Failure Factory: Project Baltimore investigates 'ghost students'
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- čas přidán 14. 12. 2022
- Every child in America deserves a quality education, but Fox45 News found many students in Baltimore City are being deprived of that right. This investigation, which is now heading into its third year in 2023, has shed light on the failures of the education system that have impacted generations of students, while providing the impetus for lawmakers and community members to finally make it right.
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As an educator in a poor community for the past 25 years, I can tell you that the biggest problem we face is student behaviors and the lack of consequences at school and at home.
Teachers are leaving the profession in droves.
Schools can’t fix a culture that does not value education. That starts at home.
Really! If I’m putting my life on the line, better to take up a career as a first responder, law enforcement, or military.
I agree with you 100%. It's not fair.
Tell em! Preach. Everyone wants to blame the "system." Nope. It's the students and their behvaiors... and the lack of parenting that contributes to that.
That is likely true, but what does it have to do with corrupt school officials falsely enrolling students in courses that don't exist or that the students aren't attending?
We have similar problems in Toronto. Theres litterally no consequences, no punishment. Teachers are actually scared of their students.
2:35….a student with a 0.13 GPA ALMOST ranks in the top 50% of the class….very concerning
How are you unaware that your child only passed 3 classes in 4 years? That is a parenting failure. Do you not look at report cards, talk to their teachers, go over their homework with them? Grade reports are generated every few months and all of us that are parents know to ask for them if they aren’t offered up our kid!
She is working 3 jobs. That's how she was unaware.
@@melodramatic7904 it doesn’t take that much to look at a report card
@@okok-kw8oh says an unemployed person 🤦♂️🤦♂️
@@Daimlerxy_ you're right it takes a lot of time
It's mind boggling. My mom is on my ass about my grades. Not because she's mean or cruel, but because she's a responsible and present parent. She knows I'm learning disabled (labeled a "general learning disability", it's most likely Dyscalcula and dyslexia) so I need to be pushed more and tutored. So she gets that. Even if you're working 3 jobs you need to at least check in on your kids before you go to bed. Before you check your phone. Discipline is a major reason we have so many "ghost students". I'm in high school right now and there's some kids I've never seen because they haven't shown up all year but they're still in attendance sheets. It's not making me angry at the kids, trust me, I get it. It makes me furious at the parents for not doing the bare minimum to help their kids then blaming the school, like the school is supposed to be parenting their children. Parents are supposed to parent children!
0.13 GPA and Class ranked above 50%? That's alarming.
I like how the mom is in denial that her son is not a failure! As if his grades being so bad that the governor gets involved doesn’t speak for itself
In most colleges, if you had a GPA that low; you would be placed on academic probation. If your grades did not improve; academic dismissal.
@@mannyistheman2221 Um long before that… probably below a 2.0 even in an empty small-town community college that cannot fill the seats
The mom trying to put this all on the schools is SO typical. Yes, the school did fail, but the mom failed worse.
Yup.
And dad.
These schools are beyond negligent and corrupt, however, for any parent to allow their children to be enrolled in an institution without any awareness of progress or otherwise, is at the top of the blame chain.
You're absolutely right. These corrupt "leaders" get away with it because the vast majority of parents don't know what's happening and don't give a damn.
*Thank you.* I'm like... are they serious?
Also, do they know most children know how to read *before* going to school. That is taught *at home.*
This problem is now generations deep
@@firebirdstark Amen. My dad had learning problems and so did my Aunt (Mama's side) . I'm blessed, because both my grandmas pushed them to succeed, and advocated for them to be helped and treated with respect. So they both went to college and even with adversity, they both got more than just an entrance degree. My aunty now works in special education and is very successful because she's like them. She knows how they think and what they're going through.
It's not at the fault of the kids with learning disabilities/differences. They need to be taught how they will learn. And sometimes, in the case of my auntie, it was audio books for her text books instead of paper books, and the ability to ask more questions.
Kid passes only 3 classes in 4 years? What took her so long? I’d be screaming after one semester. Yeah, I’m gonna say it. Piss poor parenting!!!
She thought her child was going to apply for Harvard law school after memorizing the lyrics to Cardi B's WAP at age 8. Honest mistake.
OKAY!! I have parents who have NO IDEA THAT their child is failing! And I mean DOZENS!!! Many of these parents could care less about education and it SHOWS! I see it everyday and unfortunately there is nothing I can do, except after 23 years say goodbye to the educational system, because I been saying for the last 15 years that these kids have BEEN LEFT BEHIND 😔😕
If this was a private or charter school people would have been fired by now.
Not sure about that
@@SHAWNA499 he’s 100% correct. The owner of the charter school would be legally entitled to the debt he amounted through his terrible policies. No one wants to be millions in debt, so he would’ve changed his course
Who's gonna fire these parents?
These families are too poor to send their kids to private school.
How do you not know your son is failing at school until he’s 18? That’s negligence on her part. Did she not speak to her son at all? Maybe if she paid more attention to her child she’s have known.
She was working 3 jobs to make ends meet. She’s stressed and as long as the report card comes and says “passed” she is just happy.
@@Daimlerxy_that's no excuse. You as the parent are responsible for the education of your children first and foremost!
@@Daimlerxy_She works 3 jobs because why? Seems like her parents failed her or she made a lot of bad decisions in life herself.... So it's the teacher's fault because she works 3 jobs .. This is her responsibility to know what's going on in her child life.
How was a kid who only passed 3 classes in three years set to graduate in 6 months at a new school? That's BS. Probably some school looking to use her kid for funds.
This goes to show that higher funding does not correlate to higher quality in education.
This should be one of the biggest stories in America. These incompetent criminals have to held accountable immediately!!!!
And not a single teacher interviewed....
..or if they were, it wasn't shown
I'm sure they're not allowed to speak with the media and sign a NDA.
This is just the tip of the iceberg. The same problem is occurring in many other cities across America.
Schools only get away with being this corrupt because parents have completely neglected their duties and responsibilities as their childrens' first teachers. If parents were informed, involved in their childrens' education, and actually did their jobs this would never even be possible. Parents who are informed and involved put pressure on the schools to do and give better
The collapse of the family unit has led to them leasing them out to the state, which is of course run by people that seem them as transactional funding
They don’t want to deal with the bad ass students
👏🏾👏🏾👏🏾
She failed her child.... period. How do you not be engaged all of this time. The father failed him too for not being present or engaged 😮
Thank you.
For her to take credit for his success and say “WE DID IT” but didn’t own up to also causing him to fail and just said the school did that. Wow
Shifting the blame from the school to the hardworking single mom who does three jobs and support many kids shows profoundly poor judgement.
For some who work for the school and somehow benefited from the taxpayers money at the expense of the students who are deliberately "set-for-failure" students, this crisis is normal... And, they keep blaming the victims_the parents & the kids.
I’m actually at a loss for words.
But if you did speak words, you'd sound like Jaime Kennedy (:
@@C_mao Don’t be hating! 😂
So let's fix this. Enough blame has been passed around. Parents and teachers have failed these kids. What can we do to prevent this from happening/continuing?
Nothing there’s no solution 4 these urbanites
Vote in a Democratic government. That will improve things in Baltimore. The Republicans are failing Baltimore.
@@SpoofedTVadmin Baltimore is run by the Democratic party already, at both state(Maryland) and county levels.
@@stephengouws1159 exactly, but people keep voting democrat. Therefore, vote democrat if you want things to get better.
The parents of these kids usually live in poverty or are single parent and struggle to discipline their kids.
The school failed to care about the kids' grades and just moved them to the next level.
The kids are procrastinating and not attending school because there are no consequences.
I mostly feel bad for the teachers as they are the helpless ones who can't change anything.
Poverty, lack of parenting, useless school, lazy kids
I think it's poverty and single mothers
I feel bad for the kids, really, when everyone is slacking around you, what's the futher for me?
This journalist is something else he does his job well!!!!
Atlanta school district was embroiled in a test cheating scandal. Many administrators were arrested. One assistant principal wasn’t charged. Sumter SC school district hired him as superintendent and he didn’t last a year. SC law enforcement agency was keeping advanced copies of standardized test materials under lock and key.
These people need to be criminally charged.
Correct the parent neglected her son
It's sad not only because the money is exchanged dishonestly, but children in school aren't learning the basics of math & reading. Therefore, the stolen money hasn't helped anyone, except line the pockets of thrives & keep the people who are supposed to control this student count & payment wrongfully employed.
“Educator’s” from the top to the bottom. That’s who’s at fault!!
I was definitely someone who judged this mother and young man when this story first broke out because I have children in Baltimore City schools and I know how awful and corrupt this school system is and how much every parent has to be involved for their children to have any kind of success. However, after hearing this report of how this young man and his mother turned things around for THEMSELVES. I want to commend them for their determination, preservation and hardwork. Don't let this awful city that I once loved chew you up and spit you out. You are too good for that, everyone is, no one deserves this. Show them your strength and power by succeeding when they thought they could tear you down.
A house without books is like a room without windows. HENRY W BEECHER
The parent has some blame with failing the child.
How do you put so much of the blame on the school when he had so many absences, struggled to read/write, NEVER asking for a report card, progress report, etc,.?
I can't help but wonder which university he would've been going to if she had been as attentive since his education started?
Instead, he's tried to catch up on every grade in 1 year and if he decides to further his education he's really going to struggle.
Her child couldn't read *at 11 years old.* I have four and they read before Kindergarten. It was something taught *at home.* Schools really don't teach children to read.
That's like asking the school to teach them to talk.
You don’t know what you don’t know. Read the book “a framework for understanding poverty” by Ruby K. Payne. It’s for educators, employers, policymakers, and service providers. However, it’s a great read for everyone and it’ll help to understand situations like this. Additionally, some people will try take advantage of you if you are not knowledgeable. The school is no better.
Thank God I went to a decent school and had strict parents
What do you consider strict?
The big issue is that teachers are forced to assign a minimum grade of 50% even if they never turned in their work. And "passing" means he just broke the threshold of 60% which is absurd. So seeing all the grades at 50% shows the real issue. How he got pushed to the next class is beyond me.
Passing is 70% not 60%
Ghost students and ghost classes. So where is the money allocated for students going?
Single mothers asking for help instead of taking accountability. It’s not poverty it’s the culture.
They have no culture
Why do men keep creating single mothers and not helping them if they are a problem? Oh that’s right, their outside shooting each other & gang banging instead of leading their communities.
@@Lateralus1007 Instead of blaming the single mothers, blame the fathers for abandoning their kids.
@@kokoniqueful No pun intended, Please refer to the Social Programs that Linden B. Johnson administered and Please pay close attention to the effects it had on the average family that took the help the Government offered as well as the stipulations attached to that help. Afterward you might want to take a quick look at The Women's Liberation Movement (late 60's-early 80's) and pay close attention to who funded it and why. These two changes put in place what is being witnessed today with what "was one a Family structure" and it didn't only damage People of Color.
It's the new American culture & it's happening to rural, suburban, & inner city youths. What happened to parenting?
Why didn't his parents contact the school?
More than $15,000 per student and teachers are still having to buy their own school supplies.
And it’s certainly not going into the teachers paychecks.
Where is the money going?
if they paid me 15k per child personally I would do my best to find their skill and talent as well..
I hate how the mother doesn't take accountability for her role in her child failing.
So sad. This is why education is number 1 at my house. It’s literally the collective goal of our family. My daughter has always been at private school. Since she was in pre-k3 and is now a sophomore. And let me tell you it’s a real struggle. I drive an old car, use coupons, work a night shift and a side hustle and moved to cheaper city and now commute all to make it work. We also do scholarships and grants. Those parents with money that don’t jump through hoops to be able to afford for their child to go there like I do, they’re so involved. I’m talking about tutors, SAT prep on another level, the school is ultra involved too. Lots of mandatory things like community service hours, college entrance workshops, etc all geared towards to getting a head start. They do career exploration, so many things that I have never heard about in public schools. Collectively their students get millions in scholarships for college every year. Which is crazy because so many of them don’t even need it. I know it’s not an option for all, which is why I am so grateful to be able to provide that for her even if it is an incredibly difficult thing to keep up.
So many crooks!
Look ..I took my grandson out of bmore schools and am homeschooling him with the " Power homeschool "... left at 10th grade in January and will complete 11th grade by his 16th birthday... harder curriculum and focused education.... the school system should try this program and start each child 2 grades back and bring them up....
What needs to happen is all the officials need to be investigated for fraud. They accepted money and you have more than half of the class with the GPA at or about 0.13
Do you realize the intricacy that goes along with the scan? Teachers come and go principles come and go HR come and go who keeps track of this ghost students that have been on the roster for more than 4 years? Someone that has never left Or benefits greatly Continues this practice
This is the most real comment I've read in this thread. You see what's really going on!! Enrolled kids = funding for the school $$$
Straight up- if the kids didn’t exist- where did the money go?
Damn. Education is the cornerstone of a functioning community. When you fail the kids…. You fail the communities’ future.
I blame the parents…. And the community leadership.
0.14 GPA!!! Get- r-done! Congrats to the student and the lucky mother!
How can a student fail classes for 3 years? If I were a high school student, I would know what my schedule is, and I would know if I got a report card that had failed classes that I wasn't enrolled in, and I would see that something is wrong. Why did this high school let this stuff happen?
wait a minute what is the mother's role in all of this? Whenever i got home my dad would ask to see my schoolwork and check it. If there were any mistakes or it was sloppy he'd tell me to redo that part. There was no room to blame the teachers in the house i grew up, if i was sleeping or not paying attention in class the teachers let my parents now and my parents would talk with me. It's as simple as that. The parents need to be held accountable as well, it takes a village to raise a child and the parents are the centerpiece of that
Thank you!
Same for me! My mom and dad weren’t together anymore by the time I was in elementary school but both of them always checked my schoolwork and made me redo it if it was wrong or sloppy! They weren’t having it at all!!!
It’s the School systems fault 100% for passing this student along from one year to the next! No getting around that. This woman should sue the school system and the Student should sue the day he turns 18!
I’m a Conservative. Public Education is a clown show.
The problem is obvious, the school lacks diversity.
Are there any truancy officers? If so, what are they doing about this issue?
Truancy was eliminated in most schools during covid and they have not brought it back yet. We desperately need it, it’s getting ridiculous I have one student I’ve seen 3 times this year! Its almost APRIL!
What are the parents doing?
@@Augfordpdoggieparents are helpless or too absent to bother with kids
why is this not a bigger story? Well the student ( Christopher)in question at least can be proud of himself,and his mother.
That mom is part of the problem. My God, can no one take accountability anymore?
Just further prove that the BC is done. We are failures. We are the laughingstock of the world.
Want to know how it happened? No pun intended, Please refer to the Social Programs that Linden B. Johnson administered and Please pay close attention to the effects it had on the average family that took the help the Government offered as well as the stipulations attached to that help. Afterward you might want to take a quick look at The Women's Liberation Movement (late 60's-early 80's) and pay close attention to who funded it and why. These two changes put in place what is being witnessed today with what "was one a Family structure" and it didn't only damage People of Color.
BILLIONS of dollars have been given to help the BC and nothing ever changes.
The culture has to start valuing education as a way out and not just sports or as a rapper.
Don’t you dare to talk like this! You are not failures! Man up! Woman up! Go back to Jesus! Children deserves both parents! Children deserve loving parents, parents who spend time with them. No human being is failure on its own. Wake up and do something about it! But you have to do it NOW! I’m praying for you and for myself. God help us!
All i hear from the community is everyone is to blame. But no self responsibility, no self integrity. I thought this community said it takes a village! But when the whole village is corrupt what do you expect?!
Sounds like precision scheduling
Baltimore City needs a tracking program similar to the Baltimore City Dept of Social Services that give alerts to students who are not present in school. These children are jailed, unlawfully staying home, moved out of state, homeless or have other issues that need to be legally addressed, abused, dead, etc. A system needs to be in place.
Unfortunately the school is just gonna adjust the attendance to make it like those students are present 😑😑🫢
This is a story about four people named Everybody, Somebody, Anybody and Nobody. There was an important job to be done and Everybody was sure that Somebody would do it. Anybody could have done it, but Nobody did it. Somebody got angry about that, because it was Everybody’s job. Everybody thought Anybody could do it, but Nobody realized that Everybody wouldn’t do it. It ended up that Everybody blamed Somebody when Nobody did what Anybody could have.
-black ppl in general
👏🏿👏🏿👏🏿👏🏿
Very true and as a black woman it pains me to admit that.
That’s strange I just looked up Asian Baltimore public school stats , they’re doing pretty good and have been for a while.
Look at whos running your educational department 🤣🤣🥸
where are the fathers? 😶🌫
18:49
So, in the most dangerous city, a student with a gpa of 0.13 went to a mentoring school and scored As, Bs. What they dint say is what courses was he taking??
Please remember this anytime someone just calls for the government to solve all of their problems
They don't care. They care about their voters farms
And you're trying to end them
This makes me wonder whose pockets are being lined during this error.
Start at the school board on down to the principal.
@@NotfromDetroit Wrong…starts with the teacher’s union. They’re the biggest criminals in this whole situation. Don’t get me wrong, there’s enough blame to go around, but like I said, if you follow the paper trail it’ll lead you right back to the teacher’s union…CROOKS!
@@TBonesgirl We can go even further and blame the school board.
The school sent report cards but they didn’t send someone to tell the parents to read them, or to read it for them.
To this mother: your kid's education isn't something you put on auto-pilot. It's not nursery school. And, you failed your child if he is incarcerated.
That's what's wrong with us now we don't speak up or speak out or when we do its some ignorant mess. Keep fighting for what's right & your kids future
Yay Democrats!!
Our fellow Americans in Baltimore have NO ONE TO BLAME BUT THEMSELVES.
..and the Republicans are just as bad, and many times they are worse
There is no solution. Sorry! I wish good fortune for any families who can move out of these cities/areas.
Department of Education places money on enrollment which causes part of the problem.
Corruption ... there is NO DOU T these just need to do some serious forensic accounting! But truthfully if you're child does not now basic skills .. that is the parents fsilt!
Where is the outcry and where is the oversight from the district office and the school board . How could students be missing classes needed for graduation. They need to hold these leaders accountable.
Also, parents have to become more aware of what's going on in these schools. They need to be more involved.
We need to stop hiring people based on emotions. I'm nauseous just listening to the CEO.
What will happen to these children?
Not all the teachers are to blame. This isn’t just a Baltimore problem!This is nationwide I live in Texas and I know some teachers who say they aren’t allowed to fail students because they don’t do the work or don’t show up just get them out of here we don’t care what happens to them once they’re gone
The parents of the underprivileged students gives a crap of what their kids are doing in school as long as the kids wash their hands before Sunday dinner
Who's in charge of tracking this? Whoever it is they should be fired.
the parents
@@C_maoEXACTLY! 👏🏾👏🏾👏🏾 Time to stop farming out a job that PARENTS should be doing.
How did this happen for so long w/o parents fighting back? To have kids who can't read or do simple math? How did that one kid get to his senior year passing only 3 classes? Is the machine so powerful that parents didn't dare to complain or were any threatened? Why is Baltimore paying the school CEO over 444k a year? It's just a complete failure & the kids are paying the price. People need to get behind vouchers for school choice. The city has had more than enough time to fix problems. Now give the parents & kids a chance!
This is a MAJOR issue. They are not educating our kids and this is not okay. All these kids are not given the proper education to take care of themselves. They need on outside independent company to monitor them. At this point they we’ll need to take unconventional measures to do right by the kids.
Our kids? Hell nah
Thank you for this documentary.
2 problems here are the culture and the incentives facing political institutions rather than private, capitalist institutions.
IRS and Census data show that during the first half of the twentieth century, black Americans had lower rates of homicides, fatherlessness, venereal diseases, teenage pregnancy, and general rates of crime. This happened when the supposed causes of the social pathologies, legacy of slavery, legacy of Jim Crow, redlining, etc. were WORSE in that time period. When the welfare state and the accompanying vision was established, the socioeconomic conditions were RAISED and yet the social pathologies also raised.
This would not happen in a private/capitalist system. Simply put, the fact that the owner is legally entitled to the debt they accrue forces the owners to change course and actually provide people what they want. Government has no competition and faces none of the punishments for using scarce resources optimally because it’s all covered by the infinite pool that is the tax payer
It is nice to see some investigative reporting from such a Blue City.
He should just get a GED…only a few months of study needed
Malcolm X said it best. Only a fool trusts his enemy to teach his children
But go ahead and keep voting for these criminals.
Teachers are supposed to teach students but not be their students parents..And parents need to parent they laid down and had the kids
My question is where did the money go , who’s pocket did it go into, these people are their to represent the money ,,,,,Got it ,
Is there an update video?
This been going on for years I get project Baltimore saying they broke this story but they had a whole episode about this on a Wire😂😂 where they basically hired some dudes to go round up a couple of students the bring them to school so they can get counted for the day to pad their numbers so they can get more funding it's almost the same exact story😂😂
Yep!! Everything Fox said they broke the story I’m like wait I think I seen this before … THEN I remembered this show called “The Wire” 😂😂😩And trust the school issue isn’t the ONLY issue in the city that we saw on The Wire🤷🏻♀️🫢😶
They should consider changing the name of that school. Angela Fells is failing the kids.
Get the well known rappers to teach the schools
10:40 um thats almost litterly every school in the usa,
no cooking skills, no tax skills, no wood working skill, no repair skills, no nothing skills,
Check your local public arrest record of kids that wher booked into detention during school yesrs , they probly sitting in prison victimized not even know about this story
In Baltimore the mayor is a Democrat. The city council president is a Democrat. 10 of the 14 city council members are black. The city council members are all Democrats.
The police commissioner is is appointed by city leadership. Baltimore's AG is a Democrat.
The issues in Baltimore are not due to racism. The issues are due to culture. They are also the fault of the Democratic Party.
The last Republican mayor of Baltimore left office in 1968.
The failure of public education shows that transparency is long overdue. Cameras are a good idea for police officers, so why not for the classroom?
Until these parents take accountability of THEIR children, its not going to improve 😑 😒. Parenting can be exhausting 😴 but YOUR child is worth YOUR interest, investment, and energy. IJS 🤦🏾♀️🤷🏾♀️
My mother had a nephew who was extremely hard of hearing. When he was very young, the doctors told his mother that he was retarded. My father said, "That's BS. You look into his eyes. He is not retarded. Daddy made a quick noise behind him, and no reaction. He said, "He can't hear." The boy grew up to become an electrical engineer.
You go mama and Chris! Good job!
If I was a college admissions officer and I see that an applicant is from this school/district, I would have second thoughts about accepting them because of the school's (and district's) history of passing students on through and ghost students.
The real question is, with all that extra funding, how are they failing?
They played the “Keep them on the Books to keep the Funding up” game. A practice in which many Agencies have adopted.🎓
🚨🚨🚨🚨🚨🚨🚨
“We’re creating a Large Number of SOCIAL MISFITS in the Inner City which will Prey on the larger community later on.”
🚨🚨🚨🚨🚨🚨🚨
-1986 Special Report - The Vanishing Black Family
-1986 SPECIAL REPORT: "THE VANISHING BLACK FAMILY ROUNDTABLE DISCUSSION"
🎖
I feel a DRAFT coming on!
🤪
WOOP WOOP dey it is🎤
🎖
Baltimore City Public Schools Must Be Taken Over By The State of Maryland ASAP
WOW!!
Baltimore voters elected that governor and that mayor. You get what you vote for!!
I never liked the use of the word PROJECT when it comes to our ppl. This is not ironic. I would say that it seems purposeful.
I felt terribly for the mother amd her son. She was working 3 jobs and doing her best. She thought her son was fine at his previous HS because she wasn't told otherwise. She and her son have done very well. I wish them the absolute best as her son enters college. So much to celebrate now ❤
I don't. That's her fault. As a parent, your kids education is your responsibility before the school's. If you aren't aware your child has been absent for over 250 times in 4 years that's on you!
So has anyone been charged?
Not one person.
@@NotfromDetroit Unbelievable!
@@gregjames9875 And the cycle continues! Did you see how much money the director of the schools make? $445k!!!!!
@@NotfromDetroit No one who works for a nonprofit, should make over $150,000/year.
I love that Mismanaged of student activities fund instead theft, all in the wording.
Why cant your don do anything to help himself? Why everybody have to help him?