Free Republic

It’s sad but true. Nearly 50% of high school seniors know the names of The Three Stooges (Larry, Moe and Curly) but can’t name the three branches of government. And fully one-third of students asked for the origin of the statement “From each according to his ability, to each according to his need,” responded that this came from the Bill of Rights when it actually came from The Communist Manifesto. So says Dr. Walter Williams, the eminent free market economist and higher education critic, who explained in a recent column at Townhall.com that examples like this are a testament to...

The teachers’ union representing the Douglas County school system has lost one-quarter of its membership since last year, signaling a growing frustration within the ranks that dues are used to finance politics instead of professional development. The significant drop in membership of the Douglas County Federation (DCF) was revealed in a July 21 letter from the board of education to Courtney Smith, union president, and was based on the union’s most recently released tax returns. The letter pointed to the drop in membership as undeniable proof that teachers had chosen the district over the union and the need for major...

Teachers unions are struggling to protect their political clout, but as the midterm elections approach, they’re fighting back with their most popular asset: the teachers themselves. Backed by tens of millions in cash and new data mining tools that let them personalize pitches to voters, the unions are sending armies of educators to run a huge get-out-the-vote effort aimed at reversing the red tide that swept Republicans into power across the country in 2010. The unions have plenty of money: They spent $69 million on state races in 2010 and are likely to top that this year. But as they...

Half a Billion Dollars. That’s how much the California Teachers Association and the powerful Service Employees International Union have spent on California politics since 2000. The unions’ return on that “investment”? A legislature totally beholden to them for political support and campaign contributions. Here’s another mind-boggling number: Half a Trillion Dollars. That’s an estimate of the unfunded public pension liabilities racked up by California’s state and municipal governments due to overly generous pay and defined benefit pension plans lavished on unionized government employees. If you thought the bankruptcies of Stockton, San Bernardino, and Vallejo were entertaining, break out the popcorn...

the state’s ability-to-function-in-a-modern-economy rate among graduates hovers at a dismal 37 percent. That is, according to the state Department of Education, only 37 of every 100 students who entered high school in 2009, and stayed long enough to graduate, learned enough by last June to do college-level academic work — or to enter the workforce in any meaningful way. And in New York City, the ratio was one in four. So let’s cut to the chase: If 75 percent of New York high-school seniors get diplomas, but only 37 percent are academically or economically functional ... Per-student spending — just...

A Los Angeles Superior Court judge ruled Tuesday that teacher tenure laws deprive students of their constitutional right to an education, a decision that hands teachers’ unions a major defeat in a landmark case that overturns several California laws that govern the way teachers are hired and fired. “Substantial evidence presented makes it clear to this court that the challenged statutes disproportionately affect poor and/or minority students,” Judge Rolf M. Treu wrote in the ruling. “The evidence is compelling. Indeed, it shocks the conscience.” The ruling, which declared the laws governing how teachers are hired and fired in California to...

Reaction from policy makers, lawmakers, and education activists to a Los Angeles judge's ruling Tuesday that five California laws governing teacher tenure, layoffs and dismissals are unconstitutional because they infringe on the right of all students to a quality public education: "It's surprising that the court, which used its bully pulpit when it came to criticizing teacher protections, did not spend one second discussing funding inequities, school segregation, high poverty or any other out-of-school or in-school factors that are proven to affect student achievement and our children." — American Federation of Teachers President Randi Weingarten. "Let's be clear: This lawsuit...

The Democracy Alliance, a top-secret collective of ultra-rich left-wing political donors, has a new member — Randi Weingarten, who heads the labor union that represented Douglas County teachers until two years ago when the district went union-free. ... Weingarten is president of the American Federation of Teachers (AFT), an arm of the AFL-CIO whose affiliates include the Douglas County Federation. ... Ben DeGrow, Independence Institute senior education policy analyst, said Weingarten’s joining the Democracy Alliance shows that the union is using dues collected from teachers to pursue an extreme political agenda. ... Unlike other school districts, Douglas County no longer...

It is not easy to demonize people who have spent hundreds of millions of dollars of their own money to help educate poor children. But some members of the education establishment are taking a shot at it. The Walton Family Foundation — created by the people who created Walmart — has given more than $300 million to charter schools, voucher programs and other educational enterprises concerned with the education of poor and minority students across the country. The Walton Family Foundation gave more than $58 million to the KIPP schools, which have had spectacular success in raising the test scores...

Of all the cynical frauds of the Obama administration, few are so despicable as sacrificing the education of poor and minority children to the interests of the teachers' unions. Attorney General Eric Holder's attempt to suppress the spread of charter schools in Louisiana was just one of the signs of that cynicism. His nationwide threats of legal action against schools that discipline more black students than he thinks they should are at least as damaging. Charter schools are hated by teachers' unions and by much of the educational establishment in general. They seem to be especially hated when they succeed...

If anyone wanted to pick a time and place where the political left's avowed concern for minorities was definitively exposed as a fraud, it would be now — and the place would be New York City, where far left Mayor Bill de Blasio has launched an attack on charter schools, cutting their funding, among other things. These schools have given thousands of low income minority children their only shot at a decent education, which often means their only shot at a decent life. Last year 82 percent of the students at a charter school called Success Academy passed city-wide mathematics...

7 elementary school staff hire lawyers Fallsburg police investigating the reported discovery of heroin and drug paraphernalia in a faculty bathroom at Benjamin Cosor Elementary School say the refusal by a group of teachers to cooperate is hampering their probe. No one has been charged, but six teachers and an aide were identified as having used the men's room before a school staff member reportedly found a heroin baggie on Feb. 11. Just before the winter break in December, heroin and needles were reportedly found in the same bathroom. Each of the seven faculty members initially agreed to give urine...

It seems that the unions had good reason to fear Scott Walker. In news that is unlikely to receive wide play in the legacy media, it appears that a number of Wisconsin unions failed to achieve recertification as a result of year-end member votes. The recertification votes were a consequence of Act 10, the epoch-making collective-bargain reforms pushed through by Walker in the face of mass demonstrations, vandalism, death threats, and all but open rebellion by unions in 2011. One of act's provisions was that public-sector unions must be annually recertified by a positive vote of at least half their...

Numbers of public sector unions in Wisconsin collapsed in the wake of an historic vote that ended on Thursday. The unions are acutely feeling the impact of Act 10, Governor Scott Walker’s controversy-generating collective bargaining reforms of 2011. The reforms require public sector unions to hold annual recertification votes. In order to be certified as unions by the state, the labor groups must get the approval of over 50% of their members. For several weeks now the Wisconsin Employment Relations Commission has been holding an open and ongoing vote for over 400 unions, mostly made up of public school teachers...

Voters slammed on the brakes last week, rejecting Amendment 66, a $1 billion across-the-board income tax hike, and three heavily-subsidized union school board candidates. Instead, voters gave reform candidates the green light. Jeffco voters elected three conservative school board candidates Julie Williams, John Newkirk and Ken Witt – all of whom opposed Amendment 66. Williams, Newkirk and Witt, who campaigned as the “WNW” ticket, will now hold a majority on the five-member school board that includes union-cozy incumbents Lesley Dahlkemper and Jill Fellman, whose terms end in 2015. The new trio is expected to take office on Nov. 21. Forty-eight...

CASTLE ROCK – A candidate for Douglas County School Board is under fire for protecting a union teacher convicted of assaulting a student after the same teacher assaulted another student four years later When Bill Hodges was the Assistant Superintendent of Human Resources for Douglas County Schools in 2002, teacher Todd Bennethum at Mountain Vista High School was arrested for child abuse and eventually convicted of assault after he struck a student softball player. Four years later, after being transferred to a different school, Bennethum struck a student in his class at ThunderRidge High School and was again charged with...

Noted American terrorist and left-wing radical Bill Ayers is among the signatories of a letter calling on the United Nations to probe the closing of 49 Chicago elementary schools based on claims that it is causing massive human rights violations. ... In 2009, the Chicago City Council passed a resolution adopting the international body’s Convention on the Rights of the Child, notes WBEZ. The resolution instructed all city agencies to develop policies consistent with it. Kalantry told the public radio station that the nation and the city must now act in accordance with these covenants. ... The Chicago Teachers Union,...

A group of California teachers is preparing for a Supreme Court battle to overturn forced union dues in a groundbreaking lawsuit filed in June. For nearly three decades, the Supreme Court has allowed closed-shop unionism, in which public employees must pay dues to labor groups handling collective bargaining negotiations. The Supreme Court established Beck Rights in 1988 allowing workers to opt out of union dues for political activities, while continuing to pay for union negotiating expenses. The teachers are hoping to take that battle one step further by putting an end to all coercive union dues.

New Jersey’s governor has branded them “political thugs.” A former federal education official has likened them to terrorists. Less vilified in Kansas than some other parts of the country, those teachers unions still find their clout under attack in the Legislature. The battle over teachers unions has marched its way across the country. Ohio. Michigan. Wisconsin. Idaho. And now it’s in Kansas, greeted by Republican Gov. Sam Brownback and his conservative allies in the Legislature. Lawmakers are moving to undercut the tenuous power of teachers unions by barring them from using voluntary paycheck deductions for politics. And they’re going after...

The progressive movement has always portrayed itself as one of "choice." They’re pro-choice when it comes to abortion and believe women should have the choice of a wide array of birth control that someone else pays for. Unfortunately, they stop short when it comes to "school choice." For progressives, there’s a one-size-fits-all approach when it comes to our children’s education. Problems are attributed to inadequate funding as opposed to a fundamental flaw in the foundation of our educational system. The majority of today’s school districts dictate the conditions of education for students and schools, while taxpayers pick up the tab....