of feces to eating live cochroaches. Yeah. These are the kids you might be sending your precious neshama to school with.

Not only that, but do you really expect a young Jewish child to NOT develop crushes on girls/boys they are in class with, regardless of religious affiliation? .....
A pretty blonde girl that just happens to be Catholic... Well, you know, the price of love overcomes all......

Take it from someone who knows.

And btw, the reason I left to get my GED at age 14 was due to the utter depravity I witnessed in public school. I didn't want to be in the environment anymore. And I wasn't yet religious.

Wow. This is quite a...unique experience.

Since you mentioned Denver in another post, the minimum age to take your GED in Colorado is 17. What state were you in that allowed you to take it at age 14?

amother

Denim

Wed, Oct 04 2017, 2:55 pm

I took it at 16 in the northwest. I was officially registered as homeschooled until then.

Earned a full scholarship to the university where I took the GED, but gave it up for Yiddishkeit. Public school was bad enough. Didn't need university as well!

amother

Gray

Wed, Oct 04 2017, 4:05 pm

The study did not quote methodology, so I'm assuming they used the mean, which as you pointed out, is generally, although not always, more accurate. Whether they used the mean or the median, there will obviously be some above that number, and some below.

Presumably, in this study (if there was one), no-one was 0, and no-one was 100. Presumably the numbers would be very closely clustered around 17, with any numbers too low or too high being extremely rare, hence would have very little influence on the final numbers, if the group is large enough, which, again, it would have to be to have any validity.[/quote]

In this case, looking into teens only, for 17 to be the mean, all kids are 15-19. Reasonable.

In a range of 13-19, most would fall into the 16-18 range, so median is also reasonable.

If I had to guess, it could possible be mode- look at the numbers and pick which one is most common. Insanely inaccurate in most cases (such as your 0-0-1-100 example), but possible here.

17 is typically the age of driving, prom (public school dance, many kids stay out overnight), and even R rated (more likely to show graphic violence/ graphic sx scene) movies. It makes sense that it’s the age where more kids experiment.

amother

Blush

Wed, Oct 04 2017, 4:14 pm

OP here,

thanks everyone for the responses. I'm thinking of some charter schools maybe or HLA I have to see how we could get into these since I'm not zoned for them but thank you all

amother

Gray

Wed, Oct 04 2017, 4:16 pm

Mommyg8 wrote:

In any case, I know google says that the average age is 17. From where does google get their data? How valid was this survey? Did this data come from a poll-like site - I.e. - click on this simple questionaire to enter into this drawing? Was this self-reporting data? (Obviously, kids will lie).

The number 17 is completely unbelievable.

I only knew 2 who lost it earlier than that. One was abused by a family member, the other dated a much MUCH older guy.

For ever girl that swears they’re still a v1rgin, you have 2 or more boys that say they’ve lost theirs, but haven’t. In the end, it balances out.

I remember a 70’s tv show, where about half a dozen boys all swore they were with a girl, who swore she was a v1rgin. She walked into class and told the teacher she was pregnant, and wanted him to talk to the father. Suddenly all of them denied ever touching her.

Boys don’t want to be the only one not doing it, so they’ll make up a girlfriend (or 3) that they’ve gone all the way with.

amother

Jetblack

Wed, Oct 04 2017, 5:44 pm

I don't have advice for you, but thanks for this thread that I'm following. I grew up in Israel and when my parents decided to move to NYC, they looked around some jewish schools, but ended up putting me in a public school (of course my parents were still not working at that time, so they had no choice). I was a bit scared of the whole new atmosphere, but then I got to know some Israeli and jewish kids in my class. Also, I was already in high school so I knew not to eat from the cafeteria and it didn't bother me not going to parties on fridays.

Now that I have kids, I actually don't want to send them to public. Even though I didn't have a bad experience with public, I feel like it's a bit more complicated to put little kids (from kindergarten to elementary) in public and then hope that they'll eat kosher and not food from the friends or won't get influenced badly. My husband was pro-public schools from the beginning. I think part of me wants to put them in public because I do know that there are some really good public schools out there that have better teachers and secular curriculum than in some yeshivas. We're paying for two kids right now and next year it will be three! My parents help out a little bit, but it's still VERY difficult for us to pay (even with a scholarship we got from the school). Because of the tuition, we can't even move to a bigger apartment. Sometimes I ask myself why in the world am I doing this??! I really wish my husband would want to leave everything and move to Israel, but he's not on board with that...so right now I have no choice. I'm hoping we can manage to pay for tuition for a few more years. By the way, this is also stopping us from having more kids! I really wish to have one or two more but the high tuition is stopping us.

So right now I'm just sticking with paying for jewish school until we can't no longer, but I feel like when the kids are a little older (after elementary) maybe then they could manage in public. This is a really tough topic that so many people struggle with over here.

By the way, when I was in public high school, I knew two jewish girls that were frum and are now married and are still frum. One became a lawyer and the other became a dentist,and they both went to public, so not bad results. I still keep kosher, shabbat and holidays.

LovesHashem

Thu, Oct 05 2017, 1:03 pm

Also, to all the posters who had good expiriences- when were you in public school?
Did smartphones exist?
s*xting?
Was p*rn normal?
The movies even 10 years ago were much different than once they have now

Things have really changed.
Has anyone seen or heard of 13 reasons why? There is just so much in that series, from beghining to end that I would never ever want my children to see.