President Obama recently commented that the reason American K-12 education is falling behind other industrialized nations is because kids don’t spend enough time in school. His plan to save our education system from its slow death spiral is simple: on a national basis we should make school days longer and extend the average school year into more of the summer months. Really? The answer to returning our school systems to their once greater glory is to force our children to sit through even more hours upon hours of the liberal indoctrinal drivel that has displaced real teaching in our nations schools? Give me a break. I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again: The spine of our public education system is broken, and no amount of Federal intervention is ever going to fix it. Why? Because it is the full weight of the U.S. Department of Education riding our education system pony style that broke it in the first place. Want to know how to fix it? Read on.

Primary school in open air. Teacher (priest) with class from the outskirts of Bucharest, around 1842.

Before we do anything, we as parents must step back and take stock of the fact that it is our individual responsibility to provide a quality education to our children, not the responsibility of the government. School districts were formed as tools to allow communities to pool their resources in order to assist parents in meeting that responsibility. The current system, which is governed by federal regulations and union contracts, has perverted that original purpose and replaced it with a behemoth of a machine whose goals have more to do with societization than education. The very school systems that we created to assist us have now usurped us, and dictate to us how our children should be taught instead of the other way around. The education of our children is our own individual responsibility. It easy to ignore that fact, but until we face it again as a people our education system is doomed.

What do we do about it? Simple. We take it back.

First of all, the U.S. Department of Education as it exists today needs to be abandoned. The federal government has no place in our public education system, and the very existence of this bloated, rotting bureaucracy is a slap in the face of every student, parent, teacher, administrator and locally elected school board member in America. Our school boards are elected by us to manage a school system that is owned by us, and they need to act that way. When the federal government decides that they are in charge, the elected members of our school boards have to stand resolute and do what they were elected to do. Represent us. If they won’t, they must be replaced. The U.S. Department of Education won’t go away on its own, but if communities across the nation turn their backs on them, and ignore them, they will become functionally impotent, with no more hold on our schools.

Part of the reason the U.S. Department of Education has gained such a stranglehold on our failing school system is that we became lazy. It’s too easy to sit at home, complaining that the system is a mess, and wondering when the government is going to fix it. As parents we have to hold our schools accountable again, and not to some federal agency, to us. We entrust our children to the school system because we believe that the specially trained teachers employed there are better able to teach our children, but how do we know? What do these people actually teach our kids? Reading? Writing? Math? Arguable considering the trending test results. Volunteerism? Activism? Socialism? Those seem to be common themes, but again, how do we know?

It is time that we demand an accurate accounting of everything that our educators are teaching our children. Every teacher must be required to inform every parent of what they intend to teach our children in their classrooms. Their syllabuses and talking points should be posted publicly, and be subject to parental review. If a teacher plans to spend their hour teaching my child how to solve simple algebraic equations, then the pre-class report will be nice and simple. A copy of the worksheet can be posted online on that class’s web page. If a teacher plans to explain to my child why a single payer health care system is preferable to a free market system, then they can post those talking points to the website as well. If the teacher plans to spend their hour teaching the proper construction of a functional irrigation system and instead the conversation turns to the effects of federal endangered species regulations on the local economy, that can be posted to the online class notes, too. These online class notes can be preserved year to year and be a tool for parents to decide what kind of a person they want teaching their kids. If we read them and find that a particular teacher manages to turn daily discussions of Shakespearean literature into daily discussions about the benefits of strong labor unions, we will be able to make educated decisions as parents as to whether or not this is the kind of person we want educating our children.

I know…you teachers out there are reading this and are up-in-arms right now screaming at me that we have no right to hold your occupation under a microscope. Too bad. You chose a profession where your actions will have a profound effect on the direction of the lives of our children. My children. And I want a say in how that education is provided. If putting your occupation under a microscope is the only way to do that, then so be it.

These are simple but important things that we can do to return our education system to its greater glory. Take back control of our childrens’ education from the federal government. Require adequate representation from the school board members that we elect to steward our schools. Demand accountability and transparency from our teachers. Not so tough, right?

Remember, your child’s education is your responsibility, and the school system is nothing more than a tool to help you provide your child the best education that you can. We can sharpen that tool, we can throw the tool out and get a new one, or we can throw the tool out for good and teach our kids at home. In the end, it’s our call. Either way, arbitrarily lengthening school days and school years on a national basis is just face makeup and yet another ploy to keep the power out of our hands and keep it in the hands of government.  That’s what got us into this educational conundrum in the first place.

Back on November 7, 2008, when President Obama was still President Elect Obama, the official website of his presidential transition was www.change.gov. When the site was first posted, on the page labeled “America Serves,” Obama outlined his plan that would require that students perform a certain number of hours of community service.

change.gov>americaserves -- November 7, 2008

Within hours of the website going live, the blogosphere was abuzz with reports of the suprising content of the page, such as aye chihuaha’s post on Flopping Aces (which is the source of the above screenshot). The official transition website stated:

“Obama will call on citizens of all ages to serve America, by developing a plan to require 50 hours of community service in middle school and high school and 100 hours of community service in college every year.” (emphasis added)

As the outrage rippled through the web, Obama’s transition team got wary of the impending backlash and within hours amended the site.

change.gov>americaserves - March 17, 2009

The new language in question, still available on the site, now reads:

Obama will call on citizens of all ages to serve America, by setting a goal that all middle school and high school students do 50 hours of community service a year and by developing a plan so that all college students who conduct 100 hours of community service receive a universal and fully refundable tax credit ensuring that the first $4,000 of their college education is completely free. (emphasis added)

Now, this might seem innocuous, until you read House Bill 1388, introduced on March 9, 2009, that “reauthorize(s) and reform(s) the national service laws” and creates a congressional committee that will analyze “whether a workable, fair, and reasonable mandatory service requirement for all able young people could be developed.”

HR 1388 IH
111th CONGRESS
1st Session
H. R. 1388
To reauthorize and reform the national service laws.
IN THE HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES
March 9, 2009
Mrs. MCCARTHY of New York (for herself, Mr. GEORGE MILLER of California, Mr. SESTAK, Mr. HARE, Mr. ANDREWS, Mr. TONKO, Mr. POLIS of Colorado, Ms. HIRONO, Mr. GRIJALVA, Mr. SABLAN, Mr. KILDEE, Mr. HINOJOSA, and Mr. COURTNEY) introduced the following bill; which was referred to the Committee on Education and Labor
A BILL
To reauthorize and reform the national service laws.
Be it enacted by the Senate and House of Representatives of the United States of America in Congress assembled,
…
TITLE VI–CONGRESSIONAL COMMISSION ON CIVIC SERVICE
…
SEC. 6104. DUTIES
…
(b) Specific Topics- In carrying out its general purpose under subsection (a), the Commission shall address and analyze the following specific topics:
…
(6) Whether a workable, fair, and reasonable mandatory service requirement for all able young people could be developed, and how such a requirement could be implemented in a manner that would strengthen the social fabric of the Nation and overcome civic challenges by bringing together people from diverse economic, ethnic, and educational backgrounds. (emphasis added)(truncated)

It is clear now, that the Obama Administration, together with the Democrat controlled congress, intends to institute a sort of civil service “draft” that would force America’s youth into compulsive community service. It is also a clear violation of the United States Constitution, which reads:

Amendment 13 – Slavery Abolished. Ratified 12/6/1865.

1. Neither slavery nor involuntary servitude, except as a punishment for crime whereof the party shall have been duly convicted, shall exist within the United States, or any place subject to their jurisdiction.
2. Congress shall have power to enforce this article by appropriate legislation. (emphasis added)

There is no doubt anymore as to the direction President Obama wants to take our country. He has quite effectively taken Saul Alinsky’s rules for radicals and applied them to running (ruining?) our country. His administration has broken all traditions and attacked the previous administration at every turn. In addition, his guard dogs have publicly and systematically attacked every commentator that has dared challenge his agenda. Together with the far left wing of the Democratic Party, he has used the current “economic crisis” as a launching pad to take control of our country and justify an expansion of the federal government that is unmatched in history.

In the name of protecting our economy, he has spent our nation into a deficit that is twice as large as any in the history of our country and threatened the very tenets of the economic system that allowed our country to become the superpower that it is today. This plan to further radicalize our youth by forcing them into involuntary servitude is just another stake in the heart of our nations freedom, and it cannot be allowed!

The main stream media is completely ignoring the direction that the underlying current of Obama’s administration is taking our country in, while at the same time ballyhooing his every individual action, and then spending countless hours on the television, on the radio, and in the print lionizing, idolizing, and exalting President Obama in ways that are eerily reminiscent of the fervent, compulsory praise given to previous and existing leaders such as Mao, Lenin, Stalin, Hitler, Chavez, Pol Pot, and Castro. It is ironic that in the past incarnations of this obviously socialist leaning economic direction, which our main stream press seemingly wants and supports, one of the first sacrifices of individual rights that are made in the name of that economic “good” is the freedom of speech. At the same time that so called journalists are heralding the destruction of free market principles, and personal economic freedom, they are also beating the death knell of their own beloved freedom of the press.

Very soon, sooner than we might think, the people of this nation are going to have to choose between continuing down an almost irreversible path to Marxist socialism, and standing up for the country that we know and love, and turn the tide against the mutiny in our political system that threatens to hijack the American way of life we know. Obama’s view of socioeconomics is so startlingly similar to those of freedom’s greatest enemies that it makes me cringe, and he is using their lessons to mold our country into a new socialist mecca! He will systematically dismantle our current form of government and economic system and replace them with his own warped vision of a new United Socialist States of America.

And how will he enforce these new policies and agendas?

“We cannot continue to rely only on our military in order to achieve the national security objectives that we’ve set. We’ve got to have a civilian national security force that’s just as powerful, just as strong, just as well-funded. -Barack Obama

It all starts with the youth. It begins by rallying them to an innocuous common cause and then using the bonds created in the pursuit of that cause to hold them together, and bind them into a malleable force. Then, when they have become a large, powerful force, they can be pointed in any direction and pushed. Then, with very little effort, the energy of that force can expound into a terrible tsunami that can destroy anything in its path!

This is scary beyond belief, and hearkens back to the Nazi Party’s “Hitler-Jugend.” As every youth in Nazi Germany was required to join “Hitler-Jugend” (Hitler Youth), soon, every youth in America will be required to join “Obama Ujana” (Obama Youth), where he will be able to rally, bind, mold and aim them into a social weapon that conservative America will be powerless to defend against.

Hitler Youth recruitment poster. The wording translates to: "Youth serves the leader. All ten year-olds into the Hitler Youth."

Not only is this a thinly veiled attempt to indoctrinate our youth into a left-wing dominated mindset, it is a carefully conceived plan to galvanize Obama’s permanent campaign and cement him as an enduring iconic power in American life.

“I begin with the young. We older ones are used up. We are rotten to the marrow. We are cowardly and sentimental. We are bearing the burden of a humiliating past, and have in our blood the dull recollection of serfdom and servility. But my magnificent youngsters! Are there any finer ones in the world? Look at these young men and boys! What material! With them, I can make a new world. This is the heroic stage of youth. Out of it will come the creative man, the man-god.

“When an opponent declares, ‘I will not come over to your side,’ I say calmly, ‘Your child belongs to us already…What are you? You will pass on. Your descendants, however, now stand in the new camp. In a short time they will know nothing but this new community’.” – Adolf Hitler

Look very closely at your children. Picture them, standing at attention in their one piece powder blue uniform wearing a navy blue beret and red armband adorned with the now universally known symbol of the permanent Obama campaign, chanting in cadence:

Obama Ujana!

Obama Ujana!

Obama Ujana!

Obama Ujana!

Obama Ujana!

Obama Ujana!

If this idea sickens and scares you as much as it does me, start contacting your Representatives and Senators now! Call them, write them, and don’t stop there. Tell them that our children are not their social labor force, and they are not fodder to promote their radical social agendas. Contact President Obama and tell him that your children are YOUR children, and that you will not allow them to be indoctrinated into his civilian national security force and become his own “Obama-Jugend”.

-Wisdom

Isn’t our leader in great company?

“You say, away with you Communists; we say, away with you imperialists.” – Mao Zedong

“I want you to know that everything I did, I did for my country.” – Pol Pot

“I have said it already, I am convinced that the way to build a new and better world is not capitalism. Capitalism leads us straight to hell.” – Hugo Chavez

“I am not a communist and neither is the revolutionary movement.” – Fidel Castro

“If the opposition disarms, well and good. If it refuses to disarm, we shall disarm it ourselves.” – Joseph Stalin

“Revolutionary Social-Democracy has always included the struggle for reforms as part of its activities. But it utilises “economic” agitation for the purpose of presenting to the government, not only demands for all sorts of measures, but also (and primarily) the demand that it cease to be an autocratic government.” – Lenin

“All great movements are popular movements. They are the volcanic eruptions of human passions and emotions, stirred into activity by the ruthless Goddess of Distress or by the torch of the spoken word cast into the midst of the people.” – Adolf Hitler

“How fortunate for governments that the people they administer don’t think.” – Adolf Hitler

“It’s not surprising, then, they get bitter, they cling to guns or religion or antipathy to people who aren’t like them or anti-immigrant sentiment or anti-trade sentiment as a way to explain their frustrations.” – Barack Obama

This was forwarded to me via e-mail. Quite pointed and quite right!

-Wisdom

“We the sensible people of the United States, in an attempt to help everyone get along, restore some semblance of justice, avoid more riots, keep our nation safe, promote positive behavior, and secure the blessings of debt-free liberty to ourselves and our great-great-great-grandchildren, hereby try one more time to ordain and establish some common sense guidelines for the terminally whiny, guilt ridden, and delusional folks who seem to be everywhere. We hold these truths to be self evident: that a whole lot of people are confused by the Bill of Rights and are so dim they require a Bill of NON-Rights.”

ARTICLE I: You do not have the right to a new car, big screen TV, or any other form of wealth. More power to you if you can legally acquire them, but no one is guaranteeing anything. 

ARTICLE II: You do not have the right to never be offended. This country is based on freedom, and that means freedom for everyone — not just you! You may leave the room, turn the channel, express a different opinion, etc.; but the world is full of idiots, and probably always will be. 

ARTICLE III: You do not have the right to be free from harm. If you stick a screwdriver in your eye, learn to be more careful; do not expect the tool manufacturer to make you and all your relatives independently wealthy. 

ARTICLE IV: You do not have the right to free food and housing. Americans are the most charitable people to be found, and will gladly help anyone in need, but we are quickly growing weary of subsidizing generation after generation of professional couch potatoes who achieve nothing more than the creation of another generation of professional couch potatoes. Get an education and go to work. ..don’t expect everyone else to take care of you! 

ARTICLE V: You do not have the right to free health care. That would be nice, but from the looks of public housing, we’re just not interested in public health care. 

ARTICLE VI: You do not have the right to physically harm other people. If you kidnap, rape, intentionally maim, or kill someone, don’t be surprised if the rest of us want to see you fry in the electric chair. 

ARTICLE VII: You do not have the right to the possessions of others. If you rob, cheat, or coerce away the goods or services of other citizens, don’t be surprised if the rest of us get together and lock you away in a place where you still won’t have the right to a big screen color TV or a life of leisure. 

ARTICLE VIII: You do not have the right to a job. All of us sure want you to have a job, and will gladly help you along in hard times, but we expect you to take advantage of the opportunities of education and vocational training laid before you to make yourself useful. (AMEN!) 

ARTICLE IX: You do not have the right to happiness. Being an American means that you have the right to PURSUE happiness, which by the way, is a lot easier if you are unencumbered by an over abundance of idiotic laws created by those of you who were confused by the Bill of Rights. 

ARTICLE X: This is an English speaking country. We don’t care where you are from, English is our language. Learn it or go back to wherever you came from! 

ARTICLE XI: You do not have the right to change our country’s history or heritage. This country was founded on the belief in one true God. And yet, you are given the freedom to believe in any religion, any faith, or no faith at all; with no fear of persecution The phrase “IN GOD WE TRUST” is part of our heritage and history, and if you are uncomfortable with it, TOUGH!

This article was posted all over the net on Dec 11, 2006.

Arctic may lose all ice by summer 2040

Tuesday Dec 12 11:45 AEDT

Global warming could leave the Arctic without ice during the summer as early as 2040, a study by a team of US and Canadian scientists shows.

“The effects of greenhouse warming are starting to rear their ugly head,” said Mark Serreze, a scientist at theNational Snow and Ice Data Centre at the University of Colorado in Boulder.

The research found that the extent of sea ice each September could be reduced so abruptly that, within about 20 years, it may begin retreating four times faster than at any time in the observed record.

Read More

All you have to do is ask one of these idiots how much snow is going to fall next year, or what the average temperature is going to be next year. Hell, ask them how much snow is going to fall, and what the temperature is going to be tomorrow for that matter. THEY CAN’T TELL YOU!!!! How can they even come close to telling us what the weather is going to be like in 20 or 40 years?
This is just another example of junk science where the extrapolation of data is engineered to “prove” the theory that is put forth. These weenies are so intent on keeping their grants that they’re willing to lie to everyone to keep the money flowing.
Wisdom

On October 18, members of the Sweetwater County Fire District #1 fire department spent a part of their morning teaching a fire prevention class to a group of preschoolers. The firefighters, mostly volunteers, came to the preschool in Rock Springs at the request of the preschool teachers, who knew that one of the firefighters’ children was a student at the school. The firefighters have done these kinds of classes hundreds of times, teaching children fire prevention and safety, and encouraging good will between them and the communities they serve. And, as the old saying goes, “An ounce of prevention….”

This time, though, there was a catch. A catch that came in the form of a Violation Notice from the Rock Springs Fire Department.

Rock Springs Fire Department -
600 College Drive
Rock Springs, WY 82901
Phone (307) 352-1475
Fax (307) 352-1481
HIDDEN EMAIL
Violation Notice

Date: 10/18/2006

To: Sweetwater County Fire District #1
3010 College Drive
Rock Springs, WY 82901

RE: Public Fire Education within City Limits*
_____________________________________________________

It has been noted that on October 18, 2006 your agency conducted public fire prevention activities*, within the City of Rock Springs, without permission or coordination with the Rock Springs Fire Department. This is a violation of the International Fire Code 2006 edition as adopted by the City of Rock Springs.

104.12 Public Fire Education. The Rock Springs Fire Department, or other agents appointed by the fire code official, shall be charged with the coordination of public fire education within the corporate limits of the City of Rock Springs.

You are hereby ordered to immediately cease in this activity and coordinate all future public fire education, within the City of Rock Springs, with the Rock Springs Fire Department. If this action continues further action may be taken, as the law requires. If there are any questions please contact the Fire Inspector at 352-1484.

Carl Blanksvard
Fire Inspector

*Emphasis Added by author.

Apparently, it is illegal in the City of Rock Springs, Wyoming to educate children about fire prevention and safety without the permission of Carl Blanksvard, the City Fire Inspector.

Historically, there has always been friction between the Rock Springs Fire Department and Sweetwater County Fire District #1. Fire District #1 was, in fact, created to do a job that the members of the Rock Springs Fire Department had previously be paid by Sweetwater County to do: give fire protection to the populated but unincorporated parts of Sweetwater County. The Rock Springs firefighters, worried that the possible success of a mixed department (partially made up of full time firefighters but mostly made up of on call volunteers) would put their own job security at stake, have for years hoped that Fire District #1 would be a miserable failure. To their dismay, Sweetwater County Fire District #1 has grown to be one of the most highly trained, and highly respected rural fire departments in the nation.

There have been many of these territorial disputes in the past. The Rock Springs Fire Department has demanded that the Fire District not participate in Safety Day at the local Wal-Mart. They have demanded that the volunteer firefighters not raise donations for the Muscular Dystrophy Association in Rock Springs. And several times in the past they have complained when Fire District #1 firefighters have provided fire prevention training to other school children in the community, both at schools, and by hosting the children at the Fire District #1 headquarters.This is the first time, however, that the Rock Springs Fire Department has gone so far as to claim that it is actually illegal for Fire District #1 to provide fire prevention education to the public.

Using their interpretation of the International Fire Code, it is also illegal for an elementary school teacher to teach the children in their classes fire education without Inspector Blanksvard’s permission. It is illegal for a teacher in the high school welding class to teach his students how to use the fire extinguisher without Inspector Blanksvard’s permission. It is illegal for the college to teach it’s personnel how to react to a fire at the campus without Inspector Blanksvard’s permission. It is illegal for Halliburton, Schlumberger, and ExxonMobil to teach their employees fire safety in their Rock Springs facilities without Inspector Blanksvard’s permission.

Give me a break! The Rock Springs Fire Department needs to get over itself, and Fire Inspector Carl Blanksvard needs to find something else to do with his time than prevent school children from receiving fire prevention and safety education. The fact is, schools are requesting these services from the staff of Sweetwater County Fire District #1 because they have found that the educational opportunities the District provides are better than those they can get anywhere else, including from the Rock Springs Fire Department. The Rock Springs Fire Department should be happy that other agencies are teaching these types of classes in Rock Springs because it means their job will be easier and their constituents lives will be safer.

More than that, even, Rock Springs’ interpretation of the 2006 International Fire Code is a clear violation of the First Amendment of the Constitution of the United States. For any government agency to think that they can force iron fisted control over any segment of public education is pure fascism, and that kind of censorship has no place in Wyoming, or anywhere else in this country. I am interested to know how the Sweetwater County School District #1 Board of Directors feels about that interpretation.

And do you know what, Inspector Blanksvard? The saddest part of all of this is that you completely misinterpreted the intent of the paragraph from the International Fire Code that you cited in your Violation Notice. The code isn’t really attempting to give you control over public fire education. What it is saying, is that it is your job to make sure there IS public fire education in the City of Rock Springs. So do your job, sir! Coordinate some public fire education in your city! Call the schools, call the preschools, call the churches, and call the businesses and tell them you want to provide quality public fire education to all of them, and tell them you will do it to the same standards that the Sweetwater County Fire District #1 is doing it now. Recognize the Fire District #1 personnel for the valuable community resource that they are and ask for their help! And if you can’t do that, stay the Hell out of the way and let the professional do their jobs.

Peace,

Wisdom

________________________________

Want to tell The Rock Springs Fire Department and the City of Rock Springs how you feel about this insanity?

Rock Springs Mayor and City Council

Rock Springs Fire Department

Chief
Brad Sarff
Phone: 307-352-1475
Fax: 307-352-1481

Battalion Chiefs
Lyle Armstrong, A Shift
John C. Rodiack, B Shift
Allen K. Bird, C Shift

Fire Inspector-Battalion Chief
HIDDEN EMAIL" >Carl Blanksvard
(307) 352-1484

Ah, the principal. Everyone remembers their principal, right? He (or she) is the head of the educational body. He was the guy whose office was seen only by the most disciplinarily helpless classmates. He had a paddle hanging on the wall in the reception area as a reminder to what would happen if you got out of line, and in the case of one of my classmates, a special paddle with her name on it. Most kids were never on the receiving end of that paddle, but just the knowledge that it was there, ready to be used, kept most of us in line. He also stood in the hallway before and after school greeting every child he saw by name, asking how their day was, how their parents were doing or how their pet dog was doing after tangling with that porcupine last week. Somehow, with some seemingly supernatural sense, the principal knew everything that was going on, at any time, inside and outside of the school.

His words over the intercom were few and far between, but when they were spoken, you knew they were important. I remember that I was in fourth grade when the principal’s voice came over the intercom to announce that President Reagan had been shot. Not a sound was made by student while he spoke, telling us that this was a strong nation, and we would survive whatever came our way. Not a sound was made by a student as the thirty seconds of silence that he asked for passed. It wasn’t that specific news that held our attention, either. It was the man who spoke it. We listened so well, because this was a man we respected, and we knew that if it was important enough for him to speak to us over the intercom about, it was damn well important enough for us to give him our undivided attention as we listened.

The principal was many things. A manager, supervising the teachers in their day to day job of educating, a maintenance man, changing light bulbs and working on boilers, a counselor, always there to lend an ear to a child in need, and a teacher, filling in for teachers who couldn’t be there. He was a politician, balancing the needs of his school with the requirements of the school board, and an arbitrator, keeping the peace between angry parents and harried teachers. He was a man with an important job.

Apparently, things have changed. Schools have gotten larger, and principals have more children and larger staffs that they are responsible for. They are treated with much less respect than in the past, be it by the students or the teachers. They have become less of figure to be both admired and feared and more of a figured to be scorned and ridiculed. Is this because of a change in the atmosphere in our schools? Yes, it is. But our principals are not just an innocent victim of that change, they are one of its harbingers.

Take for example, in one local school, the principal dislikes confrontation so much that he will simply not accept or return phone calls or make appointments to see parents. When a parent tries to handle a problem through the office, because the principal won’t see them personally, the staff is downright rude, bordering on obnoxious. A parent I know had to have their child (who has special needs) removed from the school because the principal refused to answer her complaints about physical abuse by other children on the bus and in the schoolyard. It wasn’t until they demanded funding from the school district for private education that the principal finally returned her calls. There is no excuse for this. First of all, as a Principal it is your job to deal with parents, yes, even confrontational ones. Second of all, no public employee should ever treat any member of the public rudely. And, third, as the principal, it is your job to make sure that your staff does theirs. The principal should never tolerate improper behavior from his staff. If you cannot do these simple tasks, you should find another job.

Another example, in another local school, the principal has rewritten the class schedule, shortening each of the seven daily classes by one minute, so she can have a full seven minutes every morning to lecture the school over the intercom. When asked what she talks about, the children can’t tell you. They say she just repeats herself and says the same stuff over and over. In return for her efforts, she is fully ignored by hundreds of students and their teachers for seven minutes a day, each and every day. If she ever really did say anything important, it wouldn’t be noticed anyway, because nobody is paying attention anymore. A few weeks ago, she spent ten minutes of lunch period with the kids who forgot their lunch cards in the auditorium, lecturing that they were all being willfully disobedient, and that if they continued to forget their lunch cards they would be given in-school suspension and that the school resource officer would write them tickets! What?! You’re going to take kids out of the classroom and put them in suspension because they forgot their lunch tickets? You’re threatening children with misdemeanors because they forgot their lunch tickets? Come on, get a grip! It is apparent that the children in this school are way out of control if this is the kind of hardcore troublemakers you have to deal with every day. If you can’t handle it without calling a cop, maybe you should try a new line of work.

The principal is the figurehead of an entire school. A principal must be able to command respect in all facets of their job from all those around them. They have to have a threat better than, “I’ll have the school resource officer write you a ticket!” They have to have a better reason for that threat than a kid forgetting lunch tickets. If they can’t, then they are just a pencil pushing pushover whom the student body will disobey for sport. They will invite challenge from their teaching staff, and the parents, and will spend more and more of their days diffusing out of control situations rather than managing a school, creating a downward spiral that will end where it should have started – with another form of employment.

In the next issue, I’ll get personal with the Administration. Boring, yes, but it still has to be done.

Wisdom

Without a doubt, teachers are the most visible part of the educational system. Along with being the backbone, they are the face of the educational body. They are the ones that our children see every day. They are the ones that we, as parents, usually have contact with when we have need to have direct dealings with the schools. And they are the ones who often band together in associations that work both with and against government agencies at all levels from the school boards to the White House.

In addition to being visible, teachers probably bear the most responsibility of any part of the education system. They are the people with whom we entrust our children to provide them with a quality education and a safe environment. They are expected not only to be proficient in the subjects they teach, but to also be capable day care providers, first aid givers, child psychologists, coaches and referees. They have to be schedulers, managers, and competent arbitrators. They are answerable to their students, their principals, their superintendents, their school boards, legislators, governors, congressional delegates, the President, and most of all, sometimes hundreds of parents at any one time. That is a lot of responsibility for any person to bear, and it takes a special kind of person to do it well.

If you search your memory, you can probably think of many teachers you’ve dealt with over the years that stick out in your mind as having born all those responsibilities, and more, quite well. You’ll remember many teachers who did all these things and did them with a smile on their faces and their heads always held high. Sadly, though, you’ll probably also remember a few who couldn’t handle it, who couldn’t balance the responsibilities required of their job, and definitely couldn’t handle it with a smile on their face.

So what’s the difference? What decides which teachers are going to be able to hack it and which ones just won’t make the cut? Well since you asked, I’m going to tell you. See, I have a theory about teachers, and it isn’t going to make some of you teachers very happy. I believe that there are basically two types of people who choose teaching as a profession, and every teacher, past, present, and future, can be pigeonholed into one of these two categories.

The first type of teacher is the kind that chose teaching as a profession because they believed that it was an honorable profession in which they could have a fruitful career where they make a meaningful difference in the lives of their students. They are people who saw in themselves a capacity to expand the minds of those they teach, and enjoy doing it. These are the folks who look forward to the opportunity to expand their own educations in order to be better at educating others. They have honed their skills in time management, organization, and worked hard to perfect their ability to work effectively with their students, administrators, government officials, and parents. All because they know that these skills will make them better teachers. These are the teachers that deserve our support and our praise. These are the teachers in whose classes we pray that our children end up.

The second type of teacher doesn’t deserve quite as much of our praise and support. The second type of teacher didn’t see teaching as the honorable profession that it is and didn’t care about the profound impact that they could have on the lives of their students. They aren’t interested in further educating themselves, because they aren’t truly interested in the educations of their students. Time management, organization and people skills aren’t priorities because they don’t really care if they are good teachers or not.

Why are these people even teachers? I’ll tell you. Respect. Yep, that’s right. Respect. These are people who, in their ordinary everyday lives, could neither earn nor command a lick of respect from any person they came into contact with. They didn’t get it from their classmates, their coworkers, or their past employers. These are people who always figured they deserved respect, but just didn’t quite know how to get it. These are people who joined every social group that came their way, but never got elected to a single office in those groups. So they turned to teaching. Why? Because, on day one, an entire classroom has to defer to them and call them Mr. or Mrs. Teacher. Because without developing a single leadership quality, they can become a leader to dozens of people. Because, by taking on a simple title, “Teacher,” they become an important part of our society and are immediately given the long overdue respect that they believe they deserve. As a result, many of our children’s classrooms are headed by incompetents who aren’t interested in our children’s educations, our children’s welfare, or in our children at all.

If you’re a teacher sitting there nodding your head in agreement, then you probably fall into the first category. And you probably know exactly what I’m talking about because those other teachers pass kids on to you every year without giving them the education they deserve. Those other teachers are giving your profession a bad name, and they are damaging an honest, noble, and selfless profession simply because they chose that profession for the wrong reasons.

If you are a teacher sitting there all flushed red in the neck and are absolutely pissed off at me now, then I know which category you fall into, too. If you’re pissed off, then maybe I’ve threatened your tenuous hold on the imaginary reality in which you think you are making a positive difference in the lives of our children. If you’re pissed off then maybe it’s time you consider looking for a new profession, because in this one, you’re doing more harm than good.

In the next installment, I will start working my way up the body where we will tackle the principals and the administrators. It probably won’t be as harsh, but it will be just as important.

Later,

Wisdom

The third injury warranting immediate medical attention is the backbone of the education system, the teachers. Now before you go all NEA on me, let me say that it isn’t all teachers, just like it isn’t all bus drivers or the entire lunch room staff, but it isn’t just a few anymore either. There’s a lot teachers with problems these days, and you know who you are.

First of all, as a parent, let me get this out of the way. Teachers: Don’t ever, under any circumstance, give me homework. I’ve been to school, have a diploma, have a degree, and have my own work to do. I make more money than any two of you. I don’t ever want to come home again to an assignment given to one of my kids that says, “have your parent do,” whatever! If you’re going to grade my kids based on my performance, then I’m going to start paying you based on my kids’ performance.

Furthermore, if you’re going to give my kids homework, then teach them how to do it. I understand that sometimes homework is given to reinforce what is learned in class, but come on! My kids get homework on an almost nightly basis that they have no idea how to do! I’m happy to help them, but you’re the one getting paid to teach them, so do it.

There are some things that I never, ever want to hear from a teacher again.

First, “You’re child is probably bored in here. He already knows how to do all this so he’s not learning anything.” What?! If you can’t teach him anything, find a teacher who can!

Second, “I’m sorry your child is behind, but I just don’t have time to give her the attention she needs.” Bull! We’re required by law to hand our kids over to you for an education, and you’re required by law to provide it. Either teach, or find us someone who can.

Third, “You need to talk to your legislators and tell them we need more money.” No. No. No. You want to be a lobbyist? Go to the capital and be a lobbyist. Don’t use me to lobby for you. My customers don’t call their legislators and say, “Hey, can you see what you can do about getting Island a raise?” Furthermore, don’t use my children as lobbyists. In fact, don’t use my child as a sounding board to espouse your political agendas at all. I’ll handle that part of their lives. Don’t teach them how important you think it is to have wolves in Yellowstone National Park, or how wrong you think it is to be invading a foreign country. Don’t teach them your PETA pledge or your Earth First crap. You go ahead and teach them the structure of our form of government, who does what, and how they are elected. I’ll take care of the rest of his political training.

I expect you to spend the days with which you have my children teaching them reading, writing, arithmetic, history, economics and the like. If you are unable to do this because a lack of education on your part, or because your ability to do so is clouded by some bull crap political agenda, then get another job.

Next installment? More about teachers. Sorry, but there’s just too much to cover in one episode.

Wisdom

Food. It does a body good. If it’s good food. If you get enough of it. If you get a chance to eat it.

It starts small, with little inconsistencies. For instance, on one nacho day, the kids get plenty of cheese. On the next, they get a little sprinkle of cheese but can have a bit more if they throw in an extra quarter. A child at an elementary school gets four cheese sticks with his meal, while a child at the junior high gets two. Now, correct me if I’m wrong, but I thought these meals were supposed to be nutritionally balanced. How can that be when there are different portion sizes from meal to meal? And speaking of portion sizes, I have talked to at least a half dozen parents who say their kids either go through the day hungry or purchase extra portions so they can feel full. I’m no mathematician, but by my calculations, when adding the cost of extra portions to a student meal, an adult meal costs less for the same amount of food. Sounds a little sour to me.

In addition, at the junior high, kids are cutting in line at lunch not only because it’s the only way that they can eat in time not to be tardy for their next class, but also because if they wait at the end of the line they probably won’t have any selection left by the time they make it to the front. Is it too much to ask that our kids, first or last in line, get the same selection as everyone else, and enough food so their stomachs aren’t rumbling through the rest of the day? Is it too much to ask that our kids be given enough time to eat their food without having to stuff it down their gullet? I was taught that it wasn’t healthy to eat like that, so why is it part of the required curriculum at our schools?

Furthermore, I have to ask who designed this new computer system that replaces the old lunch tickets? It eliminates the need for kids to keep track of a bunch of paper tickets, and gives parents the ability to track account balances. A great idea, but obviously a botched execution. It would have been so much easier if they added family accounts so parents who have two or more children wouldn’t have to write multiple checks every payday. And how about allowing parents to refill the accounts from home with an online payments? I don’t know about you, but in this day of identity theft, I’m not so sure I want my children walking around in school with signed personal checks in their pockets.

Finally, if a student forgets his ID card, he gets to stand in a line against the wall until everyone else is done (how humiliating), and then wait while the staff reboots the computer so they can enter his ID number manually. Why does it have to be rebooted? I know that Powerschool is Macintosh based software, but this thing sounds like a Microsoft Beta release.

I understand that the kids have some responsibility in these matters, but the school doesn’t get to just pass it all off on them. It is the school’s responsibility to make sure our kids are provided a nutritionally sound meal, and are given a reasonable amount of time to consume it. It can be done with better planning, better training, and a better choice of equipment.

So let me break this down and simplify it. Serve good food. Serve enough food. Serve it fast. Make payment simple. If fast food places can do it with teenaged minimum wage employees, our school system should be able to handle it. Too much to ask?

In the next installment, I’ll be begin my study of teachers. Lord help me.

Wisdom

In this installment, we’re going to look at a minor injury to the body of Sweetwater County School District Number One that can cause major injuries to everyone else. The transportation system. Even though this is just a minor wound, it warrants attention, because like a real wound, if it is ignored it will fester and lead to other, bigger problems. Let me be fair here, driving a school bus isn’t an easy job. There are traffic rules, safety rules, and scores of kids to deal with every day. Many drivers wake up every morning looking forward to the time they are going to spend that day with the children on their bus. They follow the traffic rules, provide a safe environment for the children, and become a positive part of every student’s day.

Some drivers, though, aren’t so positive, and some aren’t so good at what they do. Just recently my son’s bus driver forgot to drop him off at his stop, adding twenty minutes to his trip. It wasn’t until the driver finished his route that he realized there was still someone on his bus. My daughter’s bus driver forgot to drop her off several times. In fact, just recently, her bus driver refused to drop her off at her stop because her stop, which has been her stop all year, wasn’t on his list. So instead, her bus driver dropped her off at another stop (which he told her he wasn’t supposed to do because she didn’t have a note) so she could get a ride home from a family friend. When my wife called the bus barn the next morning, they said her bus driver “was really worried all day about whether that little girl made it home all right.” Apparently, he just wasn’t worried enough to make sure. It’s nice to know that I can depend on someone to get my kids home.

Over the past few years my children have been forgotten in the morning, forgotten at school, and one time my kindergartner even had to give his bus driver directions to our house. Another driver told my son that if he wasn’t going to ride the bus every day we’d have to call the bus barn because he wasn’t going to stop there if he wasn’t going to be there every day. Guess what buddy? Yes you are.

And be there on time already, won’t you? I’m tired of sitting by the window for twenty minutes every day wondering just what time the bus is going to show up to get my kid today. Now, I have three kids that ride different buses, so you do the math. On a bad day, I can spend nearly an hour watching for the buses to mosey down my street.

Just recently, my son’s bus driver almost rear ended a slow moving commercial vehicle. He thought it was cool that the bus driver slammed on the brakes and avoided a wreck. I think the bus driver should have been paying attention in the first place. These are our children you’re driving around with. You don’t have the luxury of not paying attention. Safety comes first.

And while I’m on the subject of safety, let me speak directly to the drivers. Just because you are in a great big yellow land sub, doesn’t mean you get an automatic right-of-way at every intersection. You don’t get to blast through stop signs without stopping, regardless of whether you’re in a hurry. You don’t get to make your right turn first even when the guy across from you entered the intersection ahead of you. I’m tired of playing chicken with you in the intersection when I drop my kids off at school! There is a system to determine the right-of-way at an intersection and if you don’t remember it, I suggest you stop by the DMV, pick up a pamphlet and refresh your memory. And yes, contrary to popular, or not so popular opinion, you do have to slow down to twenty miles per hour in the school zone, just like the rest of us, and all the other speed limits still apply, too. Just yesterday, a full sized bus flew by me in a 30 MPH zone. I was going 32MPH. When I sped up and paced it I found that it was going just under 45 MPH. Almost 15 MPH over the speed limit. This wasn’t a fluke, it’s happening on our streets every single day.

After a recent storm, I was driving down a residential artery when I saw a bus heading my way on a cross street. What a shock it was when that bus ran the stop sign, pulled out right in front of me, stopped diagonally in the middle of the street and turned on its red flashers. I was inside ten feet from it when my antilock brakes finally pumped me to a stop on the sheet of ice we were all driving on. My son, who was on the bus, thought it was really cool how I slid to a stop behind him. Now, was that really necessary? Instead of following basic traffic rules, and common sense, he put himself, myself, and all of the children on his bus at risk. This kind of behavior is unacceptable.

School buses are often the most visible part of the school system. They are seen on a daily basis by almost everyone in the community, and for the rest of the body to be healed, the bus drivers are going to need to do their job, and do it right. Some courtesy, some law abiding, and some common sense would be like a great antibiotic, and go a long way to healing what ails this system.

In the next installment, I’ll be discussing the tasty, or not so, subject of our school’s food service program.

Wisdom