OPINION: TERRY TURNER: Education requires more than just school

May 21—Every generation's children are its donation to the future. To make that donation, the major thing we do together is to provide our children with an education, an important obligation since the children of today will be making the decisions of tomorrow. We primarily meet that obligation through a tax-supported system structured by elected representatives at local, state, and federal levels.

The tax dollars involved are not trivial. The Colquitt County, 2024 school budget has been set at approximately $109.4 million. That dwarfs the approximately $25.6 million budget for all other county operations. The bulk of the school system's budget comes from state or federal coffers, but whether from local, state, or federal taxes, the expenditure represents a significant community investment in the future. What do we in Colquitt County get for that investment? Certainly, a high school athletic dynamo, but that is hardly the point.

The point is to educate our youth for an array of possible futures. Some students will go directly from high school to a job, but can they read and write at the level expected? Some students will go on to a technical education as professional plumbers, mechanics, nursing assistants, and other trades, but can they perform the math functions required or communicate as needed? Still others will want to attend a college or university, but do they score well enough on common entrance exams to be admitted?

One winces at realizing that only a third or less of Colquitt County's high school seniors exhibit competency in reading and math, an outcome that endangers student success at any level of job or training. Further, the average score for Colquitt County students taking the SAT and ACT college entrance exams in the 2023-24 school year were approximately 1000 and 20, respectively. Those scores are well below the average of the entering classes of the two major state universities in Georgia (UGA and Georgia Tech) and the two major state universities in all surrounding states. This lackluster performance is corroborated by one national ranking system that reported only 9% of Colquitt County's 2023 graduates were college ready.

We need to do better; but what's the problem? Is it the school system? Is it poor teaching, lax administration, or inadequate facilities? No. Our teachers are no less prepared or caring than other places and there is no reason to think our administration is in lay-by mode. The real problem is one unpopular to mention: teachers teach whoever shows up at the schoolhouse door. If a student comes to school prepared, agreeable, and at least amenable to learning, the teacher has something to work with. If the student comes unprepared, disagreeable, and disinterested, the teacher faces a major challenge having more to do with parenting and home life than with teaching. That means the basic problem lies in how we nurture our children in our homes and our community. That nurturing is what sets student attitudes even before they get to school.

While it often seems expected of them, teachers cannot make up for absent or inattentive parents, residues of cultural apathy or other environmental forms of indifference towards education. Neither should a teacher have to be a student's primary direction giver or disciplinarian. Children arriving at school without guidance at home that supports consistent study, respect for teachers, and proper behavior in group endeavors suffer from the lack of primary nurturing. It is a community problem shoveled onto the school system; but despite the tax dollars spent, it is a problem a school system cannot solve and should not be blamed for.

Terry Turner, a resident of Colquitt County, is professor emeritus of urology at the University of Virginia as well as author of books based on his experiences as an infantry officer in Vietnam.