I've almost always fallen on the left hand side of many issues, a fact that is most of you already know. For a long time I just agreed with a liberal way of thinking about the education issue as well. It wasn't until recently that I fully grasped the importance of this singular issue over practically all others. However, before the last election, when I thought about this issue I went about it wrong. I started attempting to justify all liberal policies to better defend them from the attacks many of my more conservative friends like to unleash. A lot of them throw out this idea of school vouchers...a subject that I, as a good democrat have often criticized as detrimental to the public school system. Then It occurs to me that a lot of my friends, Liberal and Conservative alike, have attended private primary schools. I in fact, attended a private school, and I have to admit that it often seems that we liberals have no problem with rich kids going to expensive private schools, because THAT doesn't undermine public education, and we also seem to have no problem with middle-class kids going to parochial schools, that doesn't undermine public education either. The idea that letting poor public school students choose private alternatives would destroy public education is simply contrary to our experience. So in the short run it looked like I had opened up to this idea of vouchers. After all, it IS true that public education has been a public policy disaster for 40 years. Having spent around four trillion dollars on public schools since 1965, the result has been a steady and inexorable decline in every measurable standard of student performance, to say nothing of health and safety.
But here�s the deal...I see stuff like this on the boards and it really makes me come back to the crux of the issue. On a fundamental level the liberal ideal of education has always been the ideal of choice for me. When it comes down to it...I come to the realization that Educationis THE silver bullet. Education is EVERYthing. We don't need little changes. We need gigantic monumental changes. Schools should be palaces. The competition for the best teachers should be fierce. Teachers should be making six-figure salaries. School should be incredibly expensive for government and absolutely free of charge to its citizens, just like national defense, and after much thought that's my position. I just haven't figured out how to do it yet. Any ideas? |