Her being the pick and her lack of character is not a bug, it's a feature. Creepers of a feather ..
Sec of Education - Holy Moly
- Thread starter IUclover
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Her lack of character isn’t a feature, it’s a virtue to their crowd.
Why don’t you tell us what the D of Ed should be doing and what is its value proposition?
1. It should work towards ensuring we have an educated citizen population in order to make a democracy work (I'm not even sure that's possible in a nation the size of ours, though).
2. It should be funding and guiding research--actual, honest to god scientific research--into the best pedagogical methods for math and reading and later other subjects, along with the best, useful, and most efficient methods of evaluating students' and teachers' performance.
3. It should encourage the development of ideologically neutral curriculums that are engaging, rigorous, and informative.
4. It should be facilitating communication and cross-talk between K-12 schools and the trades and other, non-academic job settings to ensure education can turn out good citizens, ensure the nation's leadership in being an educated and technological superpower, and provide people useful to the work force at all levels.
Regarding at least (2) and (3), it is downright silly to think that local school boards or administrators can do this on their own. It's more akin to an R&D problem that requires a long-term committment with no assurance of profitability.
What should the D of Ed be doing that the states don’t do? Education is state driven because we are a republic and not a unitary democracy - Always has been always will be.
So again, what do we need to D of Ed at a federal level to do? To do your #3, it’d have to be huge and would trample over the states. #1 is a fantastical dream.
No, it shouldn’t be do anything of those things. The states are fully capable of running K-12 education. Also, teachers, administrators, and local school boards are the exact people I want driving/choosing 2 (I’m fine with the state or private market driving it as well) and 3.
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We measure our education by global reporting agency ratings and conclude our system is a massive failure.
We then blame the federal Department of Education for the failure while touting our system as primarily run by state and local governments.
So we trust the analysis and reporting of various agencies which are attempting the difficult task of ranking the education of countries around the world, but want to eliminate our own Department of Education which among other things has been measuring our educational progress since 1969 using NAEP (National Assessment of Educational Progress).
Why do you trust the local politicians in Mississippi, Indiana, Alabama, et al. to figure out the best pedagogic methods, curriculum, etc. but not the people in Washington?
Free markets determine the best. If a “best” pedagogic method emerges or is obviously the best, states will adopt it.
Maybe because most of the Dept of Education still work from home?
“According to recent reports, U.S. Department of Education employees are still being allowed to work extensively from home, much as they did during the pandemic,” wrote Sen. Marsha Blackburn, R-Tenn., and Sen. Bill Cassidy, R-La., in a letter obtained by Federal Times. “[The department’s] lax telework policies are especially concerning given its apparent inability to fulfill its statutory responsibilities.”
Maybe you believe working from home works, and I am sure for a few, it does. When entire departments work mostly from home, I do not have any confidence what-so-ever that much gets done.
It is handled by states and local jurisdictions. The DOE does research and hands out grants. They don't direct education policy.
Maybe a functioning democracy, then, is a fantastical dream?
FDR: Democracy cannot succeed unless those who express their choice are prepared to choose wisely. The real safeguard of democracy, therefore, is education. It has been well said that no system of government gives so much to the individual or exacts so much as a democracy. Upon our educational system must largely depend the perpetuity of those institutions upon which our freedom and our security rest. To prepare each citizen to choose wisely and to enable him to choose freely are paramount functions of the schools in a democracy.
“Democracy is only as good as the education that surrounds it." — Socrates
"Whenever the people are well-informed, they can be trusted with their own government.” – Thomas Jefferson
"An educated citizenry is a vital requisite for our survival as a free people."
(This exact quotation has not been found in any of the writings of Thomas Jefferson, although it is a generally accurate paraphrase of Jefferson's views on education).
"The philosophy of the schoolhouse in one generation will be the philosophy of the government in the next.” – Abraham Lincoln
The devotion of democracy to education is a familiar fact. The superficial explanation is that a government resting upon popular suffrage cannot be successful unless those who elect and who obey their governors are educated. Since a democratic society repudiates the principle of external authority, it must find a substitute in voluntary disposition and interest; these can be created only by education.--John Dewey
Because - while state depts of Ed are political - they’re nowhere near as political as a national department. And local people have far more influence over their states’ policies than they do national which is completely out of sight out of mind.
Education HAS to be local. The people are different and the way they learn are different.
A functioning democracy - at the scale of the US - were it to be a unitary democracy and not federal republic with limited federal powers and most pushed down to state will absolutely fail. Our nation is the most heterogeneous large republic in the world and that can either be a strength or the nail in the coffin. No other country in the world - with our scale - has the same diversity from coast to coast and our model has worked and will continue to work unless DC takes too much power.
I don't think math, science, and reading education has to be local. I'm guessing the core of a math education is actually pretty universal across humans, in fact, with the core then just needing to be translated into local examples that kids will relate to.
The evidence behind different learning styles is controversial, at best, but even if it were a thing, there is no evidence to support the notion that people's learning styles are contingent on the state (or any arbitrary political subdivision) in which they live.
BW, as you say diversity which includes low income families can be "a nail in the coffin".
The prime federal spending as administered by the Department of Education is the Title I, Part A of the Elementary and Secondary Education Act which aims to supplement state and local funding in school districts with high concentrations of children from low income families.
This article on the subject in part states the following...
Evidence shows that school funding matters for student outcomes, yet there is also evidence of significant disparities in the distribution of funding and other resources across school districts. High-poverty schools often receive less total funding (combined from federal, state, and local sources) than more affluent schools. Without more equitable distribution of resources, including Title I dollars, students from low-income families will continue to face the same systemic disadvantages they did nearly 60 years ago when Title I was enacted.
The city school district in my county receives far and away the most funding in terms of actual dollars and in terms of per student. It’s an abysmal district and it’s due to the lack of engagement of students, parents and educators. No amount of funding will ever fix that.
I posted this a while ago. @hoot1 you'll find it interesting and relevant here:
Funding Gaps Cannot Explain Academic Gaps
we've been throwing money at our problems for 40+ years
freddiedeboer.substack.com
And the federal government would just keep shoving money over to those shit districts Willy-nilly were they given authority and funding to do so.
You mean, Mississippi kids shouldn't be learning that the Earth is 6,000 years old, and studying the War of Northern Aggression?
I'm not saying this to defend city districts, but when discussing the per pupil expenditure, you guys never even pay lip service to the fact that cities usually have a much higher % of special needs students, as well as ESL students. Those teachers/programs don't come cheap.
And that leads into a question I asked earlier in this thread:
Of the 12 countries in front of us in education, how many of them are required to teach ALL kids? No one answered.
The city school here absolutely does not have a higher % of ESL students. My wife teaches in a nearby district and they know where all the ESL kids are. I can’t speak to special needs kids.
The city schools also offer about 10-15% higher salaries than the much-better-performing suburban districts. Wrap your ahead around that one. They’re better paid and their results stink. Is it all on them? Of course not. But don’t come at me asking for more money to deliver shit results.
We have permitted our society to decay and let our values disappear and become diluted in the name of intersectionality and DEI. We have permitted people to say - and think they’re right - things like “being on time is whiteness” or “SATs are racist” and your side agrees. Do not look at conservatives for the decay in our culture. And do not ask us to throw more money at it or give us a guilt trip.
You actually answered your own question above. The schools--and the teachers--can't take lemons and make chocolate cake. (Cignetti, no matter how great a coach he might be, can't take a roster of JMU transfers who weren't even recruited out of high school and go beat OSUs 4 and 5 star athletes. Does that mean Cignetti is a worse coach than Day?)
You pay those city teachers more to go into less desirable situations, that you've admitted exist.
Assuming the elimination of the Department of Education wouldn't make our educational system either less or more effective but save tons of money consider how much of our total educational expenses come from the feds as per this chart from Brad's post.
I think maybe DOE spends more than just on that? Like, does that chart take into account money spent backing student loans?Assuming the elimination of the Department of Education wouldn't make our educational system either less or more effective but save tons of money consider how much of our total educational expenses come from the feds as per this chart from Brad's post.
We can't fix that at the fed level but can at the state? Why would that be?
Some people (not BWB) would have you believe that kids are kids, parents are parents, and home life is home life. Reality is that some of those kids walk home through dangerous neighborhoods, have little to eat, and have to take care of their younger siblings because their parents are working several jobs (or getting drunk or worse). That life is much different than little Timmy, who comes home, has some milk and cookies before going out to play catch with his friends, but makes it home before the street light comes on, then sits down at a full dinner and tells mom and dad about his day, all before doing his homework in time for his dad to check it, and to read a couple of chapters in his book from the library.
I think many grown ups around here would be astonished/saddened at what many kids endure on a daily basis, and for many of them, that overpaid teacher is the only smiling face they will see, and the encouragement they get in the classroom is the only time they feel valued at all.
I try to focus this--as you rightly did--on the child. Because it is true that it is, in a sense, unfair that we as individuals have to pay for the results of some bad, lazy, immoral parenting out there in the world. But I think that (1) community interests need to be considered and sometimes do, in fact, trump individual interests, and (2) that it is more unfair that those children are in that situation. I want to fix the kid's lot in life more than I care about the free-rider problem of the parents. I'm always astonished more professed Christians don't feel this way, too.
People would be shocked/disgusted (whatever word you want to use) to actually see the conditions some children live in. Absolute squalor.
I couldn’t care less about adults who live in those conditions, unless the person is truly disabled, or too elderly to work and maintain decent living conditions.
I don’t disagree but let’s be clear what you’re saying:
City school districts perform significantly more poorly than the average suburban district (and remarkably more poorly than the good suburban districts).
To entice teachers to walk into this situation, we pay them more - and don’t get better results.
What this means
Not saying they “can” but I’d rather there be accessible accountable bodies of government that don’t have limitless funds making decisions with better ROI than a soulless federal government that has never been to Wyoming or Idaho or West Texas.
Thinking this is some kind of “own” is silly. I’ve fully stated that the problem is tri-partite. The students don’t care, the parents don’t care and eventually the teachers don’t care. The point is money clearly doesn’t fix it.
My aunt taught special Ed in the hood in the city her entire career. Getting everyone fed and through the day was the primary goal. Some of those kids, sped and otherwise, were just in survival mode. Brutal stuff
