"I know no safe depository of the ultimate powers of the society but the people themselves; and if we think them not enlightened enough to exercise their control with a wholesome discretion, the remedy is not to take it from them, but to inform their discretion by education. This is the true corrective of abuses of constitutional power." - Thomas Jefferson 1820

"There is a growing technology of testing that permits us now to do in nanoseconds things that we shouldn't be doing at all." - Dr. Gerald Bracey author of Rotten Apples in Education

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Saturday, July 3, 2010

The Most Dangerous Place in the World is Between the Teachers Unions and the Public Trough

The Most Dangerous Place in the World is Between the Teachers Unions and the Public Trough:
The NEA posted a video on YouTube – which it has since, remarkably, taken down – with the headline, “The issue is JOBS.” Naturally. The most dangerous place to stand in the world is not on the streets of Baghdad or Kabul – it’s between teachers unions and the public trough.

Thursday, July 1, 2010

A Homework Assignment for Missouri Watchdogs

Okay, watchdogs. You have a homework assignment. We're working on a story regarding history textbooks used in Missouri. Sometime during the next two weeks, call your district's office and ask the name of all textbooks it is using for US History and World History courses. Be sure to get the edition and publication date of each text.

We have discovered an objectionable textbook currently used in several St. Louis metro area school districts. We are under the initial impression the textbook contains severe distortions of historical fact in favor of political/religious correctness. We are compiling our facts and would appreciate your help in compiling a list of books used in Missouri.

To get you started, here is a list of 28 objectionable books compiled by Dr. Dennis Ybarra of The Jewish and Research, San Francisco:

http://jewishresearch.org/PDFs/TWT_AppxA.pdf

Dr Ybarra's group is not for profit, and addresses "anti-Semitism and anti-Israelism" in American education from K-12 to higher levels. Research and drop us a line if your district uses one of these 28 books on the list. We would like to know the books used in your district even if they do not appear on this list.

Read what your children are learning. You want your child to learn historical fact, NOT political distortion.

Sunday, June 27, 2010

Educational study proves taxpayers are paying extraordinary amounts for ordinary results

A revealing study has been released by Big Government showing students' test scores have remained relatively flat through four decades, even though spending has more than doubled.

http://biggovernment.com/acoulson/2010/06/05/the-u-s-economy-needs-fewer-public-school-jobs-not-more/

Note one quite interesting fact in this work: "Over the past forty years, public school employment has risen 10 times faster than public enrollment. There are only 9% more students today, but nearly twice as many public employees. To prove that rolling back this relentless hiring spree by a few years would hurt student achievement, you'd have to show that all these new employees raised achievement in the first place. That would be hard to do...because it never happened."

The increased spending began in 1970....FORTY YEARS AGO. With all the billions of dollars thrown at the educational problems, test scores have barely increased.

Do you see the fallacy in this approach? More money, more staffing, more testing and more mandates are not the answer. How long do we keep repeating mistakes before we realize this theory does not work? How many billions of dollars will Arne Duncan throw at education for no discernible benefits?

We've been able to dodge Race to the Top twice now, let's keep up the pressure so it is finally off the table. Money promised for more federal control, which has not resulted in student achievement, is not the answer. Money given with strings that will create more state debt is not the answer.

Perhaps the Department of Education needs to be disbanded. Think of the money that would be saved...and that money would go directly into the schools, not to a bureaucratic department in Washington. Imagine that...money could be spent on programs and needs of students, not on unions and unnecessary public officials. States cannot afford to fund the Federal Government for mediocre results. Now that's a common sense idea.
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