Posted on 01/13/2005 8:54:27 AM PST by FreeMarket1
Good article.
Let me ask you a question: If public schools are eliminated, what replaces them? Do poor kids stop going to school, or do they get vouchers? I'm just interested in your opinion, because I have thought about this a lot.
So the teachers cheat on the tests and it's Bush' fault?
Of course!
ML/NJ
Nothing wrong with teaching examples like those found on the test. Presumably the test contains the types of problems we want a student to be able to solve. Cheating is different, these teachers need to be fired, and student cheating needs to be stopped.
This was recognized in the 70's in a book called "The Education Hoax" which advocated new school boards, new administrations and new teachers. But clearly wan not within the reach of the public.
This guys numbers are obviously high - even if you exclude the Black population. Agenda? Bias? Truth? Naw ...
I have heard this before, as I understand it, schools get held accountable for failure, and if failing get additional resources to help and if they still fail they are closed and kids move to other schools. As these weaker kids move to other schools, does this mean they drag down the other schools, or do the good schools pull them up?
There is nothing in the law that says a good school be punished or defunded because the kids are succeeding. So if NCLB fails the brighter students it is yet to be shown.
There are other factors of course, bright children may get their education despite the schools, and maybe have more alternatives because their parents probably are brighter and more successful as well. But I see nothing wrong with holding failing schools accountable.
From where do you come in this debate? Do you support the current system? Want to throw more money at it? Are you a teacher, former teacher, union member, parent of a kid in the school system? Home school? Private school? What is the solution you propose?
education bump
The two types of ineducable students are the defective and the disinterested; the defective have measurably insufficient intelligence while the disinterested are either emotionally undeveloped or simply unwilling to participate in what, to them, holds no foreseeable purpose.
The school system insists on mainstreaming both types to the detriment of all and believes firmly they are doing the "right thing."
Follow-up studies on the disinterested show that at later stages of life many suddenly see the benefit in education, usually specific education for vocational or social-acceptance reasons.
The defective however are always dependent on others for much of their daily needs and recall mostly nothing of those years kept cooped up except the other students about them making their lives miserable with taunts and ostracism.
No Child Left Behind institutionalizes and mandates this blueprint for failure and will bring nothing but fraud and disappointment.
Personally, I made damned sure my children WERE "left behind" by homeschooling them and keeping them from the clutches of the socialists.
They are now grown and very successful and happy, thank god.
NCLB is indeed nothing but enforcement of the socialist brainwashing system.
No, they get drafted in the coming draft and killed on the battlefield since they are not able to produce goods and services for the rest of us.
Pretty good article.
Wow! You want me to write a book right here on FR.
I certainly do not believe there is any role for the Federal government in education. It is my opinion that the Department of Education is unconstitutional.
I'm not sure what the "current system" is because it is hardly monolithic. Lots of kids at some public schools may come out not being able to connect Abraham Lincoln with the "Civil War," but that wasn't the case for my kids and it wasn't the case for me. (Of course none of us learned what a lowlife Lincoln was.) For my kids, especially, they got a classical education in (public) high school, including four years each of Latin, that is the sort of education the colleges should be giving but don't. (One went to UVa. The other is about to begin his final semester at Cornell.)
I'm not a teacher, a former teacher, or a union member. I think teachers' unions are especially bad for education generally.
Public schools can work, but if I were king I would probably eliminate them in favor of private schools. Home schooling seems to work well in the few cases I know about, but I'm not sure that it can ever educate more than a tiny fraction of the population.
As for realistic solutions, the first is to revert to local control. I absolutely believe that NCLB programs should be eliminated unless local school districts want to implement them.
I think that the civil courts should have absolutely no say in what happens in a public school. (Read Democracy by Decree to see that even liberals know they've screwed things up with their advocacy suits.)
ML/NJ
Not one of Bush's better moments, this plan. My girlfriend and I agree on this, but not much else. She's an avid liberal, and basically agrees with your statement that you can't force kids of different types (unable to learn vs. unwilling) into the same standards.
Where we disagree is how far to take it. She says the federal gov't should stay out of the schools, but when I say "So, you think we should eliminate the Department of Education," she disagrees, but can't come up with a real reason why.
There seems to be a pattern lately of the dems saying that everything Bush does IS BASED ON FALSIFIED DATA.
Has anybody else noticed this.
My take: Because Bush won't take the dems advice, then the data Bush is using is not valid.
Thanks, I have to agree with you on almost every point. I am a former teacher, saw first hand what a mess the unions make of things. Was laid of on senority even though my work for the school was benefitting a large number of students. Got paid the same whether I worked hard or not. I don't disagree that the feds have no place in education, but I can see the side of the arguement that says maybe local control has been lost to the side with the union power. In this case something needs to break the union power, or we just let the "current union led system control the vast majority of school districts until somehow the locals come to their senses.
If the locals were going to come to their senses I guess they would have by now. So NCLB places some accountability and testing on the schools. Maybe this will expose some incompetance so that the local voters will take back their schools. I would agree that the dept of education should be abolished but maybe with some accountability creeping in the left will add their support to getting rid of the fed role?
My child went through public school, I deprogrammed him in the evenings. He is getting a basic education now in Auburn. (One of the schools that still teaches a core in great literature, although he is not interested in latin, good for you though) Lots of his classmates carried sighs for Kerry after school for extra credit points. Public schools are not doing well, and if a system could be found to break them I would be for it. (I supported vouchers for that reason) I agree with you that education would be better if it was all private, but I can see how truely poor and illegal immigrants would not like it. Any change will probably come slowly, or would be highly disruptive.
Far better would be a society that recognized the limits of the defective as demonstrated and either made accomodations for their assisted welfare or ignored them to their eventual demise.
WE allow allow the business community to educate our children. Nothing has changed since the formal schooling of children began as far as what must be done. Teach them to read, write, spell, speak and and do math. Teach them legitimate history. Present them with factual material to discuss and encourage them to debate and come to their own conclusions. Do all this employing teachers who MUST succeed if they are to remain employed and pay them a good wage to do this job. The children of this nation are our real treasure and we need to do all we can to nurture and grow them both physically and mentally.
Education should not be a for-profit enterprise.
I, for one, would not want Pfizer and McDonalds being responsbile for educating my children.
I won't deny that there are problems with public education and great reforms are needed. (I also won't get into the details because I don't have time right now.)
But I firmly believe that the education of children is the responsibility of the community, not business.
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