Those of us who are interested in education know there are
people out there who want to destroy public education. I categorize them into
two camps, (1) those who want to commercialize education, and (2) those who
hate centralized government. The hate for federalization has been with us since
the1776, those who wanted each state wanted to be a little country; it was the
major issue in the constitutional convention in the State House in Philadelphia
that lasted for four months. Fifty-five men labored over the question and eventually
framed the “Constitution for the Republic”. We have been enjoying the fruits of
their work for a long, long time. There has been issue after issue where groups
of individuals have challenged that outcome for myriad reasons, some big some
small ranging from slavery to grazing rights. Until recently, we have stuck to
the principle that our strength as a nation relies on the idea of one-man
[person] one vote; in a great judicial overreach,
the Supreme Court has changed that. Money is now power.
The individual vote still counts collectively. If everyone voted
to overturn the Supremes Court decision, we would be free of that curse on
democracy. However, it would take an amendment to the Constitution and that is
not very likely because our democracy is bases on one-man one vote and dollars
are votes—Roberts, Alito, Scalia, Thomas and Kennedy used the First Amendment to
destroy the entire document. What all of
this has to do with education is that “big” money is being used to destroy
segment after segment of the government and there is no better example of that
then public education: the Department of Education. Rich donors are feeding millions
of dollars into politics to “buy” candidates who support what big money wants
and they want to make money off selling textbook, privative schools, testing of
our children, abandoned buildings and then buying them dirt cheap and a long, long
list of etcetera.
The objective of this posts it to express my concern about how
they are using the misery of people to promote their greed. The money grabbers
are quick to use everything they possibly can to further their cause. By
cutting taxes the underfund public schools. Building maintainers are first to
go (janitors, building repair; teachers can do it), then teachers are asked to work
longer hours (they already work 60 hrs a week), class sizes are increased,
student have to supply their own paper and pencils, and in some cases, that is toilet
paper. The politicians they elect destroy teachers’ unions as we have seen Republican
governor after Republican governor do: Wisconsin, New Jersey, Ohio, North Carolina,
etc. They under pay teachers to the point where even teachers most devoted to
education resign simply because they have to eat. Once that have made public schools
miserable they introduce charter and private schools: nice buildings, and other
amenities for a price.
What the voter appeal for all of this was, it shifted the
tax burdened off the backs of people and business, those who did not have
children, and put it on the backs of the parents. Of course, the poor families
have no choice but to send their children to public schools. That is what the
voucher program is all about; it puts tax money in the hands of politicians to
give to private schools at the expense of public schools. Various religious
organizations support the right of churches to run schools to indoctrinate
children into their religion every Sunday to their captive audiences. There
were many reasons to want private schools. The lack of qualified teachers for special
education, huge class sizes, crowed public school districts, and leaky roofs for
examples. The fracas over bussing was an example—especially in the South.
Now they have a new
focus of attack, which is Common Core. The cry is get the federal
government off my back! Just as the ranchers that support Clevin Bundy, they want
local control! If students can add and subtract by the time they are seniors
that is all they need, or it is OK to believe dinosaurs did not exist, or that the
Civil war was a war of aggression, climate change does not matter, etc as long
as it cuts taxes. This greedy element is
trying to find teachers that do not want to give tests for fear of
administrators using the tests to evaluate their teaching and not the evaluate what
the students learned so they know what to teach. Teaching is a sweaty palm
profession and all “good” teachers question if they are doing a good job with the
idea of doing better next year—that is the nature of being a good teacher. These
business types cash in on disgruntled teachers who resigned because of salaries
by blaming Common Core; better yet blame the “Federal government overreach”. Citizens
United is reaching into the classrooms—to hell with the children if some business
can make a few bucks.
Don’t you get caught in the Common Core trap. You and all other
teachers who have resigned, try not to fall into their trap. I can forgive you
for resigning because I know you have to earn enough money to eat but educations
is still important. Common Core is a big step in the right direction, don’t
throw it away. As a postscript; Google “public educations as a communist plot”.
It will give you an idea of how far they will go to label public education as
the untimate evil.
URL: firetreepub.blogspot.com
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