Contemporary figures like Marilyn Monroe are given more exposure in many of the textbooks than George Washington. However, these textbooks don't expound on the theory as to how Monroe died and who did the killing.
Our schools are official atheist institutions. Why a country that inherently mistrusts government allows it to unconstitutionally run the public school system boggles the mind. Everything the schools were established to teach, i.e., religious and moral values, patriotism and love of country (Americanism), and the basic courses to use the knowledge imparted throughout one's life, no longer apply. Now it's all about music, sex and football which won't get one very far.
bttt
If you cut all public funding for schools tomorrow, students who want to be educated along with their parents help, will find a way.
If you increased public school funding a thousand-fold tomorrow, students who don’t want an education, still won’t get one.
Unless you're planning a career as a historian, learning any language other than your own decently is way the hell too much work for anybody to want to be learning DEAD ones.
I wish I could truly believe this assertion, but I have my doubts.
School is more than a place to get an education, it's what you do. It's the place where you put the kids, out of your way. It's expected; it's done for you.
If parents have to do the research to find the "best" school (by whatever criteria), will they do it? Or will they go along with the neighbor's choice (who went along with their neighbor's choice) because it's easy?
Like I said, I wish I could believe that everybody would search for themselves, but I have a hard time believing it.
The author falsely assumes that many parents care about thier kids. This is demonstrably false.
You can look at any minority school you like - try to find a parent who bothers to attend PTA, bothers to help their child do homework, can be bothered to care if their precious little baby even attends classes.
Look at the drop-out rates of minority children. Here's a hint. If a parent cares, if a parent is involved in the SLIGHTEST - dropping out of school is simply never an option.
I submit that we would, within a single generation - have 3rd world illiteracy, and the parasites would have an ever greater stranglehold upon the achievers. Why? Because now the parasites won't be able to read/write and this will be yet another example of 'The man holding the (insert race of choice) down'.
The pitiful truth of this situation is that America DID indeed have the perfect school system. Think back to the 1920’s, 30’s, 40’s, 50’s, to the OLDE DAYES. No educators, just teachers. No theories, just learning. No “building of self esteem”, just STUDY or else. Some students picked for an accelerated, more intensive course of studies. Some given an easier, less intense course, all geared to actual abilities.
How many of today’s brightest could pass a 1948 high school final exam. School then had 1 teacher per classroom, 25 or 30 students, one principal, a janitor and the students learned. Without computers, they used their brains. No calculators..just brains. No spell check..brains again. Students could fill in the names of our states on blank maps (fifth grade). Then fill in “most” of the countries names on a blank map of the world (sixth grade).
A WORLD CLASS EDUCATION SYSTEM? Is that your wish. Go back 50 or more years..we had it and screwed it up royally.
ping
OUTSTANDING essay. Thanks for posting.
I otta write a book about what(and/or who) killed one-room country schools in the Mid-West. Anyone what to bet that the filthy hands of educrats are all over this one?!
Public Education = Child Abuse
If you want to cripple your child intellectually and warp them emotionally, send them to a public school.
With the e-books / digital media, Internet and telecommuting, you could significantly cut the cost of education (the number of schools and classes would not need to be occupied daily by the same number of students) and therefore, the cost and the gas spent for student transportation (by parents or busing) could make the case for “environmentally friendly” schools, as well as freeing and saving the time for parents preparing and/or dropping children off at schools before going to work... There is potential for tremendously “green” cost and time savings...
Add to that the individual pace of studies instead of going to the “slowest common denominator” in the class...
Also, even if states and/or cities accept / demand that the “government” (the taxpayers) should pay for the primary education, it doesn’t mean that the government has to run the education system - vouchers would be much better and much cheaper and more competitive way of financing primary education. Just like because government issues food stamps doesn’t mean it should run grocery stores.
Fund kids, not schools.
I agree with the author’s principle, that education should be private. Private pay, or private charity. His predictions of the outcome of that situation are arguable, of course, but a person would have to try very hard to persuade me that *any* possible outcome of fully privatizing education would be worse for the country than what we have now.
The so-called "progressive" movement brought about the promotion of other ideas which are counterfeit and lead to tyranny. Their propagandizing the citizenry through the "government" schools has created the constitutional illiteracy which brought us the Congress and Administration of the past two years.
"Although all men are born free, slavery has been the general lot of the human race. Ignorant - they have been cheated; asleep - they have been surprised; divided - the yoke has been forced upon them. But what is the lesson? ...the people ought to be enlightened, to be awakened, to be united, that after establishing a government they should watch over it.... It is universally admitted that a well-instructed people alone can be permanently free." James Madison America's Constitution is the means by which knowledgeable and free people, capable of self-government, can bind and control their elected representatives in government. In order to remain free, the Founders said, the people themselves must clearly understand the ideas and principles upon which their Constitutional government is based. Through such understanding, they will be able to prevent those in power from eroding their Constitutional protections. The Founders established schools and seminaries for the distinct purpose of instilling in youth the lessons of history and the ideas of liberty. And, in their day, they were successful. Tocqueville, eminent French jurist, traveled America and in his 1830's work, DEMOCRACY IN AMERICA, wrote:
On the frontier, he noted that "...no sort of comparison can be drawn between the pioneer and the dwelling that shelters him.... He wears the dress and speaks the language of the cities; he is acquainted with the past, curious about the future, and ready for argument about the present.... I do not think that so much intellectual activity exists in the most enlightened and populous districts of France' " He continued, "It cannot be doubted that in the United States the instruction of the people powerfully contributes to the support of the democratic republic; and such must always be the case...where the instruction which enlightens the understanding is not separated from the moral education.." Possessing a clear understanding of the failure of previous civilizations to achieve and sustain freedom for individuals, our forefathers discovered some timeless truths about human nature, the struggle for individual liberty, the human tendency toward abuse of power, and the means for curbing that tendency through Constitutional self-government. Jefferson's Bill For The More General Diffusion Of Knowledge For Virginia declared:
Education was not perceived by the Founders to be a mere process for teaching basic skills. It was much, much more. Education included the very process by which the people of America would understand and be able to preserve their liberty and secure their Creator-endowed rights. Understanding the nature and origin of their rights and the means of preserving them, the people would be capable of self government, for they would recognize any threats to liberty and "nip the shoots of arbitrary power in the bud." (Adams)
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The children of dedicated parents would receive a first class education, and would go on to adulthood to incredible success.
Millions of children of uncaring parents would no longer attend any type of school at all, and would stay home with Mom and the TV (babysitter)
Millions of children of mediocre parents would recieve a very mediocre and spotty education and would eventually enter the work-force at the earlier possible opportunity.
So, at the best case scenario, about 15% of the children would be well educated, maybe another 15% with a sub-standard education, but passable, 15% with the most possible base literacy (think ability to recognize name, environmental print) with the remainder 100% illiterate. Worked into the latter would be a small percentage of children who, altough illiterate, woudl still have marketable skills, so their literacy wouldn't be quite as damming.
First downside? At 18 all of the above are able to vote - think they are going to vote for less government and lower taxes? Nope, not a chance. Second downside? Over half of the population with no marketable skills, living on the government dime. In two generations, we'd see the result.
Bread and circuses...bread and circuses.
All well and good. Except a bit more unlikely than revoking Medicare. Ain’t gonna happen.
Too many people think of education as a “right” to which all (even the willingly ignorant) must have “equal” access.