Education news

Usually education news is on Tuesdays, but since I've been thinking
today is Tuesday all day because of the holiday, here we go.

In the What Again Does
This Have To Do With Reading, Writing, And Math category (or Secular And
Liberal Indoctrination category, take your pick), we have a school board in
California redefining marriage in their 9th grade “health” textbooks as an
agreement between partners, not a covenant between a man and a woman. On the
other coast, Governor Romney of Massachusetts stands up to the gay lobby and
vetoes a 70% increase in funding for programs in schools passed by the
legislature. But because the pressure toward immorality isn’t great enough on
America’s children, yesterday a leading group of pediatricians denounced
abstinence-only education in schools.

Michelle Malkin
discusses the latest indoctrination in pacifism in our schools. I am all for
conflict resolution. And teaching such to children. But I do heartily disagree
with the schools encroaching more and more on the family and churches’
province. Enough already! Teaching reading, writing, and math is a big enough
job! Here’s a radical idea: let the schools teach academics and leave the
social engineering to the parents!

Business Week is urging more computer classes for
children. That’s because they have that reading, writing, and math thing down
so pat. And in Kansas, a new poll shows a majority of Kansans want schools to
teach evolution as well as its alternatives.

Speaking of Kansas,
there is a big fight going on there between the legislature and the state
supreme court. The legislature, as the people’s representatives, held the line
on school spending in the upcoming budget, and did not increase it. The supreme
court was not pleased. Don’t the people of Kansas know who their masters are?
The backwards clods think it is a government of the people, by the people, and
for the people. Not willing to let such uppity behavior go unchecked, the court
ordered the legislature to increase school funding to a court-approved level.
The legislature just missed its deadline. To teach Kansans a lesson, the court
is ordering the schools to remain closed until the legislature toes the line.
Oh man, is the judiciary out of control in this country.

The battle for control
of our children is everywhere manifested in big and little ways. In Illinois, a
new law just went into effect that requires children to show proof of having
had a dental examination in order to collect their final report cards. Now I am
not against dental exams for children. But I do heartily disagree with the
schools encroaching … well, you know.

School vouchers are in the news this week. Over
at the Foundation for Economic Education, the question is asked if vouchers are
the solution to the public school morass, or just another flawed compromise,
and their opinion is well worth the read. Ohio is more than tripling the size
of its voucher program, making it the nation’s largest since the practice was
found constitutional three years ago. And the first D.C. students to graduate
from a school of their choice through a new voucher program were honored
recently.

There’s a lot more news, which I think I’ll save
for next week. I’ll close this week’s post with some good news: Maryland’s only
faith-based tutoring service has found a home in a Bladensburg church, where
teachers are helping needy students improve their reading, writing and math
skills. I am so thrilled our kids are learning reading, writing, and math
somewhere!