|
(click on ads for more
details)
|
|
May 31, '01
Vol. 1, No. 13
=======================================
T H E S C H O O L
L I B E R A T O R
=======================================
Alliance for the Separation of School and State
-Permission granted to forward in its entirety.-
--Please distribute
widely.--
1) Call Them Autodidacts, Please
2) Sowell on Public Schooling
3) Pseudo Reform Keeps Coming Back
4) This Is Choice?
5) EduAbsurdity: Meddling Parents
PLUS
* Gatto book/Fritz video bonus package
* www.sepschool.org needs your
financial boost
* SepCon2001 Set for Nov. 16-18 in Arlington VA
Technical difficulties delayed this week's issue.
Back to our regular schedule next week.--Ed.
=======================================
THIS WEEK'S LINKS
1-----1-----1
Somewhere between our parents' generation and ours, dropping out of school
transformed from ordinary to socially unacceptable. Somewhere between our
generation and our children's, dropping out--and good, ol' fashioned
playing hooky, too, by the way--transformed
further to downright criminal. We hope you are asking yourself why.
The Dallas Morning News recently ran a five-part series on those most
heinous of all criminals, high school dropouts. [Did the NEA public
relation office write this series or what? --Ed.] In response to the fifth
article, "Stopping the Spiral," mother and homeschool parent
Barb Lundgren submitted the following letter to the editor. (Copy and
paste long urls into your browser.)
"Self Graduation"
http://www.sepschool.org/Other/Lundgren_S
elf_Grad.htm
"Stopping the Spiral"
http://www.dallasnews.com/dropouts/part5/stori
es/375421_dropforward_24.html
2-----2-----2
Thomas Sowell, commenting on yet another incident in the zero tolerance
follies, gets around to wondering why parents and voters put up with the
state of public education. In a second column, he praises a fellow
editorial writer for having the courage to say that
bored, unchallenged high school students should drop out. Too bad he
doesn't go all the way to espousing separating school and state as the
solution to these government-created education problems.
"Education or incitement?"
http://www.townhall.com/columnists/thomassowell/t
s20010330.shtml
"We Are All 'Drop Outs'"
http://www.jewishworldreview.com/cols/sowell.html
3-----3-----3
The movement to transform our socialist public education system into what
can most accurately be called a fascist system lumbers steadily forward.
Vouchers, tax credits, privatization and dual enrollment--false reforms
that would quietly place all private educational enterprise under strict
government control--continue to be proposed in state legislatures despite
failed referenda and numerous challenges in the courts. Even homeschoolers
who were
viewed as the most independent of parents are easily duped into forging
their own chains with a little government money. [The welfare state of
mind we inherited from "the greatest generation" (not) is tough
to shake off. --Ed.] Read about bribery in Iowa.
"Bill plans more money for 'dual enrolled' pupils"
http://www.dmregister.com/news/stories/c4780927/14
655595.html
4-----4-----4
Cal Thomas regales William Bennett with ineffable laud. Why? For providing
educational choice. But caveat emptor. There are plenty of inexpensive
books on how to teach phonics, we hear that the California Math
standards--public school standards after all--are a cruel joke, and it
would hardly be surprising if Bennett's version of history differs little
from the government propaganda force fed to public school children. We
have a little
secret that every homeschool parent knows: with the free information on
the web and in your local library, you can do a better job than Bennett
for nothing. Now that we've saved you $1,095, do you feel flush enough to
make a donation to the Alliance? Our webpage project
could use it... See below.
"School Vouchers are Dead, School Choice is Not"
http://www.townhall.com/columnists/calthomas/ct200
10530.shtml
5-----5-----5
EduAbsurdity: You know, parents are a real pain. They have the nerve, the
audacity, the utter gall to ask inconvenient questions about their own
children's education. See how meddlesome they can be...
"Addressing the State of Parent-Teacher Relations"
http://washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/education/A581
67-2001May21.html
=======================================
BONUS OFFER. Save $15.00! Buy John Taylor Gatto's magnum opus, "The
Underground History of American Education," plus Marshall Fritz's new
video, "Public Schools Are Destroying America and What You Can Do
about It." Regularly $45, get both for $30 plus
$3.50 S&H. Call (559) 292-1776 Monday-Friday, 9 to 5 Pacific time; ask
for the School Liberator Bonus Package. Or fax us anytime at (559)
292-7582. Visa/MC/AmEx/Discover accepted. Snail mail OK, too.
=======================================
HELP UPGRADE Sepschool.org
Still looking to reach our budget goal of $25,000 for
a much needed website face lift. Steve Brock is already
hard at work redesigning www.sepschool.org.
Take a peek.
http://sbrock.hobbiton.org/clients/sepschool/
Any amount is greatly appreciated. Please email your
contribution amounts to mailto:Morgen@psnw.com
If you pay by credit card, have her call you back for the
number so all is secure.
=======================================
SepCon2001 is set for Friday-Sunday, Nov. 16-18, 2001, the weekend before
Thanksgiving, at the Hilton DoubleTree Hotel in Arlington VA. Pencil it in
your calendar now.
=======================================
SCORECARD
Total Proclaimers (as of May 31, 2001): 12,723
New Proclaimers year-to-date: 1,093
Top three states in Proclaimers per million population:
Minnesota, 177; New Hampshire, 146; Utah, 125.
See all states at
http://www.sepschool.org/cgi/ranking.cgi/PPM0
SIGN THE PROCLAMATION or get a family member to: "I proclaim publicly
that I favor ending government
involvement in education."
http://www.sepschool.org/Proclamation
WANT TO SOUND OFF? Discuss education issues with fellow articulate School
Liberators. Go to
http://www.sepschool.org/Other/eGroupsDiscussion.htm
COMMENTS OR QUESTIONS? Send us your message at mailto:ccuthbert@fix.net
WORD OF MOUTH is the most efficient means of marketing the Separator
philosophy. Please forward this newsletter to your family, friends and
associates.
=======================================
FINAL THOUGHT
By the long lure of planned grass, a society of bison may be decoyed to
captivity in the Valley of Security.
In moments of uneasiness, its bulls may be soothed by the voices of the
herders saying: "You are free at any time to go back to the plains.
Remember the grass there? It was poor and many of you were hungry."
There is no going back, because, first, these gentle herders
are rough with the few who try to start a stampede, and secondly, tame
grass is sweet poison. From the eating of it the way of life on the plains
is soon forgotten. To many whose stomachs were never so full before, even
the memory of it is harrowing. If one asks, "But will the herders
always be good to us?" another answers,
"Nature was sometimes cruel."
Garet Garrett, The People's Pottage
(Truth Seeker Books, 1992, p. 75.)
=======================================
THE SCHOOL LIBERATOR is currently a FREE service of The Alliance for the
Separation of School & State 4578 N First #310, Fresno CA 93726 (559)
292-1776. We are a non-profit, grass roots educational
organization dedicated to informing people worldwide
how education can be improved for all--not
only the poor--by liberating schools from politics.
For more information go to http://www.sepschool.org
Publisher: Marshall Fritz
Editor: Cathy Cuthbert
Copyright 2001, The Alliance for the Separation
of School & State, Inc. All rights reserved.
=======================================
TO SUBSCRIBE to The School Liberator send an email
message to
mailto:SchoolLiberator-list-request@free-market.net
with just one word, "subscribe," in the BODY of
the message (not the subject.)
TO UNSUBSCRIBE do the same but with the single word,
"unsubscribe" in the body.
|
