|
(click on ads for more
details)
|
|
July
20, '01
Vol. 1, No. 22
==================================
T H E S C H O O L L I B E R A T
OR
==================================
* Loosing Optimism * Teacher Shortage * Phantom Classes *
* Linda Bowles Says the Words *
--> After more than 20 years of presiding over a school system that has
gone from bad to worse, California Superintendent
of Schools Delaine Eastin is mercifully calling it quits.
--> "Frankly, I'm starting to lose my sense of optimism,"
Eastin told columnists Phillip Matier and Andrew Ross.
--> Eastin wasn't referring to her daily routine of marginalizing
parents, degrading curricula, usurping local control, harassing
homeschoolers and generally maintaining the juvenile incarceration
franchise. Despite the public's depression over government schools she
told Matier and Ross, "I love the public policy part..."
Somehow, we didn't doubt it.
--> Cracks in the Edifice: The teacher shortage in New York is the
largest ever. The City is looking for 8,000 teachers
by September, that's 10% of all the teaching positions in the city
schools. AP reports: "School officials are recruiting
teachers from Italy, Spain, Barbados, Jamaica and Austria and have
authorized a $6 million ad campaign to lure teachers to the
classroom." Maybe educational freedom is closer than we think. More
below.
--> At the same time, a new scheme to combat truancy has been proposed.
The New York Department of Education wants attendance to be taken at every
class period. The NY Post says that their investigative reporting is
behind the proposal.
--> "The Post first reported in December 1997 that officials at
Brandeis HS in Manhattan set up phantom classes that never met, and
counted hundreds of no-show students. Two weeks after the first report,
The Post found similar abuses at three other city schools."
http://www.nypostonline.com/news/regio
nalnews/29221.htm
--> So we're wondering what's to stop school officials from falsifying
the new attendance reports?
================ ANNOUNCEMENTS =================
--> Your donations are starting to roll in for our website upgrade.
Thanks, and to those still on the sidelines, there's
a way to go to reach our goal with less than two weeks left. We need
$8,500 to pay our new webmaster to upgrade other areas of the website. We
are hoping for a $1,000 gift, three $500 gifts, and a whole bunch of gifts
from $25 to $250. We need your commitment of support by July 30 to be able
to secure Geoff Braun's services for the rest of the work. Email Morgen
with your pledge mailto:Morgen@psnw.com
or call
559/292-1776.
Take a look at our new homepage http://www.sepschool.org
and show us how much you like it with your donation. As always, we thank
you for your generous support.
--> SepCon2001 is set for Nov. 16-18 in Arlington VA, the weekend
before Thanksgiving, at the Hilton DoubleTree
Hotel in Arlington VA. We have a SepCon2001 page listing the speakers and
topics. Registration information, too. Go to
http://www.sepschool.org/sepcon.html
Mark your calendar now.
======== SPECIAL OFFER ========
In "Educational Freedom Might Be Closer than We Think," Alliance
President Marshall Fritz describes how separation will be just as big a
surprise as the fall of the Berlin Wall. Get this 60 minute audiotape as a
School Liberator special--$1 plus $3.50 shipping--a full $7 discount. Call
Morgen at 559/292-1776 to order.
================================
The Other Half of the Wretched School Failure Story
By
Linda Bowles
There was a time, let's call them the good old days, when parents could
send their little children off to school with full confidence they would
be in good hands.
Sadly, the good old days are gone.
It is appropriate that most of the criticism of government schools deals
with academic failure. But that is only half
the wretched story. Contrary to what many parents think, most of those
responsible for the education of our children are not socially and
politically neutral. They are ideologues with an agenda.
While a good case could be made to say we are on the verge of being
overrun by an avalanche of academic ignorance, it would not be
accurate to say our kids are graduating empty headed. Perhaps it's time
for another updated review of some of the important things our children
are learning in government school classrooms.
While Johnny and Jill may not be learning how to read, they are learning
that: teachers are underpaid, G-d is irrelevant, big business is ruining
the environment, the Bible says driving an SUV is a sin, rewards should be
based on need rather than performance, bisexual individuals are under the
command of unstable genes, the Alamo was a great Mexican victory, society
rather than the individual is responsible for crime, saving the sucker
fish is more important than saving farmers, teachers' pay should be
doubled, a diversity of cultures and languages is America's strength,
Thomas Jefferson was a racist, two plus two equals whatever, competition
is destructive, the right to be wrong makes wrong right, the Boy Scouts
are a hate group, Ronald Reagan is responsible
for the disappearance of the dinosaurs, the Catholic Church is a hate
group, defending yourself promotes violence, the government is the source
from which all blessings flow, Southern Baptists
are a hate group, high taxes are good for America, equality is more
important than excellence, carbon dioxide is poisoning the world, cops
hate black people, putting a condom on a cucumber is child's play, the
Salvation Army is a hate group, the
Constitution is obsolete, G-d is a homophobe, porpoises are smarter
than people, the Constitution requires the government to censor religious
speech, taxes are the same as charitable contributions, boys and girls are
exactly the same except girls are better, the
toleration of evil is a virtue, moral discernment is a hate crime, cutting
taxes is like stealing from poor people, American Indians would not have
polluted the environment even if they had known
how, George Washington was a racist, rich people enjoy stomping on poor
people, the condom is mightier than the conscience, Christopher Columbus
infected the natives with syphilis, one
person's opinion is as good as any other, the American Constitution was
written by racists and sexists, Ronald Reagan is responsible for the
spread of AIDS, teachers should be paid as much as NFL
quarterbacks, sex between consenting children is inevitable, all sexual
orientations are created equal, religious people are bigots, in the
beginning there was a big explosion, a family is any collection of
oddballs living under one roof, the right to kill babies is in the
Constitution, it is un-American to have
more than someone else does, the only hope of the world is for workers
everywhere to unite, and it is the constitutional responsibility of
government to provide jobs, housing, clothing,
condoms, hot lunches, living wages, family leave, child care and band-aids
to all citizens. It is little wonder that more and more parents are
frightened and frustrated as they watch their children
grow away from them and become like strangers, full of strange ideas.
It is time to face the wretched reality that the American classroom has
been appropriated by liberal ideologues. Their
goal is to strip away all vestiges of religion, and fill the vulnerable
psyches of children with the secular mind-sets,
ideas and philosophies that will resonate with a hedonistic and
socialistic society.
One answer to the problem of education in America is school choice. A
better answer is complete privatization, with a high wall of separation
between state and education. This will subject schools to that tried and
true, all-American, marketplace competition, which demands results,
instills discipline and accountability,
relentlessly drives toward excellence, and puts customers (parents and
children) first.
It is time to return to parents control over the education and
"upbringing" of their own children. When and by what
authority did the government take charge of the children? Whose children
are they, anyway, and why, in the land of the free and the brave, has it
become necessary to ask such a question?
(c) 2001, Creators Syndicate
http://www.jewishworldreview.com/0
701/bowles.html
==============================
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/eGro
upsDiscussion.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
"[I]t is not hard to imagine a day when children will become property
of the state upon leaving the birth canal. Already on some kibbutz
communal farms in Israel children hardly even live with their parents,
instead spending most of their time in separate barrack facilities. Laws
and
regulations lowering the school age and subjecting non-abusive parents to
scrutiny by school officials are merely designed
to desensitize the average American to this brand of radical sociological
tinkering."
Frederick B. Meekins in "Sons of the Red Pioneers: Lowering of School
Age & Other Questionable Academic Reforms Promote the Cause of
Socialism"
http://americanworldview.tripod.com/
==============================
THE SCHOOL LIBERATOR is 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@fr
ee-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.
|
