Profoundly disturbing demonstration of the damage done by unionization of public schools and ending local control

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Copyright 2010 by John T. Reed

Here is a video clip from a recent episode of Jaywalking. Jaywalking is a regular bit Jay Leno does by asking people on the street simple questions to show how ignorant Americans are.

At some 4th of July celebration, Leno found three-generations of a black family. He asked each what we celebrate on 4th of July, how many original colonies there were in the U.S., and from whom did we win our independence. The current school-age kid and his parents had no clue—literally using that phrase.

Then they brought over the 50 or 60ish grandfather. He apparently had not been able to hear the prior questions asked of his son, daughter-in-law, and grandson. He not only answered each question correctly and instantly, but did so in a tone of voice that expressed surprise that Leno would waste time asking anyone such easy questions.

The grandfather and I and my Baby Boomer generation were educated in Catholic and/or public schools. I went to both. They were non-union and run by local school boards. Far less money was spent educating us. There was no busing or special ed. or ADD or extra time to take tests for some, and snow days were used only for days when grown-up businesses were unable to open—like maybe once a decade. Athletic teams and band were funded entirely by the school including supplying football and baseball cleats.

The Department of Education needs to be shut down. Reagan said he was going to do that but was unable to.

If necessary, public education should be ended altogether. Roughly speaking, it was a twentieth century phenomenon and worked fine until the 1960s. The Founding Fathers never went to public school. One-room schools like those Abraham Lincoln went to were sort of local co-ops where the often illiterate parents would pool their money and hire a school marm, often from out of town. Then public education was captured by the left and their unions and state and federal bureaucrats to get above market pay and benefits for union hacks who kickback to the politicians in the form of union political contributions and campaign workers. Since then the quality of public education has fallen off a cliff. Americans claim their kids’ education is extremely important to them. But actions speak louder than words. Their actions say they could not care less about the disasters our public schools have become—as evidenced by the fact that they whine but never vote out the bums who caused this. Indeed, those bums are Democrats and they voted them IN not OUT in 2008.

It can be fixed almost overnight by enacting separation of school and state. No more public schools. If that were done, the current schools would be sold to private operators. Most kids would continue to go to school in the same buildings, perhaps even with many of the same teachers—but getting paid private-sector market pay and benefits, not union government pay and benefits. And they would have to satisfy their customers—the parents—not government bureaucrats and union tenure rules to be rewarded.

In his PBS video series Free To Choose (you can watch it free on the Internet)—which is about capitalism not abortion—he opened one episode standing in front of an inner-city school. He said it was doing an excellent job of preparing its students in spite of the lousy neighborhood it was in. It had to do an excellent job. It was a Catholic School and as such was optional. If it did not do a good job, the parents would take their education dollars elsewhere.

Then he pointed across the street to a public school. It was lousy he said, but neither the administrators nor the teachers of that school were punished for their poor educating results. Why not? It was a union public school. They get more money than the Catholic school and almost nothing can take that money away—such is the political power of the unions.

It is crushingly obvious that public schools now exist to protect union pay and benefits and that they will reduce the amount of education they provide their students to zero or worse without the slightest qualm. The fact that America’s parent continue to watch this happen without taking any effective action against it is contemptible. But, of course, the kids we are allowing to get the lousy educations and the same ones that are getting tons of federal debt dumped on them by their parents and grandparents—so perhaps we should not be surprised.