The Demise Of Public Education
By Cathryn Crawford (10/01/03)
There are two issues commonly focused on by the American people at this time in our history – the war on terror and the economy. While both have to do with our everyday and contemporary survival, there is another issue that is of deep and long-lasting importance that seldom gets the attention that it deserves – the demise of the public school system in America. Public education is fading away, and while it is doing so, it is taking a whole generation of children with it.
The problem lies within the very foundation of public education – the notion that education itself entails parenting and raising children instead of educating them. Instead of simply being accents of parents and families, public schools have become the families themselves, and the results have been devastating.
We are losing our unchallenged standing and superiority in commerce, industry, science, and technology to a rising tide of mediocrity. Teachers are no longer concerned with whether or not their students have a firm grasp of the core curriculum – they are more concerned about whether or not they offend someone with their curriculum. Instructors must embrace every child’s opinion – no matter how wrong it may be - in order to teach them in a politically correct manner. Teachers are taught in college to teach from every point of view, so instead of a nationalistic viewpoint, the content is more general, and students suffer from the lack of depth and detail.
Public schools are facing declining test scores, poor performance, high functional illiteracy rates, watered-down curriculum, and declining standards, and yet no one sees any correlation between these statistics and the expanded role of public schools as socialization centers. Public education has become all things to all people, and academics are suffering. It has become so focused on providing nutritional, medical, psychological, religious, and social care that it has lost sight of its original purpose – to educate. Public schools are no longer places of learning – they are set up instead to be social service centers that, according to Sharon Robinson of the American Educational Research Association, “accelerate progression toward the day when reform is guided by the joint efforts of researchers, practitioners, parents, social workers, health professionals, law enforcement officials, members of the business community, and other civic-minded citizens.”
Beyond the very important argument that the government makes a horrible parent, there is the added issue of “busyness” that has overtaken schools. By focusing on too many programs, their standards are lowered and their focus on the details of academics – science, history, and language – is lost. Instead of making sure that students have a firm foundation of knowledge, public schools are focusing on solving the social problems of the community around them. Instead of education, it has become socialization.
Is there a solution? Not under the existing structure. In a socialistic system – our current public educational structure - there is no competition; therefore there is no incentive for improvement or innovation. Public schools have a monopoly on the education market. Private and charter schools are only allowed to compete on a limited level because of high costs.
The only viable solutions that can be seen are either complete privatization of the public school system, or, barring that, school vouchers. Competition improves quality, and until we see public schools having to fight for their funding, we will see no improvement whatsoever in the educational system. When schools are privatized – when the government is no longer a factor in education – then we will see a difference; with vouchers, parents no longer are chained to a horrible district – they can take their money and children elsewhere.
(Printer friendly version) Email: Cathryn Crawford
