Santorum Bashes Public Schools, Says They're Stuck In Factory Era

LATimes ^ | February 18, 2012 | Mitchell Landsberg

[Steelfish]

Santorum Bashes Public Schools, Says They're Stuck In Factory Era

By Mitchell Landsberg February 18, 2012

Reporting from Columbus, Ohio— Republican GOP hopeful Rick Santorum may be the most prominent homeschooler in America. So it might not have been surprising that, on Saturday, he told a conservative Christian audience that he intended to homeschool his children in the White House.

In his remarks to the Ohio Christian Alliance, however, Santorum went further, seeming to attack the very idea of public education.

In the nation’s past, he said, “Most presidents homeschooled their children in the White House.… Parents educated their children because it was their responsibility.”

“Yes, the government can help,” he continued, “but the idea that the federal government should be running schools, frankly much less that the state government should be running schools, is anachronistic.”

[Steelfish]

You raise a good point. He better be prepared for the debates with Obama.

[Girlene]

LOL, thanks for noticing, Lancey.

Marguerite, why are you pushing this anti-Santorum stuff so hard if you’re from France?

[Girlene]

THe headlines on these articles are getting ridiculous. Those comments didn’t sound like “bashing”. The print media is in full attack mode.

[hinckley buzzard]

Exactly. There never has been government money without strings attached, and never will be. You know, I was on my highschool debate team in the early 60's and one year the topic was "federal aid to education." I actually recall the days when there was no federal gubmint involvement in education at all. One of the most effective arguments for the con side was that with government money came government control, and with government control came loss of liberty and local self-determination. Well, we now know how true that was.

[hinckley buzzard]

The Ordinance of 1787 is not a "myth." It is organic law of the United States and it provides for the support of free public education. It reflects the importance the Founders placed on having an educated populace. Nobody said "government-run education" except you. Read your history.

[Steelfish]

You got that absolutely right. They “editorialize” the headlines so blatantly that it appears that aren’t even worried about the evident bias.

[EDINVA]

Public schools in PA pay/reimburse parents to home school? They sure don’t in VA.

I never got a dime, nor were my home-schooled children allowed to participate in ANY extracurricular activities at the public schools that I had to pay for through my property taxes. They had to be tested by the county (or was it state?) every year to assure they were on par (ha!) with students in the public schools.

However, that said, if kids are being home schooled and learning online, why does it matter where they are physically? They could be in PA/VA or Timbuktu for all it matters. It’s a cyber-world out there. Many companies have employees working ‘remote’ from all around the globe; they don’t have to be in the office. Why should schooling be any different?

The current social compact is that the legal residence of the parents is that of the kids, and the local school district has taken on responsibility for their education, unless parents opt out, either for private or parochial schools, or for home schooling.

If the PA law allows payment or reimbursement for home-schooling, I don’t see what’s wrong with what Santorum did. Did the Santorums not pay taxes at their PA home? Or would the PA district have given them a cut in his home’s taxes because he wasn’t there with his family? Or because his kids weren’t in the public school? Do PA parents who elect to send their kids to private or parochial school get a break in taxes since they aren’t using that costly public service?

[RobbyS]

Don’t suggest that public education is identical with, or even continuous with the bureaucratized systems we have today. By the end of the 19th century, the systems of locally supported and private schools was rapidly being replaced by system modeled after the Prussian state schools. Likewise, the German model was working its way into the colleges and universities, and the German idealism that had such an effect on Emerson and others, had become dominant. Dewey began as a Hegelian but gave up that form of idealism for something like the materialism of Marx . Dewey lead the way toward socializing the schools, driving private schools out of business as they gained an ever large share of tax revenue. The so-called Military-industrial complex has nothing on the public school monopoly that takes an ever greater share of the national wealth for ever diminishing results.

[berdie]

First let me say that I have no complaint with the OP and what Santorum said about schools (other than the lack of a solutions.) Santorum is not my guy, but I will vote for him if he is the nominee.

I ask these questions because I truly don’t know the answers.

Is cyber-schooling different from home schooling? Are you able to access regular school curriculum via the internet for a charge?

Although the Santorums owned a home in PA, their primary residence appears to be VA for several years (job convenience). So why not use the VA school system?

I can understand being overseas and cyber-schooling your child in America.

[EDINVA]

Berdie, I’m not familiar with ‘cyber-schooling.’ I am familiar with traditional home schooling, and with taking classes online. I don’t know if the Santorum children were plugged into live classes in PA from their house in VA. If that is the case, it’s not an option available in VA. Technology has changed somewhat dramatically since my kids were home-schooled 10+ years ago.

The Santorums could have sent their kids to VA schools had they chosen. Lots of Congressmen and Senators do. But if home-schooling is what the Santorums wanted, and if they consider PA their home, and if this cyber-homeschooling is available through their PA district, why wouldn’t they do that?

Some families, especially very traditional religious families, prefer home-schooling. They don’t want their kids exposed to the ‘culture’ of the public schools. Often the choice has to do with health issues, and certainly the Santorums have had enough of those to deal with. Seems to me parents should be able to decide what’s best for their family and their kids. Even within a family, they might choose to educate one or two at home and send others to the public school, depending on the individual child(ren)’s needs. But it should be the parents’ decision, unless they are unfit parents.

Santorum isn’t my guy, either, but this endless nit-picking on each and every Republican who enters the public arena, especially by other Republicans or conservatives, is getting disgusting.

[theBuckwheat]

In the Washington, DC district given their drop out rate and test scores, it now costs in excess of ONE MILLION DOLLARS to graduate a single student who is competent at their grade level in math and science.

What a grotesque waste of human and financial capital.

[Norseman]

>>Are you able to access regular school curriculum via the internet for a charge?<<

Better than that: http://www.khanacademy.org

If there were no public school buildings today, no central administrations, and no buses, and a law was passed providing that every child was to be provided a free education:

1) The internet would become an even busier place.

2) The last thing we would do is build huge schools at centralized locations, hire teachers and administrators to put in them, and buy buses to haul every child in the county to that central location, at a tremendous cost.

3) Our tax dollars would go a lot further than they do now, and the Left would have a far more difficult time indoctrinating our youth.

And that’s where we’re headed. Getting there is going to be messy, but productive. It’s interesting that Santorum has decided not to shy away from this issue, because in a lot of places public schools are quite respected, whether they should be or not.

[Norseman]

>>In the Washington, DC district given their drop out rate and test scores, it now costs in excess of ONE MILLION DOLLARS to graduate a single student who is competent at their grade level in math and science.<<

It probably costs about $15,000 per year per student, so close to $200,000 to get one student through. I suspect this calculation is based on something like only one in 5 or 6 DC students successfully graduate with competence in math and science, so to get one, you’ve got to spend on 5 or 6.

In any case, it’s ridiculous. DC schools should have been shut down long ago, and parents given vouchers instead. Or, just give them the vouchers and don’t shut the schools. Many of them would close their doors in a year.

[BobL]

“According to his/her/its freeper homepage, that scumbag Marguerite is from (or in) France.
Personally, I am supporting both Newt and Rick. Either one is fine and dandy with me. And so I get a bit irritated by scumbags like “Marguerite” (from France!) coming along and trashing one of them.”

I agree, it’s ridiculous having FOREIGNERS messing around in our political process. Unreal.

[EDINVA]

Think your math is a little fuzzy. The average per student cost in DC is an (outrageous) $18K/pupil. Over 13 years that’s a bit under quarter million (wasted) dollars. Even given that the cost will increase (double every 10 years), I still don’t think you’ve gotten to a million. Doesn’t that make you feel better ?

[Lancey Howard]

...it’s ridiculous having FOREIGNERS messing around in our political process.

It's bad enough having a FOREIGNER as president.

[EDINVA]

wait a minute .. are you saying that because of the drop out rate, factoring in the cost of those who dropped out, say after 9-10th grade, it costs $1M to graduate those who finish and can score at grade level?

I.e., let’s say the Oyster School, class of 2024 started with 50 students, half of whom will drop out by 10th grade, so the cost of “educating” them through 10th grade, plus the cost of “educating” those who finish the next two years, divided by those who actually graduate, and are at grade level, comes to $1M each?

[Jim from C-Town]

Just to clue you in, Mr. Santorum WAS ENTITLED to that money as a permanent resident of Penn Hills, PA School district. He paid the taxes on his PA home and used it as his legal residence.

His residence, no matter how small, or how often visited by him, was his home for voting and residency requirements while a Senator in the U. S. Congress.

I suppose it is very selfish for him to want to live with his family full time while he served as a Senator. That would be almost Criminal to the Pittsburgh Pack of Crap, I mean Post-Gazette, but it is not only legal, it is expected that a Senator with young children would live with them in the DC area. Ask Al Gore where he grew up, It wasn't in TN.

[Gene Eric]

>> Do you work for someone ?

You should be concerned they’re not being paid.

[theBuckwheat]

Notice that I said ‘competent at their grade level’ at graduation. The DC schools have less than 20% of their graduates who are competent at their grade level in both math and science. Being generous with the numbers, I now find sources who state that the District system spends upwards of $18,000 per pupil per year, NOT INCLUDING CAPITAL COSTS.

$18 * 12 = $216 / 0.20. = $1.080 MILLION.

QED.