Who Declared War on Education?
In the debate over education reform in Indiana schools, it took a little while to figure out exactly how the opponents of education reform would try to frame the debate, but they have finally tipped their hand. They are calling it a “war on public education and a war against teachers”.
I find that somewhat odd, because I can’t figure out who made the declaration! Was it the Governor, Mitch Daniels? Was it Superintendent of Public Instruction Dr. Tony Bennett? Was it the Speaker of the House Brian Bosma or Senate Protempore David Long? I ask because in the conversations that I’ve had with these gentlemen I’ve never heard anything that could be considered a declaration of war against public education or teachers.
I’ve heard things that could be considered a declaration of war against bad schools and getting rid of bad teachers, but educators as a whole, I don’t think so. I went back and reviewed the Governor’s State of the State address. It was 3,795 words long. The only time the word “war” showed up was in the words “forward” and “awareness”. He mentions accountability and improving student performance and rewarding teachers based on merit and not time served in a classroom. How is that a declaration of war?
I did a Google search and typed in “declare war on education” and mentioned the above names and I came up with nothing. I searched the news and the blogosphere and got nothing. Now I did go to Facebook and found three pages “Educators Against Mitch Daniels”, “Educators Against Tony Bennett” and “Parents & Educators against the Daniels & Bennett Educational Reform.”
And by the look of the rhetoric, if anyone has made a declaration of war, it’s the folks who are running these websites. Of course I do think if they put as much energy and effort into educating kids as they do lobbying maybe some of Indiana’s school reform might not be necessary. But I digress.
I do think there are some valid questions about education reform. For example, is pay for performance the best incentive to offer someone who went into a profession not for money, but because they love what they do? And how do you develop a metric that measures student performance while taking into account various socio-economic backgrounds? These , as well as others, are valid questions but that’s not what I’m hearing from the opponents of education reform.
All I hear is that proponents are “against public schools”, “anti-teacher” and the most egregious complaints say reform is racist and is designed to hurt minority children. Come to think of it, if this all the anti-reform voices can bring to the table, perhaps they are better left unattended. After all, if it weren’t for them, this discussion wouldn’t be necessary in the first place.
