EDUCATION IN AMERICA

After raising children - who attended various Canadian and American public school systems I have a genuine concern with the present quality of education for future generations.

What are they learning? 

If it's true according to a survey by the Jewish National League, that 40% of recent college graduates do 'not' know about the Holocaust, then do those same graduates know there 'was' a World War II - or even WWI?

What is currently being taught from kindergarten to grade 12? Or - worse - what is 'not' being taught?

In 1990 the United States was ranked 6th globally in Education. So, what happened, but more importantly why?  Question: Is it easier for those governing to convince voters that 'politicians-know-best' IF entire generations of voters don't have anything to compare what 'looks/sounds' good now with what is not good for the longer term?  Scary concept. 

Personally - I'd want to govern a country [as vast and diverse as the U.S.] packed with wise, well informed, well educated, well experienced people. Wise people can look after themselves. Wise people are able to understand layers of different concepts. Wise people start and run businesses. Wise people contribute with ideas, innovation, research and development... 

When former President Bill Clinton [D] came into office in 1993 America was still ranked in the top ten globally. Regardless; Improving education was a cornerstone of the Clinton-Gore administration...Okay, what was improved? Because -- when Clinton left office in 2001 America's global education ranking had dropped to 17th. 

Clinton was followed by President W. Bush [R] [married to a former educator] who developed the catchy: No Child Left Behind, program. Well, something got left behind, because funding for education was cut everywhere federally, overshadowed after 9/11 by a vast increase in military spending. 

That steady decline in funding state public school curriculum created a surge in Charter Schools that competed with so many [failing] public schools. America's global education ranking by 2018 was even lower still at 27th. [Interesting to see which countries were a head of the U.S.]

IF, the United States is to 'keep-up' let alone complete in a world of medicine, technology, efficient [natural] food production, clean[er] energy etc...America needs an entire nation of well educated or well read or well informed people with the ability to use critical thinking. Henry Ford understood the value of creating shared autonomy when he not only increased pay for his assembly workers from $1 a day to $5 a day - he paid all of his workers the same including minorities.

Which brings us to the subject of how income affects education. Does higher income/more tax money make better schools? Let me answer that question by asking another. Using New Jersey as an example; how many schools face seriously deferred maintenance in lower income districts compared to higher income districts? Answer: Paterson, New Jersey [median income $32,915] needs an additional $500,000 just to meet base safety standards, but in Tenafly, New Jersey [median income $140,923] no schools have deferred maintenance.

Would a national federal standard requiring a fairer distribution of education tax dollars mean that schools in Paterson get their school roofs inspected every five years like Tenafly? You bet. Would it mean teachers are paid better? You bet. Would it mean that school supplies are supplied by the school and not the teachers? You bet. Would it mean that music is as important as math? You bet. 

Using simple math [because I'm a writer] lets pretend New Jersey and all 49 other states [and 5 territories] averaged all incomes then created a national standard for the same amount of each education tax dollar collected, from each taxpayer to each school - regardless of district median income. 

 ..........

 Ammunition for the War-On-Poverty is an 'equal' primary education - followed by equal opportunity to certify in a trade or earn a two year associate degree or full four year degree.

...........

President Trump [R] [who didn't go to public school] appointed Betsy DeVos [who also didn't go to public school] as Education Department Secretary. Was DeVos okay with the status quo of a diluted, inequitable public school funded curriculum? Apparently so, because what did Betsy do with some of her budget? Betsy scrapped guidance that attempted to reduce suspension rates for students of color; she eliminated how districts could consider race in school integration plans, but nothing about ensuring every student had enhanced learning or a clean, safe building in which to learn. 

*Education budgets are routinely cut, but somehow Congress found $8.6B to allocate for Covid19 relief. 

Let us now take a look to Miguel Cardona [who did go to public school] the pick for Education Department Secretary, by President Biden [D]. Perhaps [if confirmed] Cardona might consider a few What-Ifs :

*What if music, yoga and team sports was standard in all primary K-12 public schools?

*What if a Life-Skills program was standard [girls&boys] for grades 9-12 with home budgeting/using credit, simple investing, a simple tax return, cooking, sewing, nutrition, simple electrical, plumbing, carpentry? 

*What if History was K-12 with American History K-4th then World History 5th-12th with how America came to fit in? How about world geography too - Fischer Price toys makes nice map puzzles!]

*What if a second language and English [with grammar] was K-12?

*What if we actually showed our kids equality by supporting all schools regardless of zip code?

*What if we addressed the sources of school bullying by helping the bullied and the bully?

*What if the nation was standardized so no matter where kids lived they received the same high quality primary education?

*What if our kids were taught TO think not just fed limited-diluted information of 'what' to think?

*What if the same education standard we had in the mid 20th Century was returned to all American primary schools in the 21st Century?

*What if it was unconstitutional to cut primary school budgets? [Perhaps cut the salaries of administrators instead...]

*What if America brought back the 'DRAFT' but with a focus on conscripting our youth to complete a Gap-Year of domestic-public-service immediately after high school graduation?   [Teens in the northwest would be sent to the southeast and reverse - then teens in the southwest would be sent to the northeast and reverse. Kids in foster care wouldn't be dumped out on their own at 18 and homeless teens would have a place to go with purpose. Kids from higher income families would work with kids from middle and lower income families...Each new generation of senior teens would develop greater maturity while they experience other parts of America, working anywhere there is a need for volunteers in any community. The teens would get a distinctive uniform - their food and logging provided - earn $1 an hour - and their first year of college or training for a trade, paid for.  Just a thought...]

And now we come to the zoom upward in college and university tuition...What's 'that' about?  Starting in the late 1990s and for a runaway decade into the early 2000s, pseudo colleges popped up in office spaces on side streets and in strip malls offering 6month, 10month and 18month  'certificate-classes' in a variety of fields in everything from medicine to real estate to food and then some.

Somehow these schools got authorization to offer second-tier diplomas and their students got the ability to qualify for student loans. Though getting a job after graduation was not so easy. However, millions of dollars in fees for student loans were funneled to hundreds of these businesses for classes taught by people with marginal experience or qualifications.

Observing the lucrative diversion of student loan money heading in the direction of so many smaller and 'pop-up' colleges - prompted the larger established state colleges and universities to steadily raise their tuition rates [almost] with every semester. The result [so far] has been twenty years of graduates with artificially high student loan debt and interest rates.

Because of fractured standards America falls behind. And too many people elected to serve in public office [employed by us/their peers] patch programs that will leave the vast majority our next generations poorly prepared to compete with the rest of the globe - because - they won't know what they don't know - until they discover they can't keep up.

But anyone on Biden's new cabinet and anyone who represents your state and county is only an email or phone call away. So let your federal and state representative know you exist and how you feel and what's important to you. Be informed and stay informed.

"KNOWLEDGE IS POWER" Elizabeth Smith Friedman  

 https://medium.com/@BraveNewFilms.org/heres-how-to-contact-all-535-members-of-united-states-congress-call-email-tweet-20b8a1c54195

*Sherrie Todd-Beshore is a mystery suspense novelist and former journalist... 

Via amazon.com or patchworkpublishing.com 

MG/YA Mystical-Adventure: "The Crow Child"

MG/YA Mystery Series [Mosquito Creek Detective Club]: Book1 "Mosquito Creek Inn"