US Public Education needs Reform

The AJC article 12/3/16 on the age discrimination lawsuits being filed by Atlanta public school teachers who were fired after the cheating scandal confirms the depth of our public school problems. The pension system is the prize and these teachers are fighting to stay so they can collect these pensions. 

I think we need more than vouchers and school choice to solve the problems in public education. This might improve student performance, but is will not solve the cost or content problems.

We need to remove the Muslim and Liberal political indoctrination from public schools completely.  We need to convert teacher’s defined benefit pension plans into 401K defined contribution plans. We need to completely reform school districts to run “bottom-up” not “top-down”.  We need to break up big city school systems to make school systems smaller and classes more homogenous.

The best education today is achieved with homeschooling. The parent is the teacher.  It was also best when the student hired a tutor.  If the tutor didn’t teach, the student would get a better tutor. There were no lawsuits, no discrimination complaints, no expensive bureaucracy, no pension plans and no union rules.

To take the cost out of education, we already have the technology that would allow internet classes. E-books need to be on line and tests can be taken from a computer. Written work can be typed and submitted. Handwriting can be its own course.  They key to this working is to offer a “classical” education with reading, writing and math.

The problem that keeps the existing school model in place is daycare.  It may be cheaper to hire your own home-based teaching assistant to lead learning at home on days when students don’t need to be physically at school.  They would see to it that students “cover the material” and take their tests. They could schedule recess with the other groups in their neighborhoods. Schools could have class 2 days a week to concentrate on tutoring in a variety of settings. The classroom control problem could be mitigated. Expenses for K-12 could be tax deductible.

Norb Leahy, Dunwoody GA Tea Party Leader