NGA Winter Meeting to Open with Dialogue on Preparing America's Children to Learn

NGA Winter Meeting to Open with Dialogue on Preparing America's Children to Learn

WASHINGTON - The nation's governors will open their Winter Meeting with a dialogue on the importance of early childhood education. "Preparing America's Children" will be the focus of the first half of the opening plenary session. The session will begin with Rob Reiner and Craig Ramey outlining the research and key issues relating to early childhood education; then governors will discuss the challenges and opportunities of policy design and implementation.

Rob Reiner, perhaps best known as an Emmy-winning actor and film director, currently chairs the California Children and Families Commission and is the founder of the I Am Your Child Foundation (IAYC). The foundation is a national, nonpartisan organization that raises awareness about the importance of early childhood development and school readiness. IAYC also promotes public policies that help ensure children have the physical well-being and the social, emotional, and cognitive abilities they need to enter school ready to succeed.

Craig Ramey, Ph.D., is the founding director of the Georgetown Center of Health and Education and the Georgetown University Distinguished Professor of Health Studies. Author of more than 200 publications, Ramey specializes in the study of factors affecting the development of intelligence, social competence, and academic achievement in young children. During the past 30 years, Ramey has led research and development teams involving more than 500 professionals and 14,000 children and families across America.

"The No Child Left Behind Act focuses on closing the achievement gap between high- and low-performing children," said NGA Chairman Kentucky Gov. Paul E. Patton. "This plenary session will show how quality early childhood education programs can help to reduce - or even prevent - this gap."

At the plenary, Gov. Patton will announce the creation of the NGA Task Force on School Readiness. This bipartisan group of governors will focus on preparing children age birth through five for school by:

The task force will identify best practices of state policy and evaluate programs' fiscal requirements to ensure that a wide range of early childhood policy options are available to governors.

"To compete and succeed in today's New Economy, states need to build a highly-skilled workforce," said NGA Vice Chairman Idaho Gov. Dirk Kempthorne. "And that starts before high school or even grade school. It begins with preparing our youngest children to learn. Students who walk into school ready to learn have a much higher potential for achievement. Governors are in a unique position to form partnerships and help develop strategies that will increase opportunities for early childhood learning and development."

Two points:

1) Education is not a legitimate function of government at any level. "Preparing children to learn" is a function of parents, their children, and their teachers. The only way that we will ever restore excellence to american education is to remove the government and turn it back to the private sector.

2) "The No Child Left Behind Act focuses on closing the achievement gap between high and low performing children"

I'm reminded of that old joke about liberals yearning to "build a world where all children are above average". This is as idiotic as saying that we need to teach basketball skills to close the gap between me and Michael Jordan. In reality, the only way that this will ever happen is if we dumb everything down to the extent that all of our children are equally ignorant and illiterate (at which time, presumably, the libs will be content that american education will be "fair").

Source

Hillary's socialist education agenda

Before the people of New York choose Hillary Rodham Clinton as their senator, they ought to know something about what she stands for on education, because that is one of the issues on which she is supposed to be very strong. Like every other candidate, she wants education reform. What kind of reform? Hillary is, unfortunately, not very strong on details. She wants better education. But don't we all? The simple truth is that the kind of education Hillary wants is not better at all. It's a more radical, socialist kind of education. In fact there is a name for the program she endorses. It's called the Human Resources Development Plan for the United States, and her education guru, Marc Tucker, conceived it.

Mandatory preschool almost happened in Washington, DC:

Tremendous Victory in DC!

For over 16 months, homeschoolers have been fighting a bill in the District of Columbia that would have subjected 3 year olds and some 2 year olds to compulsory attendance. Home School Legal Defense Association has now received word that B14-261 has been revised so that attendance for these very young children would be optional, not mandatory. This is a dramatic victory over one of the most outrageous attacks on parental rights in memory.

Soon after Councilmember Kevin Chavous introduced this unbelievable bill in June of 2001, there were several town hall meetings. HSLDA Attorney Scott Woodruff testified at the first town hall meeting. He challenged Chavous to amend his bill to make attendance voluntary. Chavous sidestepped the challenge.

Numerous opponents of the bill were prepared to testify against it at a subsequent town hall. Chavous cancelled it on short notice.

When the DC Council Committee on Education, Libraries and Recreation finally announced a public hearing on the bill, Woodruff gathered together documentation and expert witnesses to show that mandatory school attendance for such a young age group was unwise and even potentially harmful. Many homeschooling parents called committee members to voice their opposition. Chavous, chair of the committee, cancelled the hearing at the last minute.

HSLDA continued to call Chavous' office at least once a week for updates. We were repeatedly told that the hearing had not yet been rescheduled. After the holiday weekend of July 4, HSLDA contacted Chavous' office and was informed that a "roundtable" (informal hearing) had been held several days before. No notice was provided to the public, in violation of the rules of the DC Council. Unsurprisingly, no one testified against the bill. Chavous' staff said that since there had already been a roundtable, there would be no formal hearing.

Under Council rules, written testimony can be submitted with a certain period after a roundtable. Woodruff put together a substantial packet of written testimony from many authorities and delivered it to every committee member. He reminded the committee that if the bill passed, state control over children in DC would surpass that of one of the most notoriously statist societies of the ancient world, Sparta, and one of the most statist societies of modern times, Communist China, neither of which tried to control children under 6 years of age. He reminded the committee that HSLDA would challenge the bill's constitutionality in court if it passed.

The committee subsequently scheduled the bill for a vote on October 22. Woodruff sent a letter to all members of the committee protesting the scheduled vote on the ground that the roundtable was held without public notice. The committee cancelled the scheduled vote. During a subsequent phone call, a staffer told us, to our amazement, the bill had been amended so as to make attendance voluntary rather than mandatory.

It is possible that Chavous could change the bill again to reattach the mandatory provision. We hope and pray, however, that it is gone for good.

We are grateful to God for what certainly appears to be a tremendous victory. We also gratefully acknowledge the efforts of many others in this battle, including the Heritage Foundation, the Cato Institute, Bolling Area Home Educators, and the many homeschoolers who called and wrote to oppose this bill. We must continue to stand together whenever overzealous and misguided government officials seek to usurp parent's freedom.

For more information on the history of this legislation visit:
http://www.hslda.org/legislation/state/dc/2001/dcb14-261/default.asp

As a homeschooling parent, I have often thought of the situation my family is in that allows us to have that option. Lefties like Dodd and Hillary have said, outright, that we're priveliged and wealthy enough to make such choices. Any homeschooler knows what an insulting lie that is and despite such ignorant comments, the truth is that the situations homeschoolers are in are usually the result of hard choices they have deliberately made.

In fact, it is my belief that any set of parents that wistfully look at homeschooling families and says 'I wish we could do that,' can, if they quit their demanding jobs, sold their expensive homes and cars, got out of their credit card debt, had one parent stay at home, cut their living expenses to the bone and, like many homeschooling families, accepted the idea of economic sacrifice as the cost of what they are doing.

Believe me, I'm glad we have had the foresight of good people to lead the way and the movement has had the resources to legally fight to wrest these rights back from the government - BUT - there still remains the problem of what is to be done with the millions of underprepared and intellectually hindered children in family's or situations that are far, far less that ideal. Certainly it is the right of parents to school their children, but what of those whose parents are criminals, crack addicts, poverty stricken or, worse, Democrats?

I'm not casting about for an all-encompassing answer, but the kids that are simply unable to get the resources sacrificing parents provide will suffer. Decades of humanist 'compassion' and 'liberal' government policies have rendered education unworkable, bloated and hideously expensive while at the same time promoting and aiding the destructive living that has destroyed many families and huge segments of the American population. What are we to do with these children? What are some thoughts about this situation?

International educators conference held in Cuba [Full Text] HAVANA - President Fidel Castro told a group of educators from around the world that education can create a better world by helping to resolve social problems, such as the nagging racial discrimination that still exists in Cuba. Closing the international educators conference here on Friday night, Castro told hundreds of participants that over four decades his socialist government can boast high marks for its primary school programs. But he said secondary education here needs serious improvement.

Beginning in early 2002, Cuba launched a campaign to improve conditions at its primary schools, but reforms for the older students are still pending. Cuba's secondary school program will be radically improved, Castro declared. "The future developing of our education will have enormous political, social and human connotations," the Cuban leader said.

Despite the huge changes that the 1959 revolution made in Cuban society, some social problems have not been completely eliminated, including racial discrimination, Castro acknowledged. "While science shows unquestionably the real equality that exists among human beings, discriminations lives on," especially among the island's poorest groups, Castro said. [End]

Boston Globe: Cuba's lessons on caring for children *** Let's hope it can and that as more Americans visit Cuba's shores, we can learn something from the Cubans - about how to raise our kids here, how to instill in them self-respect and cultural pride, and how to give all of them a chance to be happy, creative, and productive adults.***

We could start with offering parents a radically different education for their children than what is offered in today's public schools, meaning a traditional (Hillsdale Academy, Heritage Schools)or classical education:

http://www.accsedu.org/

This is a Christian school website, but classical education can be implemented in charter schools. My state has a rather successful classical charter school (Great Books curriculum) and others are popping up in various parts of the country.

Fact-based history; phonics instruction; Latin; traditional math programs (no rain forest math; the study of Western Civilization; English grammar -- no inventive spelling; Great Books curriculum (no "Heather has Two Mommies); geography; civics. The day will be so filled there won't be time for PC indoctrination, multiculturism, extreme environmentalism, etc.

You are so right about so many families that say they wish they could homeschool but won't part with the extras they enjoy from 2 paychecks.

It is depressing. There will always be that group of parents and people who have no businsess or time to be parents. Those who use the school system as a babysitting service. For those who want to teach and are dedicated to fighting the socialist publik skools, the only thing I can think of is Day Care Services. Especially for those who have young ones at home. It's not hard to qualify for state licensing to care for kids in the home and the poverty level families qualify for assistance with payment for child care. Of course the schools will get them at kindergarten age. I know this isn't much, but I feel for these kids and had to respond.

Here is AZ you can start a Charter School. Maybe part of the answer is to encourage children being homeschooled to get teaching degrees or enough credits to be a Teacher's Assistant and sacrifice their perferred careers for a few years, anyway, and help the home education movement in some way.

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