Removing The Flaws From Public Schools

A teacher’s union paper in New York recently reprinted a column of mine, headlined, “Re-arrange the Letters in `Rosemond’ and You Get `Moron Sed’.”

Farther down, I am described as an “`expert’ who never misses an opportunity to skewer public education.”

As my more faithful readers know, I employ my so-called “skewer” in a fairly impartial manner.

Over this column’s 23-year life, it has impaled: the self-esteem movement; specialists who argue that attention deficit disorder results from genetic anomalies; New Age “cures” for ADD; liberals who argue for anti-spanking legislation; and religious conservatives who believe sparing the rod spoils the child, to name but a few.

Yes, I have skewered public education; nonetheless, I am in favor of it. I am simply distressed by the direction public education has taken since the late ‘60s.

A fitting extension of the Nanny State, its educational mission has been co-opted and replaced with the pseudo-educational goal of making children feel “special,” an adjective which, when combined with “person,” forms an oxymoron.

I believe the federal government’s role in public education, once useful (albeit always afoul of the 10th Amendment), has become counterproductive. It should disentangle itself from the monster it has helped create, leaving educational matters to the states.

I have been a proud, outspoken critic of every fad public schools have foolhardily embraced over the past 30 years, including cooperative education, whole language, outcome-based education, open schools, “new math,” and values clarification. None of those has lived up to its advance publicity.

I don’t believe public schools need more money per pupil. I think they need to trim their fat. The most successful egalitarian school system in the nation — Catholic — does a better job than public schools (across the demographic spectrum!) on about two-thirds the money per pupil and less than a third the number of administrators.

I believe one key to public education’s rehabilitation is putting the National Education Association in its proper place. It has no more right to dictate educational policy (which it does through its federal “front,” the Department of Education) than the AFL-CIO does to dictate car designs to Ford Motor Co.

I believe in school vouchers because I believe competition for the education dollar will result in improved quality across the board. In other words, vouchers will result in improved public education, not in its demise, as many critics of vouchers claim.

Now you know why a teacher’s union official in New York challenges my self-esteem. Can you blame him?