“The Department of Education was set up in 1980 — and since that time, we have spent almost almost a trillion dollars and we have watched our performance scores continue to go down,” says Education Secretary-designate Linda McMahon. “It’s not working.”
10 Comments on Linda McMahon: The Department of Education is not working
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Results are inversely proportional to every single dime put in after legitimate functions of any government program are funded.
Although she is correct in what she speaks, eliminating the agency wholesale would, in my opinion, not budge the “embicile” meter one inch.
The problem lies in the individual states bending the knee to the teachers unions, which are made up of radical feminists communists (or communist feminists, it’s hard to tell which cause they align most with).
Although my kids are adults now, I’ve been pounding the drum for decades in favor of the school voucher system. If you use the public school system (as detrimental as that is) then your state taxes remain the same, but if you opt out and use either private religious schools or home school, you get a tax credit that offsets the extra cost of educating your kids.
The teachers unions have declared this the beach they are willing to die on. They suck at their job, can’t educate, only indoctrinate, and if measured against any international standard, would be exposed as incompetents. This is why they are such big contributors to Democrats……….quid pro quo.
Depends on what you think their ACTUAL GOAL IS.
Education has been trainwrecked by Marxism. The DOE has been the catalyst and should be eliminated. Federal oversight of the educational system should only be necessary if there is corruption, abuse or miss management at the state level that can’t be resolved by state authorities or legislation. That can be handled by a federal law.
Creating another Central planning agency to oversee the educational system can again, be used as a conduit for money laundering and Marxist indoctrination when a Democrat Administration is in control. Therefore, the DOE should not continue to exist.
@Rich Taylor: Something to think about – public schools have to take all students and try to educate them. Private schools can kick the dangerous, the distracting and the downright criminal out of their system. This is a huge private school advantage because public school teachers spend an inordinate amount of time on a relatively few troublesome students that they can’t get rid of.
Public education needs a lot of changes, but I would start with just a couple. First, I would change the mission of a school from “we will educate your child” to “we will provide an opportunity for your child to receive an education.” Instead of spending a lot of time on students who do not want to take advantage of the educational opportunity, they will either make the cut and receive an education, or not make the cut and be out of the system.
Second, students should be fairly evaluated and, if they refuse to take advantage of the educational opportunity, they should be kicked out of school. If a student is failing at age 16 or is a discipline problem (one usually leads to the other), they are gone. If a student is under age 16 and failing or a discipline problem, they are banished to a “continuation school” until they either get their act together or turn 16. This seems harsh, but it much fairer to the vast majority of students who can be educated. Too many government officials believe that all students can be educated – I can think of many reasons this is not true.
A lot of people on this thread have spotted a lot of valid issues that need to be addressed, but I would start with these.
“teachers spend an inordinate amount of time on a relatively few troublesome students that they can’t get rid of.”
But they can get rid of them. If a student is disruptive or dangerous, he can be expelled. Their first obligation is to ensure the safety of the other students, and if a kid compromises the safety of others, out he goes. Sure, the school has to exhibit the will to follow through and do it. This is where they get pushback from the teacher unions, who want minority kids insulated from the normal disciplinary measures meted out to white students because, you know, equity and all.
“we will provide an opportunity for your child to receive an education.”
But they don’t provide any education in the strictest sense, they offer revisionist history, indoctrination, no standard of achievements, and a grading system based on race or skin color and not merit. Even the most receptive of students come away with a skewed impression of his country as systemically racist and oppressive to certain classes of people. And they are ill-prepared to compete internationally for any job opportunities because they lack the basic levels of critical thinking, problem-solving, math, or communication (both speaking and writing) skills.
If the collective group of teachers had a diabolical plan to shirk their duties entirely and leave our kids lazy, dumb, and dependent on the government to take care of them forever, they could not have done a better job than what they are doing now. Of course, this has been my suspicion all along, a concerted effort to train little automatons to do whatever the government tells them to do because they can’t think for themsleves.
Parent Teachers Associations have zero impact at the Federal Level. Bringing it back it the individual states will give them a voice. Burn that department down now. My kids all went through the public school system. But things have gotten so bad not one of my grand kids will go to a public school.
my kids went ro public schools, and the biggest single factor is parental involvement. An educational opportunity
? By all means. As to behaviour etc., it is THE PARENTS’ job to send the child to school rested, fed, supplied, and ready to learn (learn English at home). Watched quite a few (peers) crash and burn when there are irresponsible adults involved. As noted, the teachers work at Least Common Denominator level, so the whole class suffers.
“Students can be expelled.” In theory – true. In practice – not true. But I was actually advocating for allowing students 16 and older to flunk out. As things stand now, schools cannot expel students for failing classes.
“Educational opportunity.” I agree that there are many schools and educators who shirk their educational responsibilities. But there are a lot of dedicated teachers and administrators as well. There is this warped mentality that schools can force students to learn; schools cannot do this for a variety of reasons. So I would make it clear that either your student will take advantage of the opportunity, or not – your choice – but don’t think schools can forcibly make your kids learn.
@Sippin’ Covfefe: I could not agree more. A couple of my friends are teachers and they get virtually no support from admin when the parents come in to protect their children or if they ignore their kids.
None of the problems with public schools will be solved until parents voices are heard. You figure it out.