I was driving along in my car yesterday listening to talk radio. Yes, I know it makes me old, but guess what, it also keeps me informed on a variety of issues that have nothing to do with reality television stars, who might be on crank or pregnant, or the score of some game. Anyway, here I was listening to this show and this whiner who called in to complain that without the federal governments over sight public education would be in a much worse state. I quite nearly bit my tongue off in a fit of apoplexy as I listened to this moron attempt to bait the host into a debate over the control of education, federal vs. state vs. home. Wow I thought, this guy doesn’t really get it. So in the hopes that moron will find and read this someday, let me spell it out for him.
First thing; not only does the government not owe you an education it has no right to demand that you get an education. If you read the Constitution, I know, gasps as we wonder what the hell I am doing reading the founding documents and attempting to apply them, most people only see them as something encumbering the path they want to take. Anyway, if you read the Constitution I dare you to find any section that gives the federal government the right to provide and therefore dictate the public educational system. You won’t. The only thing you will find is that the tenth amendment gives those unmentioned rights to the states to do with as they please. So, you can have local and municipal schools, but federally mandated education is against everything the founders stood for.
Two; how do you think people educated themselves before the benevolent government came down and bestowed upon them the wonders of education. Tell me what public institution educated Hamilton, Jefferson, Madison, and other founders back in the day. Um, the answer is they did it themselves. But day-to-day life is more complex than it was all those years ago you say? Well, excuse me I didn’t know that the rigors of life excused you from using your brain to gain knowledge. Clearly I missed this lesson in public school. I tell you what man. I’ve learned more doing my own reading and research than I ever learned in public school. I’ve read very important documents and discovered things they don’t even touch on. The amount of intelligent thought in a public school is down right frightening. Which leads me to:
Three; Kid’s reading, writing and arithmetic skills are atrophied. Yet, they can tell you all about being “green” and saving the planet. We’ve lost focus on the building blocks of our education because we’ve put too much focus on social programs intertwined with school. Being green, saving the polar bears, treating mother earth well; who cares about this new age bs and how is it going to help my kid get ahead in life. Another thing is the free lunch social programs. The idea is that children aren’t getting fed at home, so let’s feed them at school, right? Of course, the more kids in the program, the better for the school running it, as social programs are typically funded by participation counts. Most people don’t realize this, but many sources of funding in a typical public school are directly determined by free and reduced lunch counts. Schools actually benefit by trying to get as many kids onto the free and reduced lists as possible, because the state gives the most funding to the schools that appear to be the poorest. So they’re building a business racket like a bunch of teamsters to game the federal system and rake in dough to feed kids. Aren’t they supposed to be there to educate them. Well, judging from what they bring home and say, I think not because finally,
Public schools teach one-sided revisionist history,critical information along with critical thinking is conveniently glossed-over to emphasize other points. In public school history, there were no violent indians, only the South had slaves, and all slave-traders were white. Yes, this country has some tough history to explain, but overall we’ve had a positive impact on the world and that little bit of information should be the emphasis, but remember white people ruined America and Americans are to blame for all the problems. Is it any wonder that these kids come out of the system and have no idea how to go about questioning and examining a theory. No, because the federal system says shove it down their throat until the drown in it and give up trying to understand it.
No your public education sir, isn’t worth @#$%.