One Man's Boredom with Retirement and Vision for What School Could Be

Unfortunately, this story out of the LA Times doesn't take place in the U.S.

It's in Mexico, where a retired marketing executive decided he was bored with golf, and started looking around for something to do. But after talking with his friends and neighbors in Puerto Vallarta, David Bender grew increasingly disturbed over the lousy education he was seeing the kids around him receive. If their parents were not rich, the kids didn't receive the challenging studies and more importantly, the English skills they needed to get the best jobs.

So Bender decided to do something about it, and with little more than an idea, started a non-profit school that now has 1,100 pupils, and a waiting list.

There's a couple of passages that I'd like to highlight. One is that kids, if told the stakes, will meet the expectations, including learning the English language. (And don't think I agree with Newt. I think he's an idiot.)

Jose Rodolfo helps out by collecting cans to earn recycling money. Fidgeting in a chair in the family's tidy home on a recent afternoon, he was too shy to practice his English with an American visitor. But the serious, handsome child knows what's at stake. "That's how you get a good job," he said softly in Spanish.

Actually, I was thinking more in the math/science mode, that ELL kids. But still, if you set the bar and stick to it, students invariably will match and meet your expectations.