Home of Today's Common Sense

Published – Brownsville Herald 7/27/2003
I just read the viewpoint of Justin Raines entitled “Reasons why taxes going up” with pleasure. Though I don’t agree with the basic arguments raised, I was indeed impressed with the articulate description of his point of view and the amount of work that obviously went into the commentary.
The points raised were substantially, that we have to pay more local taxes to make education better, because the federal government will not give us more money, and that the federal government would be able to do that if the rich would pay more in taxes.
Of the most critical importance to us here in Brownsville at this moment are two positions that I can support easily: You can indeed change things with your vote (if you vote and most don’t) and helping schools to effectively provide a good education is helping yourself and the community as a whole.

The first issue of voting is at the seat of most other problems; not enough people vote in the polls; they vote by their absence, thereby accepting the status-quo.
Most important to education though, is how the money is spent to provide the education, and the assumption that everyone will be able to- and choose to- assimilate the information provided within the same time frame and then, be able to- and choose to- apply the information in a real world situation. The President recently said that everyone graduating from school should meet certain criteria in reading, writing etc; but he didn’t say that it must be done in 12 years just as Universities do not require a student to graduate in 4 years, as was the expected norm just a few years ago. Some folks because of a lack of certain initial skills just require more time to assimilate the information provided, others just choose not to do it then but may be motivated later, to secure the information needed to demonstrate the competence to graduate.
I think it is important to note that good teachers can go a long way to motivate students to gain this information but they can only make it available for the student, in such a way that it can be understood and assimilated, they can not and should not be solely judged on the amount of information retained by students; only on the skill with which the information is made available.
The school system must provide a positive environment from which teachers present the information and the students to learn it. It is the responsibility of the local community to assure that the school system provides that kind of environment.
Throwing lots of money at a poor system of education does not guarantee well educated students. In Washington, DC a city that has the highest spending for students also has the worst results.
The current system does not provide for any accountability when there is administrative lack of success. The Board fires the Superintendent. The taxes go up to try new programs that don’t work, the bloated administration gets larger, the shortage of experienced teachers gets worse, the principals get shuffled, the education stays the same or declines and the same cast of elected representatives return or change places.
The rich can just send their kids to a private school to improve the situation; the poor can’t. It would appear that the only way to achieve accountability is with a voucher system that would let the poor choose another school if it is better. The low performing school system would be motivated by financial need to improve the quality to get students back. Capitalism works! Socialism didn’t.