Dear wintertime: I just want you to know that the only reason I responded to this post by you was to let others know that being a public school teacher is not what you say it is. I want others to know that I and many, many other school teachers like me, are not the “godless”, “collectivist”, “socialists” you say we are. I refuse to be defined by you.
You are very sure of my sins - hypocracy, deception, promoting godlessness, etc. The truth is all of us will one day stand before God and we will then be judged by Him. So, I’ll leave it with Him as to the rightness of my motives in being a public school teacher.
Finally, I want other Freepers to know that the vast majority of public school teachers that I know, love kids and do their very best to teach them the subjects we’ve been hired to teach, and, to impart good, wholesome, even Godly, American values to our students.
I know I will never change wintertime’s opinion, but I hope that, although many of you are very disappointed with the performance of public schools in the last 20 years or so, you will not write off everyone who is trying to make a positive difference. Remember, most of our young people in the country attend public schools and will continue to do so in the years ahead. We need to work hard to improve public schools - I’ve got some thoughts on that below. It’s a bit long, but it is a big subject. I know you will give me a fair hearing.
Public schools, in the United States, are established, funded by, and supervised by each individual state and local “county” (or “parish”). The state government and the local county school district policy makers (i.e. local “school board” - or as wintertime calls them - “THE VOTING MOB, COMRADE COMMITTEE”) are elected and answerable to the voters of that state and county. Each individual state determines the teaching objective standards for graduation and the curriculum for it’s own schools. Each state establishes the qualifications for who can teach in that state.
The local school district hires/fires the school employees in that particular district. The point is – the public schools in your state, district and city are not Federal schools – they are local, state-run institutions . And, just like a lot of things in our country, the federal government has been intruding upon the state public school systems step by step, slowly but surely, over the last 70 years. However, that is beside the point (for now).
The real question is, do individual states have the right to establish public schools and fund them by the tax-dollars of each individual state’s citizenry? Another way to put the question is - is there anything in your state’s constitution that prohibits the establishment of public-funded, public schools by your individual state? If not, then are your state’s public schools just another example of “COLLECTIVIST SOCIALISM!!!” as defined by wintertime?
I think we can agree that expenditures of public funds by your state and local governments to fulfill its obligations as stated by your state’s constitution would not necessarily be “COLLECTIVIST SOCIALISM!!!” as defined by wintertime. I think most of us would agree that expenditures by the state and local government for fire departments, police departments, road maintenance, etc. are not necessarily “SOCIALISM!!!”. As much as I hate the DMV, I’m not sure that the state setting the criteria by which it’s citizens obtain a driver’s license is unconstitutional or “SOCIALISM” either. However, the question is, do state-funded public schools fall under the same category as police departments, fire departments, etc.?
If the citizenry of an individual state wants to establish, fund, and maintain schools to help educate it’s citizen’s children for the benefit of the citizenry as a whole, and, that such expenditures for such a thing is not prohibited by that individual state’s constitution – then is that “SOCIALISM!!!” as defined by wintertime? I’m not so sure that it is. Wintertime makes much of the fact that “government school attendence” is compulsory. That is not really true - it is true that kids are required to get an education - but it dosen’t have to be in the public schools. As far as I know, all the states allow the requirement to be fullfilled by homeschooling and/or private schools.
I think the problem most of us have had with the public school system has been the slow but sure deterioration of the quality of education our children have been receiving over the last 50 years.
But consider and be honest, are our public schools the same today as they were 20, 30, 40, or 50 years ago? Weren’t most of you reading and posting articles here on FreeRepublic educated by public schools? I was, and yes there were times I had a bad teacher or two – but, for the most part, I had teachers who did a d—n good job and influenced me for the better as a student and a citizen.
When I was in public school, we opened with the Lord’s Prayer every day. We said the pledge of allegiance. We learned our nation’s proud history – along with some of it’s flaws – but, always with the idea that the United States was the greatest nation, the most giving nation, the most innovative nation and the bravest nation on the planet. I had public school teachers who taught me about how communism and Marxism are utopian ideas – how they lie and use violence to achieve their goals.
I was shown, by my public school civics teacher, how the major media (Newsweek, Time, in particular) slant the news and sometimes outright lie about the specifics of an individual or event.
For the most part, even religion (Christianity in particular) was affirmed and respected by the public schools I attended. I remember in my elementary school that we had a live Nativity scene as part of our annual Christmas program! No one thought anything about it.
So, don’t tell me that the public school system has always been the same and have always been an indoctrinator of our children for “SOCIALISM!!!”. It can be a strong positive educational influence on our children for the individual’s and our nation’s benefit. It can also be a powerful tool of a totalitarian government if the citizenry allow it to be. Our own state and federal governments can become the same thing if we do not stay vigilant.
The local public school district boards are elected by You, the people. The public school curriculum, the standards to be learned by Your students, the qualifications for teachers, along with textbooks, are selected and voted on by Your state government and local school boards. We, as citizens of that individual state have a tremendous amount of influence on what the local public schools do. But, we have to be involved! We have to stay informed! The only reason this Obama speech in the public schools was stopped or curtailed was because the public found out about it and made their voices be heard.
The local state public schools are definitely an easy target and deserve much of the criticism they get. But, if you honestly look at the reasons for many of the public school problems, I think you will see that most of these originate with “outside” influences – the ACLU, the NEA, Federal mandates, Federal courts, lawsuits, etc. When the state public schools accept federal money – then, they have to play according to the Federal government’s rules. But, perhaps the biggest source of the problems facing public schools today is the gradual deterioration of the family and of moral standards in general.
When I was in public school in the 1960’s and early 70’s, single parent homes (no matter what the ethnic group) were the oddity. Today, just the opposite is the norm. When I was in school, discipline was maintained and affirmed by the school and the parents. This is sadly not the case anymore.
These things can be changed – they must be changed. One of several ways to do this is not only to stay informed and involved politically on the local and state level, but also to have more and more conservatives to become teachers and administrators. There are teachers and administrators who are bucking the wave of political correctness and mandates by the ACLU and the NEA. We also need people who go on to higher education and become college professors to reform college educational methods and standards, and to train young teachers. It’s the colleges probably more than anything else that has promoted most of the “educational” idiocy. This can be changed.
My problem with wintertime and others who have similar views about the public school system is that they shoot in the back anyone who advocates improvement of the public school system. According to wintertime, you are part of the problem if you teach in the public schools, if you are an administrator in the public schools, send your kids to public school – even if you are conservative and make positive influences within the system.
Wintertime wants to shut down the public school system – she maintains that they are beyond hope and unconstitutional. I don’t think it is unconstitutional for individual states to establish a public school system and I don’t believe that public schools are beyond hope of conservative influence and sanity. Just like our own government – it has taken many, many years to get to the crisis we are in and it will take years to fix it. We can’t give up! We must not be what Thomas Paine called, “fair-weather patriots”- that only helps the bad side. It will take lots of involvement and hard work, but I believe most would agree that our nation and our schools are worth fixing.
The age group I mentioned at the beginning of the article, teens through early thirties are perhaps vulnerable for a number of reasons;
It is they who have been for the most part deliberately propagandized through our public schools, to develop ‘sensitivity’ to homosexual issues, and to question even their own sexuality, long before they have even entered puberty ( from the article)
When children attend godless schools, and are taught in these schools to think, reason, and view the world through the lens of a godless worldview, this is what we can expect.
So?...Our collectivist government schools have two choices:
**They can teach everything from a godless perspective,
** or they could be God-centered.
Neither of the above worldviews is religiously neutral in content or consequences. Regardless of the worldview chosen the government will be establishing a religious philosophy with profound moral, ethical, and **political** consequences ( see quote above), and taxpayers will be forced under the threat of police action for this religious establishment.
Obviously, if the government chooses a God-centered worldview then which denomination? Shall it start the day with the Muslim call to prayer, the Mormon 13 Articles of Faith, the Lord's prayer, chants to Krishna?
Even our earliest modern collectivist government schools struggled with this question. Riots broke out in Philadelphia in the mid-1800s over which version of the bible was to be used. Finally, the collectivist schools settled on a generic, basically Unitarian, lukewarm Protestantism.
(By the way...We know what Christ does with the lukewarm. He spits them out of his mouth!)
There is no solution to the problem except to begin the process of privatizing all K-12 education. Let these matters be resolved individually by the parents, teachers, and principals in private settings.
I want others to know that I and many, many other school teachers like me, are not the “godless”, “collectivist”, “socialists” you say we are. I refuse to be defined by you. ( Nevadan)
Regardless of the political or religious beliefs of the teachers, government schools in the U.S. are collectivist, socialist-funded, compulsory-funded, compulsory attendance, government owned and run, managed by people's collectives ( school boards), and utterly GODLESS in their religious worldview.
No one is holding a gun to any government teacher's head forcing them to work in these schools. They willingly go to work and willing agree to support a system that teaches children to think, reason, and evaluate everything in their school day ( and homework) in godless manner. They agree to establish and uphold a system of schools that teaches children to think godlessly, and to be comfortable with collectivism; socialism; government ownership and management of their lives ( and now even death); and people's committees ( voting mobs) that regulate their moral, ethical, cultural, political, and ( most important) spiritual indoctrination .
It is the godlessness that has led to the very problem outlined in the essay. Yet...Government teachers, every day, across this nation agree to support this godlessness in our collectivist government schools. Everyday they go into government schools and actually teach their courses in a godless vacuum! If they are Christian, why aren't they working to establish schools in their own churches and working to rescue as many children as possible from this toxic godless stew? Why would they actually agree to feed this poison to the children in their classrooms?
I refuse to be defined by you. ( Nevadan)
Our godless, collectivist, socialist-funded, socialist-managed, compulsory, government owned and run schools define themselves.
As for sin,...It is a sin to teach children to think and reason godlessly. It is a sin to force taxpayers to fund it. It is a sin to force children to attend it. It is a sin to force parents to pay ransom to rescue their children from this religiously NON-neutral toxic stew. (Some call the extra money needed to pay for private schooling and homeschooling "ransom" or "jizna".)
Government schools are NOT religiously neutral. They teach and establish the religious worldview of godlessness!
although many of you are very disappointed with the performance of public schools in the last 20 years or so,
ALL government schools in this nation are godless in their worldview: The academically good, the bad, and the ugly.
All government schools in this nation are socialist-funded, government owned and run, managed by people's collectives: The good, the bad, and the ugly.
Simply by attending children learn to be comfortable with socialism; government ownership and management of their lives; and have the people's committees ( voting mobs) make moral; ethical; **religious**, and political decisions about what they should think and believe.
Regardless of the motivations of the teachers in these godless schools. They are what they are! They are godless! (And..By the way, socialist etc.)
The real question is, do individual states have the right to establish public schools and fund them by the tax-dollars of each individual state’s citizenry?
The fundamental problem here is that government schooling can NOT NOT NOT be religiously, politically, or culturally neutral. There is a fundamental conflict between government schooling and the establishment of religion. NO school ( this includes **all** government schools) can be religiously neutral because **all** schools must choose between either a godless or God-centered worldview. Neither of these worldviews is religiously, culturally, or politically neutral in content or conflict.
"Gotta" go. I am in a rush. ( not proof read).