Edumacation

Good Lord, the president was on the news this morning talking about how it is time to revamp our education system, because some study came out and said that 80% of our public schools are failing. Why is that Mr. President? It's not because failing schools need more money, which seems to be the plan. I'm sorry sir, but you don't throw more money at a broken system. All you end up with is a more expensive broken system. It's because Liberals have been in charge of our education system for the past 50 plus years, and have watered down the curricula in order to make school fun and a vehicle for social indoctrination rather than education. Add the emphasis on unearned self-esteem, and you have a recipe for disaster, which is what we have in the public schools today. The private independent schools still have high standards, but they are out of the price range of the vast majority of the people in this country. I teach in a private independent school, and the tuition per year is more than a lot of people make as an annual salary.

I experienced this "dumbing down" process personally when I was in school. When I was in first grade, I was part of a pilot program involving math that used the Cuisinaire Rod system for learning arithmetic rather than the tried and true method of drill and memorization of learning addition facts and the times tables. Consequently, I had a very difficult time with math from elementary school all the way through high school. I barely passed math by the skin of my teeth. The thought of having to take college math when I got to college scared the living Hell out of me. When I started taking college courses again when I returned to college when I was in my 40s, I realized that I wasn't going to be able to meet the college math requirement for graduation unless I took matters into my own hands. I hired a tutor for a couple of years, and because of the guidance of an outstanding grad student tutor, who walked me through math from the basics through college algebra, I finally was able to enjoy math. Why? Because for the first time in my life, I was able to understand it. We started with the basics. We went right back to 1+1 and built from there. Consequently, I discovered how much fun math really is. What was sad, was the fact that I had to do the tutor route in the first place just to get comfortable with the basics and then learn what I should have learned in high school.

The No Child Left Behind Act, just like Goals 2000 and similar programs are nothing but bullshit. Yes I know that the intention behind the NCLBA was to reintroduce Phonics as a way to teach reading, but it doesn't look like that was implemented at all. I'm not sure what Goals 2000 was about anyway, except for creating more bureaucracy. Here's what I think about both programs: They are nothing but smoke screens to get more money out of the tax payers, rather than actually doing something to improve education. The NCLBA does nothing but try to improve the test scores of the kids that are on the cusp of meeting the minimum standards set by the program, because this is where the federal funding trap is set. It does nothing for the kids below that cusp, who really are the ones that need the help, and it does absolutely nothing for the kids at the top of the heap that need the challenges that will drive them to the real top of the heap. Consequently, those at the bottom are ignored and bored, and those at the top are ignored and bored, and having bored kids is not a good thing, to put it mildly.

Here's where I disagree with many of my fellow Conservatives. We really do need a national education policy that has uniform national standards for graduation, and while those standards need to be implemented at the local level, the feds need to develop those standards, and have them apply to every school district in the country, managed at the local level. There can be no exceptions for race, sex, creed or national origin. No waivers. Blacks are not stupid. They don't need to be treated like second class citizens, and educated as second class students in order to advance a social agenda that does nothing but benefit highly educated white liberals and their guilt and their entitlement of power mentality. Look at the success of the American Indian Charter Schools in Oakland, California, and the success of Dunbar High School in Washington, DC during its heyday from the middle 1800 until Dunbar became just another neighborhood school in the middle 1960s, rather then the black academic high school in, at that time, segregated Washington, DC, a school where just about every graduate went on to college...not just the free UDC, but to Ivy League schools and the US Military Academies too. The Black Conservative intellectual, Thomas Sowell, has written extensively about the education of minority children. Dr. Sowell, for those who don't know about him, was raised in poverty in Harlem, dropped out of high school when he was 16, joined the Marines and served in Korea, returned and got his GED, went on to college, and ended up with a PhD in economics from the University of Chicago. He is now 80 years old, and is the Rose and Milton Friedman Chair economist in economics at the Hoover Institute at Stanford University. I wish he was younger. I'd love to see him run for president. If he ever did, I'd show up at the polls at 5 AM, so that I could be the first person in line in order to vote for him. Check out his website and follow the links.

School is school. It's not supposed to be play time. It's about learning. Sometimes learning is hard. Also, testing is the only way that you can determine whether or not someone grasps the material being taught. I am a firm believer in standardized tests in order to show whether or not students grasp the material being taught. For those that are opposed to testing, let me put this scenario out there. Do you want a doctor treating you that hasn't passed rigorous exams certifying that they are board certified in their respective field? Do you want a lawyer representing you that hasn't passed the Bar Exam? Do you want an accountant doing your taxes who hasn't passed the CPA exam? Do you want a barber or hair dresser working on you that hasn't passed the board exams that grant them the license to practice their trade? How about the same for the electrician that wires your home or the gas fitter that makes sure that the gas dryer in your home doesn't blow up when you turn it on?

I am a musician. There are many times that I have taken an "exam" for a musical job. That exam is called an audition. Many times I have "passed" the audition, and there are also many times when I haven't. Someone else, who was a better player than I was, was hired for the job. In an other words, they scored higher on the "exam." If you read the International Musician magazine, which is the official publication of the American Federation Of Musicians, there are ads in the back announcing the various positions available in various orchestras, both major and minor. In each ad, there is a statement at the end of the advertisement: "The audition committee reserves the right to dismiss immediately any candidate not meeting the highest professional standards." There are no provisions for race or sex. All auditions are held with the committee sitting behind a screen, so they can not see the applicant for the job. Only the best qualified applicant, regardless of whether or not they are male, female, white, black, Asian, etc., gets the gig.

I am going to throw this out to Barack Obama, Mr. President, I know that you are a big government liberal. I respectfully disagree with 99% of your policies, being a Conservative. Sir, may I make a suggestion? How about using your bully pulpit to push for undoing the damage to our education system that has been caused by social engineering over the past 50 years. Don't just throw more money at the No Child Left Behind Act and expect it to get better. It won't. Push for real education reform in this country that again will raise our academic standards to being the flagship standard of the world. In addition, leave the teleprompter at home, and start showing up at some of the worst performing inner city schools, and have the principal call a school assembly. Explain to these kids the value of getting an education. Your education is a key component on why you are the President Of The United States Of America. Explain to those victims of the ghetto culture that doing good in school is not "acting white." Enough said.