Conservatives to Calif. parents: Leave K-12 public schools

[Desertdog]

I reccommend it for all public schools, no just CA.

Conservatives to Calif. parents: Leave K-12 public schools
Ed Thomas
OneNewsNow.com
http://www.onenewsnow.com/2007/11/conservatives_to_calif_parents.php

 
A California pro-family leader and his organization are making the blunt pronouncement that because of two new laws signed by Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger last month, it's time for parents and their children in the Golden State to exit the public school system.

"It's time to exit the public schools because your children will be sexually indoctrinated if you leave them there," warns Randy Thomasson of Campaign for Children and Families (CCF). The pro-family leader says that that indoctrination will include kindergarten-age children because of the new laws scheduled to go into effect at the beginning of January 2008. SB 777 requires all school instruction and activities to include positive promotion of homosexuality and cross-genders; and AB 394 enforces the positive attitudes through anti-harassment training for students, teachers, and parents.

Karen England, executive director of pro-family lobby Capitol Resource Institute, agrees that it might be time to go, despite her group's current last-minute efforts to gather petition signatures for placing the matter on a state ballot referendum. "Yes," she admits. "I would be very frightened if my kids were in public school in California after the passage of SB 777."

Thomasson warns parents must sacrifice to protect their children from the schools, and that private and home schools will be their only sanctuary -- so they must believe they can overcome obstacles to do either one.

"If you love your children, and [if] you have a will -- and God gave everybody a strong will -- you can home school ... and you can learn along the way," he counsels. "There are books and curriculum to help you. And you can afford private school if you sacrifice other 'wants' and replace the 'wants' with 'needs,' and [if] you financially adjust." CCF is assisting parents from its website with links to information on how to find funds to pay for private schools or home-schooling material.

According to Thomasson, there is no "opt-out" for families or school districts to any of the homosexual "anti-harassment" laws that will go into effect in all public K-12 schools next year.

[Paddy]

The queer agenda.  "All they want is to be treated equally".  Right.     The time is long overdue to abandon the failing K-12 public school system. Problem is, most parents both have to work just to keep a roof over the family's head and feed themselves.  Didn't used to be that way.  Whyizzat?

[Perd Hapley]

Because they want, and have, more square footage?  More electric service, more outlets, air conditioning, a bigger screen and internet?  Because they expect to have more and bigger and safer cars, or expensive Priuses, Prii, hybrids? 

[CAnnoneer]

Ergo, the need for a voucher system as a way out into private schools without added cost. Guess who is opposing vouchers the most.

[Paddy]

Hopefully, this will help 'mainstream' the voucher system.  Until now, it's been a pet project of the RR.

[Perd Hapley]

Ergo, the need for a voucher system as a way out into private schools without added cost. Guess who is opposing vouchers the most. 

Well, yeah, at the very least. 

[Euclidean]

I still think vouchers are a fundamentally bad idea.  What the heck kind of system is it when you pay your taxes, and then get money back that probably doesn't reflect the amount you paid in?

I also firmly believe that those vouchers will be turned into malt liquor and cigarettes in short order.  For those of you who think that wasting funds like this can be prevented, I would like to point to the fact that in Texas, Lone Star Card holders can spend their allotment on junk food, and Katrina refugees have wasted untold amounts of government money they were supposed to use for necessities, and those are just two quick examples off the top of my head.

Instead just excuse people from paying the taxes.  That's a much better system.

[Paddy]

Vouchers aren't friggin food stamps, Euclid.  They're credit memos from a county or state government only redeemable at a private school.  You're an accountant, right?  Think 'offset'.  Think 'reimbursement' or whatever you're calling it these days.

[Euclidean]

Okay Riley, you're right I'm studying accountancy.  Now, let's think like an unethical accountant.

I don't know what the standards are in one state or another to be considered a private school other than you teach a curriculum for money and don't take public funding, but what happens when some shifty character figures out he can set up a bogus diploma mill school, cash the vouchers, pocket his share and give the voucher holder some of it too?  "Sweet I cashed my voucher, my kid's already graduated, and I got $50 back too."  Who's going to complain until the authorities uncover the scam?

Now even if you're completely satisfied that couldn't happen, that still doesn't answer my other complaints.  Does everyone get the same voucher?  Say if I pay $3000 in taxes and my neighbor pays $1, how come we both get a $2000 voucher?  Also, even if we do get a voucher scaled to what we pay in, why are we paying extra for someone to take our money, pocket a little bit of it for a processing fee, and then hand it back to us?  Hell, sounds like a great part time job for an accounting student I'll give it that, but it seems so unnecessary.

The food stamp is actually the perfect example because it too is a voucher.  Our state is constantly changing the way the system works to cut back on the fraud and misuse, and the people who get the stamps are always, always, one step ahead.

I just don't like the idea of the government handing out payments when there's a more elegant solution.

[Paddy]

I just don't like the idea of the government handing out payments when there's a more elegant solution.

I couldn't agree more.  Government (every government, local, state and federal) is too big, too intrusive and has too much of our money. And ya know what?  We've got nobody to blame but ourselves.  We don't involve ourselves in local government, let alone state and federal.  Federal government, especially, is media driven. It's bullshit and has no substance whatsoever.  We've allowed them not only to tax us at their pleasure, but through our apathy, we've relinquished our constituency.  Our governments no longer (and hasn't for some time) represented us.  Instead, they represent the special interest lobbyists who not only butter their bread on both sides, but provide all sorts of perks as well.

The entire system has degenerated into 'what's in it for me?'  The American people have become too stupid, too apathetic, and too occupied with bread and circuses (tv, sports, consumerism, etc.) to do anything about it.

So, the only thing left, after the life force has been sucked out of us, 'what's in it for me?'  IOW, what 'benefits' can I qualify for?

Good luck.  You're gonna need it.  This country is a debtor nation.  Our only strength is our military, and that is quickly waning.  We have no manufacturing capability, our technological edge will evaporate within a generation due to the abject failure of our educational system, and our 'borders' are non-existent.

In the words of Alexis de Tocqueville: "As one digs deeper into the national character of the Americans, one sees that they have sought the value of everything in this world only in the answer to this single question: how much money will it bring in?"

Or, as Benjamin Franklin said outside Independence Hall after the 1787 Constitutional Convention "A republic, if you can keep it".

[CAnnoneer]

While vouchers are not perfect in and of themselves, they are a huge but achievable step in the right direction. They would give far more power to parents while simultaneously dismantling the power of the bureaucracy and drastically diminishing socialist-leftist indoctrination. Using vouchers and private schools, we can educate the next generation, whose task it will be to achieve the next step - the dismantling of state schools and the associated tax structure. By contrast, the all-or-nothing approach tends to end up with nothing. It did not take an year or two for the liberals to take over the school system and build their indoctrination program. Why should we expect to retake it overnight?

[Warren]

How about this:

Don't have kids in the public school system? Then you don't pay any taxes to support the system. Though you could donate as much as you wished.

AND

Any costs for homeschooling or private schooling your children could be deducted from your total tax bill. Up to a certain amount.

[Len Budney]

Ergo, the need for a voucher system as a way out into private schools without added cost. Guess who is opposing vouchers the most.

Vouchers are a surefire way for the government to get its fingers into private schools. As soon as CA went to vouchers, everyone would start screaming that the government is "funding homophobia," and SB 777 will be extended to include any school that accepts public funding, including vouchers.

Libertarians oppose vouchers, because it transfers money from taxpayers to parents. The key word being transfer.

--Len.

[HankB]

While vouchers are not perfect in and of themselves, they are a huge but achievable step in the right direction.

Ditto.

Most government schools are spending between $7k and $10k per student annually. A $4k voucher will allow many parents to send Junior to a private school of their choice.

* Parents win - their kid goes where THEY want him to go.
* Kid wins - most likely, the kid gets a better education.
* Taxpayers win - educating the kid costs less.
* Society wins - better educated future citizens, with less leftist indoctrination.

The only losers are the public school teachers and bureaucrats, who OUGHT to suffer some consequences for their miseducation of our youth.

As for someone setting up a scam school . . . the only parents who would send their kids there are the ones who already don't give a d@mn about the kids anyway. Sad, but hard to do anything about.

So anyway, vouchers, while not perfect for reasons already mentioned (return on taxes paid is uneven) are a step in the right direction, and an improvement on the system we have now.

How about this:

Don't have kids in the public school system? Then you don't pay any taxes to support the system. Though you could donate as much as you wished.

This idea is even better than vouchers . . . but too many people are used to the idea of .gov taking from others and giving to them . . . 

[Manedwolf]

Don't have kids in the public school system? Then you don't pay any taxes to support the system. Though you could donate as much as you wished.

I'm personally for that because I do not have kids!

[longeyes]

Withdrawing is step one.  Step two is not paying for the indoctrination, a bit more prickly.  Education is the lion's share of the California state budget and is currently over $50 billion a year.

[CAnnoneer]

Don't have kids in the public school system? Then you don't pay any taxes to support the system. Though you could donate as much as you wished.

I'm personally for that because I do not have kids!

Precisely. Most of the people that do have kids cannot afford to send them to school under "pay-your-way". Therefore, they would not support such a system. So, while fairest in many ways, it is not implementable politically.

The point of the voucher system is to break the power of liberal indoctrinators, bad teachers, and excessive bureaucracy, by providing healthier, higher-quality alternatives. Even if it ends up costing the same to the taxpayer, it would still be a big victory for the good guys. That it will likely cost less is an added benefit and a useful political argument but not the primary boon to me.

The question of gov regulation of private schools is an interesting one. IMO, it can go either way, and certainly after a big political battle. The same voters that can organize to push through the vouchers will also be the ones opposing excessive regulation.

[Euclidean]

Folks, I'm gonna tell you all the big secret to fixing 80% or more of what's wrong with the education system.  Are you ready for it?

Free the schools from government regulation.  Let people with math degrees decide what a 10th grader could or should know about derivation.  Let people with English degrees come to a consensus on a grammar curriculum.

And how can we free the schools from government regulation?  Stop funding the schools with taxes.  So long as the legislators are the ones funding the schools, they are the ones the school is accountable to, not the students, not the parents, and not the community.

Now how do you demolish the integrity of private schools?  Fund them with taxes, which is precisely what the voucher system does.  Once the private schools start getting tax money in significant amounts, they too will be regulated to the point of impotence.

[CAnnoneer]

Now how do you demolish the integrity of private schools?  Fund them with taxes, which is precisely what the voucher system does.  Once the private schools start getting tax money in significant amounts, they too will be regulated to the point of impotence.

Many private universities gain a lot of their money through federal grants and some state funding. As a result, they do have to comply by certain contractual regulations but are not really crippled by them either. By comparison, with a few notable exceptions, state schools are generally inferior. Why wouldn't the same model work for highschools?

[roo_ster]

What CAnnoneer wrote.

I don't expect to craft Heaven on Earth, ever, let alone in one fell swoop.

Vouchers are one step in the right direction.

[Euclidean]

Because having worked in a high school, I do not trust any politician to leave them alone.  They have long had the opportunity to just back off and let the secondary and primary schools take care of themselves and have failed to do that. 

To be fair, I realize that a public school system left to see about itself that has no competition or accountability isn't a good situation either, but that's not what I'm advocating here.  I have to admit I do question why they haven't done the same to post secondary institutes, although I've had enough fits with post secondary bureaucracy as a result of state laws to be convinced that there is a level of government interference there which is not beneficial.

I contend that the voucher system could faciliate the following:

fraud
unfair wealth redistribution
government asserting more control over private institutions
unnecessary bureaucracy to process the vouchers

Whereas my idea of people simply not paying the applicable taxes any more won't.

Contrast that to the simple and elegant system of simply not paying the taxes if you don't want to use the public schools.  It's actually a less radical idea than the vouchers because it simply calls for something to not be done any more as opposed to the creation of a new authority.  If I wanted to be unrealistic I'd propose my cooperative schools idea, something that wouldn't fly in the current political climate.

[doczinn]

Libertarians oppose vouchers

Not so fast, Len. I'm in favor of vouchers. It's not perfect, but it's a damn sight better than what we have now.

because it transfers money from taxpayers to parents.

And that would be worse than transferring it to public-school teachers how, exactly?

Yes, meddling would probably go along with the vouchers, but private schools would be free not to accept vouchers or meddling.

Vouchers=better than the status quo, and achievable.
No more taxes=better than the status quo, and not gonna happen.

[Len Budney]

Libertarians oppose vouchers

Not so fast, Len. I'm in favor of vouchers. It's not perfect, but it's a damn sight better than what we have now.

Granted. I'd still say that a majority oppose them. Heck, even John Stossel is against them, even though he initially favored the idea.

because it transfers money from taxpayers to parents.

And that would be worse than transferring it to public-school teachers how, exactly?

In the short term, I suppose it's "better." In the long term, it's worse because today we have private schools; with vouchers, eventually private and public schools will be indistinguishable.

But I'm not especially interested in comparing the two injustices. I'm against all injustice. If I believed in replacing one injustice with another more to my taste, I'd be a Republicrat.

--Len.

[CAnnoneer]

with vouchers, eventually private and public schools will be indistinguishable.

That's the point of contest. You have to substantiate that assertation.

The counterargument is that they won't be, because private schools can fire bad teachers, refuse to hire bad teachers, and refuse to offer service to customers they don't like, e.g. disruptive hooligans etc. When both systems are in place, I expect that some very good meritocratic schools will emerge, while bad teachers and bad students will precipitate at the bottom of the barrel, in a few bad public schools. In principle, regulation may try to homogenize that somehow, but then all the parents in the mid-level and best schools will fight tooth and nail to prevent regression. Once the spirit is out of the bottle, putting in back in will not work. As the situation stands now, it is a dictatorship of a malignant minority (leftist bureaucracy, bad teachers, hooligans and retards, bad parents) over a disorganized majority which has no viable legal alternatives. Ergo, my point about breaking up the current power structure by the trojan horse of vouchers.

[Len Budney]

with vouchers, eventually private and public schools will be indistinguishable.

That's the point of contest. You have to substantiate that assertation.

The linked Stossel piece is a good start.

The counterargument is that they won't be, because private schools can fire bad teachers, refuse to hire bad teachers...

All that's nice, but when they're teaching the same curriculum as the public schools, the quality of the teachers is secondary. A great chef can get a job at McDonalds, but there'd still only be crap on the menu.

--Len.