I do have my LD son in a closed program in the public school, but because federal law is on MY side as the parent, I could send him to the school that best suited his needs.

His teachers are good decent people and the principal of that school dares to pray and honor the military.

Not only that, it is considered an honor for the mainstreamed kids to be allowed to help with the SE children, as only the most trustworthy and kindest students are allowed to interact with them.

If this trend continues, I will be sending my younger children to this school when it is time.

Yeah, there are a lot of problems with education in America right now, I agree. The solution is to start from scratch with schools free of State interference (market driven) and certainly free of beliefs and values contrary not only to that of the parents, but also in opposition to that which made America a once-great nation.

Or, as Pat Buchanan said in 1992, speaking at the HQ of the Department of Education, “We should shut this system down, padlock the doors, and fumigate the building!”

Here’s what the “Z” man forgot: It would still be twenty times better than the government educational system!

The gov’t school system is all about indoctrination; Dewey’s instruments of social change (social-control through mental manipulation), rather than what most people assume true education consists.

Therefore, homeschooling parents who started from a belief in education, bumbling along as many of them surely would; would be in a far superior position than ANY public school, no matter how well-equipped.

There is a core group of teachers at my campus (including myself) that fight the lower accountability and expectations that are showered on us from up above. On our campus, the accountability meme splits itself right down party lines. Too many of our teachers worry about what our kids can’t do instead of expanding on what they can do.

The current state of lower income and inner city schools is one that grinds on teachers until they quit, move, or give in. It takes extraordinarily principled, determined, and incredibly strong teachers to stay in it and get a campus turned around. Unfortunately, not enough teachers are willing to make that choice, and it is not an easy one. When there are other, more attractive options out there, what choice are you going to make?

I don’t blame any teacher for not wanting to get cussed at, threatened, looked down upon, or castigated by bureaucrats for wanting to have higher standards. It really is a tough gig.

Having super-lefty organizations like the NEA driving the education policy bus makes the problem worse, not better.

Several conflicting views, philosophies, and policies characterize the conservative coalition of voters that have elected Ronald Reagan and George W. Bush. An honest debate within in our movement is in order. This could be a warm-up for developing plat…

Consider Crenshaw High, a public school in the Los Angeles Unified District. The State of California revoked Crenshaw’s accreditation in the Association of Public Schools. California is gearing up for a State takeover of that school. Opting-out didn’t destroy Crenshaw High. Nobody opted out. If anything there was overcrowding. Crenshaw High had all the “local control” in the world. There were task-forces, endless study groups, tax-payer funded research. There was a major profusion of corporate cash and donations, a big fund-raising drive to save Crenshaw High.

None of that worked. Once you have a State take-over of a public school, it’s all over. And, Crenshaw is only about one of dozens of public schools in LA Unified that is earmarked for State take-over.

The system is already broken without any possibility of repair, whether parents opt-out or not.

For your information: Homeschoolers have won the national spelling and geography bees, and are consistently ahead of their peers at the same grade level.

The outrage that mere homeschoolers would beat publicly educated youngsters in spelling and geography aroused the ire of the NEA.

They screeched and howled about how these kids don’t have a social life, nor do anything fun, nor are productive except study. Homeschoolers are more well rounded than their counterparts in the public schools. Here is another little known fact: You will hear about the curve of learning and how African-American children aren’t performing up to standard in school. Well, that is true, because teaching is racist. When Afrtican Americans began to homeschool, the differences in learning disappeared. IOW, they performed as good as, or better than, their white public and privately taught peers.

All points have been proven false about how illiterate and ignorant homeschoolers are. I think you are just jealous.

In my own experience, my then fifth grade son tested at seventh grade for reading, spelling, grammar, math and general knowledge. The public school I would have sent him to for science courses didn’t have a science curriculum on his grade level, or ‘ability level’ since you want things to be dumbed down. The school had a three to one student teacher ratio. Most public school teachers would kill for that kind of class.
The school’s highest reading level at 12th grade was ninth grade, and that was pushing it. For 24 kids, you would think that they would be much higher. Well, it wasn’t. The school barely got it’s accreditation two years prior to me making the inquiries, and was routinely testing the kids at eighth grade reading levels to not only keep their accreditation, but to show that they could all make it…at a lower level. Intellectual dishonesty and education rape? I think so.

He was at 12th grade ninth month when he was 15 across the board in all core subjects. He has had songs copyrighted, along with some other intellectual property, to include working on a new Dungeons and Dragons character.

He was taking German and practicing with native speakers to improve his pronunciation and vocabulary.

He had attained the rank of Life Scout and earned
over 26 merit badges, 11 of them required, to get his Eagle rank.

My next oldest son is no less stellar in his achievements. He is the senior patrol leader in his patrol, and holds the rank of Scout, First Class and has earned a total of 12 merit badges.

My children participate in community service projects, have tutored public school children
in math and English grammar and have been sought out, well liked members of community and church.

Their level of literacy is a grade level or more ahead of their peers and has been since I have been teaching them.

So why don’t you chill and take a look at the statistics? The Wall Street Journal has taken notice and makes the observation that homeschooling will stem the tide of illiteracy, poverty and ignorance.

Your post is ill informed and a knee jerk response.

And a lot of those suckers are NEA members teaching in our classrooms today.

Zorro : “Some people may just take your advice, and you will further contribute to the illiteracy and closed-mindedness of America.”

The moonbat political commissars of the NEA are doing an excellent job of turning our children into illiterate, loony left indoctrinated morons already.

1.) Recognize that the 3 R’s are at the root of successful learning. It would scour its vast network of teachers and use its enormous wealth to pin-point successful teaching techniques and send “flying-squads” of rescue teachers to help failing schools adopt and implement successful programs.

2.) It would serve as a vast clearing house for successful curricula and implementing effective teaching/learning methods.

3.) It would never settle for mediocrity.

4.) It would…….Oh, just forget it.

You really think it can get any worse? You’re a more optimistic man than I. – Admin