Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: WEDNESDAY, October 20, 1993 TAG: 9403180012
SECTION: EDITORIAL PAGE: A-11 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE: Cal Thomas
DATELINE: LENGTH: Medium
I asked her, ``If you don't like my value system, what would you recommend to replace it?'' She said she wasn't sure.
``What year are you in and what is your major?'' I asked.
``I'm a senior and my major is ethics,'' she said.
``On what do you base your own ethics?'' I queried.
``I don't know,'' she replied. ``I'm still trying to work that out.''
Nearly 16 years of schooling at a cost of tens of thousands of dollars have left this student and many like her unable to think. It isn't entirely her fault. She is the victim of a failed public education system that has so ``dumbed down'' a generation of young people that they think ``wisdom'' refers to their teeth.
Could there be a more compelling reason for allowing choices in how the next generation is educated?
California voters will decide next month if they want educational choice in their state. The monopolistic state and national education establishment (which favors choice on abortion, but not choice on where those who are born can be educated) is spending millions of dollars in an attempt to maintain its intellectual and moral chokehold over children.
Whether school choice passes in California or not, a national attempt to press for educational choice has been launched by former Secretary of Education Lamar Alexander and an impressive array of current and former public officials and business leaders.
In a ``vision statement,'' Americans for School Choice calls for ``charter legislation to create new schools, responsive to the communities they serve, and free of onerous union rules and government regulations.''
The group's objectives are to promote equity by giving middle- and low-income families more of the same choices of all schools - public, private and religious - that wealthy families already enjoy; to empower families with rebated tax dollars to spend at the school of their choice; to encourage innovation by removing government from the backs of teachers and principals and investing tax dollars at the school without strings attached; to create a dynamic marketplace of education opportunities by offering incentives to spur new academic services, including programs for students with special needs and disabilities.
School choice is growing more popular. A September 1992 Gallup Poll found 70 percent of the public favors a system that would allow parents to select their child's school, including private and religious. Fourteen states already have enacted legislation to offer limited school choice to parents, teachers, communities and principals. Private-sector scholarship programs are operating in at least six cities to assist low-income students who want to escape schools in dangerous neighborhoods.
Last year, Sweden, which is slowly emerging from economic socialism, decided to shake up its education system by offering powerful incentives to create new education opportunities and give parents wide freedom to choose among them.
Businesses have repeatedly lamented the poor quality of students graduating from American public high schools and colleges. David Kearns, chairman of Xerox Corp., recently observed, ``Public education has put this country at a terrible competitive disadvantage. American business will have to hire a million new workers a year who can't read, write or count. Teaching them how ... will cost industry $25 billion a year.''
The evidence can no longer be denied. It is as plain as the student who questioned me at the University of Michigan. Nearing graduation, this student does not know what she believes about her major and, at great expense, has been defrauded of a real education.
Los Angeles Times Syndicate
by CNB