Freedom as an Option

by Tammy Drennan

How much do parents really care about the quality of their kids’ schools? To hear activists Leonie Haimson and Julie Woestehoff talk, it seems a lot. Or at least a chunk of them care a lot. And that’s good news, sort of.

“As public school parents and parent advocates, we have grave reservations about the Obama administration’s “blueprint for reform…

“…the parent voice has been missing so far from the national debate on education, and is entirely absent from the top-down, often draconian policies put forward by U.S. Secretary of Education Arne Duncan.

“Secretary Duncan’s approach not only ignores the central role parents should play in their children’s education and lives, but also gives scant attention to the reforms we believe are necessary to improve our schools.” – Haimson and Woestehoff

Sadly, these ladies go on to sound increasingly like official voices for the NEA. We need smaller classes, more money, unfettered tenure, etc.

It’s encouraging to see parents who will put so much energy into their children’s schools, but very disheartening to hear them toe the party line (this party being unions) without really thinking for themselves.

The ultimate solution to our school crisis, and it is a crisis, is parents. Moms and dads who think for themselves, who are confident in their role as parents, who don’t give a hoot what politicians or special interests or self-promoting “experts” have to say about how their children should be reared and educated.

But the parent part is only the first step. The second step is community. Parents cannot do it alone, but they must choose their allies carefully. Any ally touting government as part of the solution is not to be trusted, however sincere. Community means families, friends, neighborhoods, churches, civic groups, businesses and other non-government entities pulling together to create solutions.

It will not be easy at first. It will be a lot of hard work. But once people see they can do it, once they taste the success and see their children thriving and experience the high of defining their own families and futures, there will be no turning back.

Over the course of our history, we started out an intellectually free, self-defining people. Even those who were enslaved, once they were free, started out educating and defining themselves. Then we slipped into slavery. For former slaves, it was a second round of bondage. Now we’re reaping the consequences of living in such abject servitude that we hand over our children to a master who was once our servant.

Have we had enough? Do we have the courage, or even the will, to be free again? To join forces with one another to turn the tide? Does the taste of freedom still linger enough in our culture to tempt us, to remind us how good it was, how good it can be?

One thing is sure: as long as our children are educated in state schools, freedom will erode. Soon it will be a thing of American myth, something that sounds quaint and that our children will believe never really existed.

We can do better than this. We can choose freedom. That’s what we need to help people understand: Freedom is an option. For now.

PJ O’Rourke on Public Schools

A must-read and fun, too.

P. J. O’Rourke has outdone himself in a blistering (and, of course, quite humorous) article in The Weekly Standard on the state of public education and what we should do about it. You won’t want to miss it (thanks, Frances, for the heads up). Here’s the link and some excerpts:

End Them, Don’t Mend Them

Excerpts:

Figures in the Statistical Abstract of the United States show that we are spending $11,749 per pupil per year in the U.S. public schools, grades pre-K through 12….

In March the Cato Institute issued a report on the cost of public schools. Policy analyst Adam Schaeffer made a detailed examination of the budgets of 18 school districts in the five largest U.S. metro areas and the District of Columbia. He found that school districts were understating their per-pupil spending by between 23 and 90 percent. …

Schaeffer calculated that Los Angeles, which claims $19,000 per-pupil spending, actually spends $25,000. The New York metropolitan area admits to a per-pupil average of $18,700, but the true cost is about $26,900. The District of Columbia’s per-pupil outlay is claimed to be $17,542. The real number is an astonishing $28,170—155 percent more than the average tuition at the famously pricey private academies of the capital region.

[Article goes on to cite poor test scores and outcomes]

Enough, however, of outrageous statistics. Let’s generate some pure outrage. Here’s my proposal: Close all the public schools. Send the kids home. Fire the teachers. Sell the buildings. Raze the U.S. Department of Education, leaving not one brick standing upon another and plow the land where it stood with salt.

“Wait a minute,” the earnest liberal says, “we’ve got swell public schools here in Flourishing Heights. The kids take yoga. We just brought in a law school placement coordinator at the junior high. The gym has solar panels on the roof. Our Girls Ultimate Frisbee team is third in the state. The food in the cafeteria is locally grown. And the vending machines dispense carrots and kiwi juice.”

Close them anyway. I’ve got 11,749 reasons. Or, given the Cato report, call it 15,000. Abandon the schools. Gather the kids together in groups of 15.4. Sit them down at your house, or the Moose Lodge, or the VFW Hall or—gasp—a church. Multiply 15.4 by $15,000. That’s $231,000. Subtract a few grand for snacks and cleaning your carpet.

What remains is a pay and benefit package of a quarter of a million dollars. Average 2008 public school classroom teacher salary: $51,391. For a quarter of a million dollars you could hire Aristotle. The kids wouldn’t have band practice, but they’d have Aristotle. (Incidentally this worked for Philip of Macedon. His son did very well.)…

“Don’t kids need to experience the full range of human diversity that public schools provide?” No. And if you don’t understand the process by which modern kids become socialized, you seriously need to update your Facebook page. Also, let the Statistical Abstract tell you something about the diverse experience provided by public schools. During the 2005-2006 school year 78 percent of public schools reported “violent incidents,” more than one in six schools reported “serious violent incidents” (robbery, rape, sexual battery, or a fight or attack with a weapon), and 46 percent of schools reported thefts or larcenies. More than 10 percent of high school boys admitted to carrying a weapon to school during the previous 30 days. Among middle schools, 8.6 percent reported daily sexual harassment, 30.5 percent reported daily disrespect shown to teachers, and 43 percent reported daily bullying….

“And this $15,000, is it just going to be available with no strings attached? Won’t there be all sorts of exploitative scams cheating people who are seeking to educate their children?” Unfortunately there will be scams. What’s to keep the District of Columbia Board of Education from going private?

Governors to Parents: Please Help

by Tammy Drennan

Imagine states sending out letters like this…

Office of the Governor

Dear Parents and Guardians,

Due to budget restraints and our current economic crisis, the state has been forced to reevaluate the school services it provides. Many citizens are not aware that school costs consume 57% of the state’s budget. While we all want to see children well-educated, it has become necessary to examine and redefine the responsibilities of taxpayers and the specific responsibilities of parents for education and related needs of children.

To that end, here is the new delineation of responsibilities.

The state and local governments will provide the following school services for K-12 students: 

• Instruction in reading
• Instruction in language arts
• Instruction in mathematics
• Instruction in science
• Instruction in social studies, history, geography and civics
• Instruction in foreign languages
• High school instruction in public speaking
• College and career guidance for high school students

Parents or guardians will be responsible for the following areas of instruction and services for their children.

• Meals
• Healthcare and health instruction
• Family planning and management
• Physical education and sports
• Socialization issues, including getting along with others, anger management, etc.
• Instruction in the arts, including art, music, dance, theater, etc.
• Enrichment activities such as field trips
• Instruction in morals, ethics and/or religion

Resources for parents and guardians will be made available on the department of education web site and at public libraries.

Sports facilities at public school locations will be leased per local board of education discretion to individuals, businesses or parent groups. School auditoriums will be made available for nominal fees for arts related activities. Communities and families are encouraged to form committees to explore the use of said facilities.

We thank you for your willingness to take back some of the responsibility for rearing your children in order to help your state avoid bankruptcy.

Yours,

The Governor

Note: This is not a real letter sent out by any state, though it is one many states probably wish they could send. It would be a start toward a revival of community and family and a society defined not by politics and special interests but by the people.