Posted on 03/15/2011 12:51:41 PM PDT by IbJensen
The U.S. Department of Education does not serve any clear purpose. The Constitution leaves education to state governments as a residual power. In our history, that did not mean states had to provide education to children at taxpayer expense, although that was the rule throughout the states, at least to a certain age.
Only very gradually did the policy of mandatory education spread across the nation, and during those decades in the latter part of the 19th century when education through public grade school became compulsory, it was recognized that parents had the right to to choose instead to educate their children at home, or in private or religious schools. Religious education has always been a crucial part of the education of the young. Learning in the Middle Ages was preserved through clerics — members of religious orders, which we have come think of as the “clerks” of today. Universities in Europe were all religious. The first people to have universal male literacy were the Jews, and the reason had little to do with secular learning. All Jewish boys were expected to be able to read the Torah. The first nation on earth that had universal literacy for boys and girls and for rich and poor was Scotland, and the reason was utterly theological: Scottish Calvinists believed it was a sacred duty to teach all children to read the Bible. Although the responsibility for that teaching fell upon the community, it fell primarily upon the churches.
The idea of having the federal government stick its nose into the education of America's children is relatively new. It would surprise many chic collectivists to know what group was one of the earliest proponents of: (1) mandatory public, rather than private, education; (2) standardized education for these children; and (3) a federal Department of Education. Who demanded that in the 1920s? The Ku Klux Klan did. The homogenization of American life, particularly the closing of parochial schools and yeshivas, was near and dear to the heart of the Klan.
Education during a great deal of America's early history was always a way for people to keep the values of their children a matter of home and community, not government — and especially not the federal government. But for many years now the U.S. Department of Education has been relentlessly pushing for more control over the lives of American citizens, through control of the education of their children. And that control has recently reached a dangerous point with Secretary of Education Arne Duncan. Title I funding was used by many school systems to avoid reduction over the last few years. Now Secretary Duncan, through his “Common Core Curriculum” program, is requiring states to comply with new federal standareds as a condition of continuing to receive these funds. At first the new data required by the Department of Education included innocent-sounding statistics: test scores, demographic characteristics, district size, and so forth.
Now, however, the Orwellian bureaucrats of the Obama Education Department have begun to mine for much more personal information — facts which appears to have no real connection to education, such as eye color, gestation size at birth, hair color, blood type, birth marks, blood test results, and bus arrival times. At the present time it is not mandatory to submit this information, but these are elements of the National Education Data Model, which is itself the standard for the collection and manipulation of education data that the Department of Education will use. Just as troubling, the data sets for this system are already coded: the responses allowed are being defined by the system. That strongly suggests that the mandatory nature of this data collection at the local level for the Department of Education will grow more emphatic over time.
Moreover, some of this data, such as “blood test” results, can be used in biometric databases to identify particular specific individuals out of a national population by drilling down into DNA. The data “pipeline,” as it is called, is not intended simply to follow children through their public school life. Illinois calls it the P-20 Pipeline, and its avowed purpose, as the name suggests, is to track Americans from kindergarten through age 20. The Illinois Longitudinal Data System (ILDS) is intended to be part of a national system to identify suitable workers and employers, as well as educators and community leaders. The notional purpose, to “encourage economic development and high-growth opportunities” — like the names of almost all collectivist programs — sounds fine on paper.
This data collection also appears to be a way for state school systems to circumvent local school boards by “signing on” to the system without the approval of the local boards. If a national curriculum is developed, then the role of state and local school boards in development of standards and areas of instruction would be made irrelevant. The standardization of education for all children in America, a statist’s dream, could become a reality.
The collection of the sort of data which is in the National Education Data Model could also endanger students. Who, besides bureaucrats, might want to know “bus arrival times,” for example? Sexual predators might. Drug dealers might. Most parents would feel very uncomfortable if a stranger began asking them when their children left for school in the morning and when they got home in the afternoon, or what birthmarks they had or what their hair color and eye color were. If the questioning delved into blood test results, many of them might be ready to call the police.
What additional information might seem likely to be requested in the future? How about fingerprints? Automated fingerprint systems are available in nearly every major law enforcement agency in the nation. How about email addresses of students — and of parents? What about retinal scans? This information is collected by indifferent bureaucrats, but who might be able to access this information? How many Republican politicians in Wisconsin, say, would be happy to allow public school administrators to have vast amounts of highly personal information about their children right now? Most parents have heard of certain types of male school teachers who they would hope did not know everything about their daughters, but Fox News has also reported many predatory female teachers who engage in statutory rape with young male students.
There are no databases that cannot be hacked, and this would be particularly true of ones into which hundred of thousands of school staff entered data — and, presumably, accessed information as well. One of the most abiding aspects of personal liberty is personal privacy. Once, parents would look askance at revealing even to a teacher at a religious school the sort of information that federal education bureaucrats now will be demanding as a matter of course.
More and more, it looks as if the federal government is collecting information simply as a source of power.
That's it in a nutshell!
It's a day care and feeding center for the nation's massive underclass benefitting the mind-numbed lazy parents at the expense of the ruination of children.
Defund it.
I would not register a friggin dog in this country, never mind a child.
I think that is why they have basically outlawed midwives.
I say abolish the Department of Education (and the NEA). Let the parents choose. We should also stop financially enabling irresponsible breeding.
All part of community organizing. FUBO!
bttt
Which department of the US Government DOES serve a clear purpose?????
So you are an enemy of our right to freedom of association, eh?
I would defend the Constitution from you.
Thanks! :)
The DOE aand the EPA have been nothing but nests of socialist “change agents” since their inception. They NEED to be abolished- the sooner the better.
I find it not so amazing that the test scores for public school kids have been declining steadily since the DOE opened for business. After all, you can’t make “good socialists out of individuals”, now can you?
One of the tidbits I teach the kids- in Germany Hitler defederalized the German state. He began by creating a national school system.... Centralizing education under federal control is a step towards totalitarianism. The Federal government should have never been allowed to create such an agency, and it should be abolished with haste.
When I was born, 30-odd years ago, in a typical hospital, they took my footprint and my mother's thumbprint, without her knowledge or consent. When my mother was born, some 60-odd years ago, they took the placenta and (I hear tell) customarily did not merely dispose of afterbirth specimens, but kept them for medical research or some such arcane purpose. Wouldn't surprise me if they still do, and now they can mine the DNA.
So when I read that "fingerprints" might be "requested," I can only shake my head in amazement at the naivete.
They have fingerprints. And they don't make requests.
Boehner seems to be a teenage girl.. we need a man with balls and everything..
Since it was a discussion on education, I inferred you meant the National Education Association. With your clarification, my comment no longer stands. :-)
It’s okay, it is like alphabet soup out there.
Ahhh, but it DOES have a purpose: TO FORWARD THE “PROGRESSIVE” AGENDA BY PRODUCING HUNDREDS OF THOUSANDS OF NEW LITTLE SOCIALISTS EVERY YEAR.
Reagan campaigned on a pledge to take it down if elected. He was beaten by the same morons now raising hell in Wisconsin.
D E F U N D I T AND TELL THESE DORKS TO GET REAL JOBS.
GOVERNMENT SCHOOLS THEN AND NOW:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=D0lR1KQq2-U
BTW, FREEDOM HAS AN ADDRESS: IT’S HTTP://WWW.JBS.ORG
In case you failed to make the connection, “The New American” is a publication of the John Birch Society” and this subject is just ONE of the hundreds on which they’ve been ahead of the curve. That explains why the socialists working to “transform” America unleashed their media pit bull lapdogs on the JBS 50 years ago. Folks who laughed at the mere mention of the JBS back then have stopped laughing — or soon will.
Thank the left.
You betcha! And when we have a majority eliminate the entire department, and the bureaucracy. So some people walk, so what. We get this country rolling again by reversing bunches of Leftist crap there’ll be jobs a plenty.
Oh,no! Our schools are ever so different! We live in the suburbs and the schools don’t look at all like those nasty, icky urban schools. We even feed our children, or give them money to buy food. We may be mind-numbed and lazy, but we feed our own. Besides, we like our daycare welfare entitlement ;-)
Like Obozo the nicotene has scrambled his eggs.
ping
How many people Know that we Did Not even Have a Dept. Of Education Before 1979? How the Hell Did the Country Survive?
So we owe dept. of Education to Jummah Carter, Tip O’neill and George Mitchel..
I want to add my vote. Department of Education needs to be defunded and now is the time. They are looking for billions to eliminate and here are some billions not doing anything useful.
Seriously, what is wrong with this congress? They’ve got clear marching orders to cut and cut again, and they seem like they are afraid of their own shadows.
Just compare the products coming out of the Federal schools today with those
who received their education before the DoE was begun. We were far better
educated without the federal regulation.
Thats Right,Abe Ribicoff in Ct.also,My wife worked for one of his Staff Members and was Given a Book Autographed by Him for all his Help on getting this agency Implemented,the whole sordid Story
None. Including the DOD which is headed up by bureaucratic civilians who are hell bent on nation building.
Our porous borders beg for attention. Our cities are being overrun by muslims and their mosques.
One of my unregistered pups bit pooper (a cat) and he got a infected cyst we did not notice.
After paying the vet $150 to shunt the cyst, she informed me that she had notified the town board of health, and I should be prepared for a home inspection to prove that the animal can be quarantined for five weeks (rabies).
Orwell had no clue. These crapeaters micromanage your cats ass.
It is possible that upon inspection I will simply shoot the cat and both my pups in front of my government controller..
Maybe that mf too... depends on my mood at the moment, as I was told it will be a “random” home inspection.
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