Changing Educational Paradigms Must Include Stopping Unions from Having a Stranglehold on Kids' Education

For the most part, our educational system is a debacle with massive amounts of money being misallocated by school districts. Our tax dollars are going down the tubes.  During the 2002-03 school year $440 billion was used to fund public education for kids from prekindergarten through secondary school.  Unfortunately because of the misappropriation of funds in order to benefit the adults instead of the students the effects of this have produced consequences including:  illiteracy, high secondary school drop out rates in democratically-controlled areas of the United States, and in 2009 results of testing showed that ONLY 60 percent of high school students are proficient in basic science skills .  These aforementioned examples show that it is imperative that we change the educational paradigm in the United States.  One question worth posing is what exactly does the phrase "basic science skills" refer to today?  How basic is "basic"?  The fact that 40 percent of high school students are unable to pass the basic proficiency science test is highly disconcerting and unconscionable.  This is further evidence that our public schools are failing, and the teachers' unions are failing to provide children with a good education. 
The teachers union in Detroit will have nothing to do with compromising their benefits for the sake of either the school children or the city of Detroit.  The unions greedy nature may force the closure of half of the public schools in Detroit.  If the unions, democrats and President Obama actually cared about educating our kids properly they would not have been against the DC Opportunities Scholarship Program (a voucher program), and defunded it. The program was an instant hit, and according to the Dept. of Education it was working. This program in Washington D.C. was helping disadvantaged youths yet those (Democrats and unions) who claim to champion for kids quashed the program which was working.  How dare those happy and successful kids siphon away money from unions (sarcasm). 


Virginia Walden Ford is an advocate for school choice.  As an adolescent her son William started struggling with academics and eventually started getting into trouble with the law.  Then a generous next door neighbor's intervention changed the trajectory of her son's life when he offered to help pay for William to attend a local parochial school. In a matter of only months there was a major transformation: William went from being an angry kid to really enjoying the learning process. After 2 years he transferred to a charter school and graduated as Valedictorian. He enlisted in the Marines, served in Iraq, and is now working for a real estate company in the Washington D.C. area.  After seeing how much a nurturing school enhanced her son's education in the 1990's Virginia became an outspoken advocate for the D.C. vouchers bill. Unfortunately the program was cancelled in 2009 but after the 2010 mid-term elections Ford is hopeful that with the help of Speaker of the House John Boehner the D.C. voucher program will breathe new life soon. 

With all the issues in our educational system it is an absolute necessity that we change the educational paradigm in order to prevent a calamitous outcome for the United States. 




Here are two videos on reforming our educational system. The first video is a trailer for the movie "Kids Aren't cars" and the second video is on changing educational paradigms. 






RSA Animate - Changing Education Paradigms