Paying students paying parents

WRT the plan in DC to pay middle school students for school... ("D.C. Tries Cash as a Motivator In School" from the Post).

1. I say, switch the high school program to a cooperative education program, at least for some, with internships-jobs that aren't make work like the DC Summer Youth Employment Program is.

2. CNN reports how rather than pay students, a program in a school district in Iowa focuses on parents.

"Our parents are disconnected. They're disconnected from a system that doesn't respect them," says Wiley. "They're disconnected from a system they don't have a positive relationship with, so we've got to reconnect our parents."

Wiley's program, the Education Brain Trust, runs daylong seminars that show parents how to work with teachers, help with homework and support their kids. Parents are given a T-shirt, a tote bag, food and provided with on-site babysitting.

The parents are required to sign a commitment letter agreeing to have at least four positive experiences in their child's classroom, including attending parent-teacher conferences and supervising an hour of homework a night.

Given the reality that a big part of the failure of student performance in DC Schools is family-based, it makes more sense to focus there.