[updated 11/22/05]
Dane Roberts, of UNM, speaks of “the impossibility of standardizing our
public schools” and believes “the state shouldn’t assume the task of defining how or what each kid should learn.” Roberts imagines an
ideal world in which “principals could choose teachers who match their educational beliefs. And teachers [could] focus on what is too
often forgotten: teaching kids.”
How can anyone believe teachers have forgotten that it’s all about teaching kids? How is it good
that principals could discriminate against teachers whose “educational beliefs” they disagree with?
I don’t want a teacher fired
for believing the world is only 4,000 years old. Nor do I want a school packed with such believers.
Throughout hundreds of years
of public education, many countries have not had so much trouble standardizing public schools. The trouble has grown in the last 30
years, coincidental with rise of the Radical Right.
If the state has no business at all in education (the ultimate extension of
this line of reasoning), who does? The church? Or, the parents, most of whom hope their children will achieve more education than they
could. Many caring parents participate in elections of local school boards; many know their kid’s teachers and principals. How are they
not represented in this process?
How does anyone reasonably conclude the Market can do no wrong? What have they been teaching
you?
One of the many things that has helped the United States to become a great nation is public education. That and a progressive
tax system, especially estate taxes, have helped delay the growth of an American Aristocracy. In schools we meet people and ideas we will
never meet at home or even in our own neighborhood or church. The melting pot of America is its public schools. Undermining that system
undermines everything. Public education serves the public good. mjh
[published in The Daily Lobo (11/17/05)]
—–
Vouching for vouchers by Dane Roberts, Daily Lobo columnist
The issue of evolution versus creationism in the science
curriculum perfectly illustrates the impossibility of standardizing our public schools. Some people will never accept public schools that
promote ideas that contradict their religious beliefs. Others will never allow religion to influence the curriculum.
—–
[11/22/05: response from James McClure …]
Letter: Education system soured after morality removed
Editor,
This is in response to the
letter in Thursday’s Daily Lobo written by Mark Justice Hinton, “Public education crucial to free circulation of ideas.”
Would
you rather go to Smith’s Food & Drug, Whole Foods Market, Albertson’s, Raley’s, or to the Motor Vehicle Department, the Social
Security office, or Medicaid office? That would be the difference between government schools – the disaster they are now – and voucher
schools. In my many years on this planet, I have only seen one thing the government does well – and it’s not the American education
system.
Hinton asks, “If the state has no business at all in education, who does?” The answer is: people who would do it well.
When people or businesses or schools have to compete, they produce a better product – every time.
The trouble in schools coincides
with the removal of morality in schools, which was fostered by the liberals, not the radical right. I’m not a fan of either, but
Hinton’s statement is not accurate.
And neither is his statement regarding estate taxes. The burden of taxes has never spurred
growth in any country.
Hinton’s misconceptions are frightening.
James McClure
Daily Lobo reader
class="mine">I’m intrigued by “In my many years on this planet, I have only seen one thing the government does well” — is it wage war?McClure’s comparison of a bunch of groceries to 3 huge, disparate bureaucracies really seems comparing apples to social
services. Ask me whether I’d rather go to one of those private Motor Vehicle services joints or the real state-run deal — answer: the
latter. Or let me ask McClure: does he dial 911 or his private security company? Does he drive on public streets or only take private
toll roads everywhere?
Let’s not do this. There are certain things government should do and can do well. There are things that
private enterprise cannot or should not do (like aggregate huge amounts of personal data through corporate spying).
Let’s get
back to vouchers. If vouchers were universal tomorrow, some public schools would fold immediately. Some private, especially religious,
schools would appear. Is this the glorious wisdom of the market at work?
Would those new schools be full of better teachers than
found in public schools? How? Where would they come from? Do you really believe they’d be both better and better paid?
Would
every kid tossed on the street by the closing of his or her neighborhood school immediately be welcomed in a just-as-close and vastly
superior private school — of course not. So, what happens to the kids who don’t take the money and run?
Vouchers are a mechanism
for siphoning off public money for private profit and, as such, fit perfectly with the Party of Corporate Interests. It’s like taking
tax money to fund private roads.
As for estate taxes, I don’t suggest that they have anything to do with growth. I said they have
to do with preventing the cancerous growth of an upper class, a fat community that can buy anything they need to keep the rabble at bay
and keep themselves surrounded by those just like themselves. mjh