16 Comments

The subtle beauty of the American experiment of fifty states is that each may experiment with its own policies. We have fifty petri dishes. I believe that all learning is trial and error and that ultimately we are all autodidacts. Socrates famously said: "I cannot teach you anything, I can only make you think", or words to that effect. Better that our failures occur in small bunches (where we can readily adapt and learn from our failure) than all at once when imposed upon us by a single all powerful unchecked political elite whose idea of change is to spend more money on a failed policy.

Battles are won by squads and platoons and soldiers on the ground, not by the generals far behind the lines. Leaders of these small units are the seeds from which the generals are grown.

And Yes, I would have fifty state PT boats, quick and agile, where there is the real possibility of innovation and change, rather than one giant all powerful battleship that no one can turn around and which can crush all opposition with a single broadside.

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Chris: My apology but what you are saying is pie-in-the-sky stuff. The facts belie your pollyanna assessment.

For example, show me a SINGLE state that has a competent set of K-12 Science Standards. Just one!

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As an old man I tend toward what I understand. The concept of rationality makes more sense than any of the alternatives including the romantic philosophers who were always in favour of divine right but for the minions rather than the royalty.

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The Department of Education was taken over and is more The Department of Indoctrination providing information that has been destroying young minds. All connected to it, should be fired! The basics, which were taught for generations...Reading, Writing and Arithmetic was tkan out of the equation...and high school graduates can't read, write or balance checkbooks. In fact, many college graduates are in the same place..

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Barbara: I agree that this happened, but careful investigation revels that 90% of the problem is the States. Contrary to what some people think the DOEd has relatively little to do with the curricula. That is almost exclusively the purview of State Boards of Education.

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If one allows the Department of Education to survive, there is a risk (I believe substantial) that the next Democratic administration will simply resurrect it back into its current political nature. I believe that the Department should be disbanded and the enabling act repealed. All outstanding loans should be transferred to the Treasury Department.

I would propose that the decision makers consider passing the following legislation:

1. Make student loans fully and completely dischargable in Bankruptcy (currently they are not). There can be no compelling reason to allow sophisticated businesses to discharge loans but saddle 18 year olds with 20 to 30 years of nondischargable debt in a virtual debt's prison or indentured servitude to the loan holder. ( I formerly practiced in Bankruptcy Court).

2. When a student debtor defaults, require as a matter of law that the College or University which originated the loan and who reaps its benefits, become immediately obligated to pay the lender, and become the new holder of the note. Now when the University sues to collect the debt it has to sue an alumus or alumna, with all the bad relations that it will make with that student's classmates. Moreover, the school would now be held accountable for its education.

3. Require that all schools who benefit from students loan have a faculty to administration ratio no less that 5 to 1 to qualify for its students to be eligible for a student loan.

Just some thoughts of how one might return accountability to the system. The fact that the disgraced Harvard president was demoted to her old teaching job at a salary of $900,000.00 shocks the conscience. (Unless I have the figure wrong.)

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Chris: With that belief system, it follows that it makes no sense to do anything in the EPA, FDA, etc., etc.

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John: I disagree. Each agency must stand on its own merits. In my experience as a former local school board member, a former adjunct instructor at two colleges, a parent who paid off a fortune of my offsprings' education loans, and a former practicing bankruptcy law attorney, I see no reason to have a National Board of Education made up of political appointees who advance an anti-western marxist agenda and a racially divisive mission.

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Chris: So the answer is instead to have 50 State Boards of Education made up of political appointees who advance an anti-western marxist agenda and a racially divisive mission? That's the alternative.

Clerly it is better to fix the one than fifty!

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Dept of Education

Get rid of it.

"Regulating" what students are (and are not) taught is NO BUSINESS of the Federal Government. It is not within the scope of their Constitutional authority, and for anyone who has the audacity to say, "What HARM could it possibly do?", just LOOK! at the results - -

What curriculum is empathized may vary from community to community, and State to State. What is and is not taught is the province of local communities, as is the percentage of tax revenue devoted to education. That revenue does NOT have to be filtered through the Federal sieve before reaching school districts.

Personally, I do not WANT my children and grandchildren taught in what has been called "The California School of Charm". If that is what other people want for their children, they can place them under the wing of the California school system.

When Washington DC figures out how to balance a budget, they can come and talk to me. Until then, I will be pleased to see them get their nose OUT of public education.

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MadChimp: You are confusing matters. By-and-large our current system is made up by 50 states calling almost all of the curriculum, etc shots. The end result is an unmitigated disaster.

The DOEd would not be in charge of curricula — after certain basics are met by States. For example, the DOEd ahould declare that Critical Thinking is a priority. Then DOEd would say that any State that does not properly teach Critical Thinking would be ineligible for certain federal funds.

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I agree with your recommendations. I would like to add:

1. Abandon the implementation of DEI, CRT (critical race theory and culturally responsive teaching), and SEL.

2. Less focus on conceptual understanding and more focus on procedural learning in mathematics. The current focus on conceptional understanding spends more time on multiple methods to introduce a new concept, sometimes ridiculously roundabout method, than working on problems. There is no evidence that this works and makes students perform better in mathematics.

3. When implementing curriculum with data-driven or evidence-based decision, the decision makers should be required to research the data and evidence they referenced. For example, I read a metanalysis on the implementation of SEL. The conclusion is not even consistent with the data and result they show. But the conclusion is used in the arguments when SEL is adopted.

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The National science Teachers association have 4 of our published high schools textbooks for general and environmental science. Easy to understand for 10th grade. Every patriot should have one of these on their coffee table. https://rosedogbookstore.com/climate-crisis-changed-the-intergovernmental-panel-on-climate-change-ipcc-reports-are-deliberate-science-fiction-1/ Also President Elect Trump is expected to order all high schools to teach it starting next fall. cctruth.org

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Whenever I think of the DOE, the song "Tobacco Road" pops into my head, the refrain of which goes like this..."Blow it up, start all over again." Correlation doesn't prove cause, but the decline of student achievement accelerated after the DOE was created by Saint Jimmy of the Legumes. It's nothing but a bastion of wokeness that we can do without today like we did without it before Saint Jimmy was overcome with his immaculate vision in Plains. Trump has a pen, don't he? Respectfully submitted, JOHNNY "TOO BAD" ROSEMOND

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These 3 recommendations are accurate.

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Thank you.

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