The proof is in the pudding. Aspen Learning Systems, a subsidiary of Knowledge Universe company, recently opened Colorado’s first privately-run reading center in Denver. Yes, that’s right, a school that concentrates on teaching kids to read. Aspen’s reading center gives kids a nine-week reading course that emphasizes heavy phonics. The result? In the first quarter of 1999, students gained an average of two years and four months in reading ability after they completed the course. Only nine weeks. Compare that to the twelve years your kids have to suffer through in public school, and still graduate with poor reading skills.
Continue reading about Free Market Reading Center Puts Public Schools To Shame
The question to naturally ask is this: if our kids learned to read far better when we had an education free-market before public schools came along, why on Earth do we need public schools now? The answer is, we don’t.
Continue reading about Public Schools — Why On Earth Do We Need Them?
Actions speak louder than words. The fact that so many public-school teachers send their kids to private schools should be all the proof you need that it might be wise for you to look for education alternatives for your kids elsewhere.
Continue reading about Public-School Teachers Know Best — They Send Their Kids To Private Schools
Success in school is predicated on a less regimented environment in which a child is nurtured and not sucked down to the level of the lowest common denominator.
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It’s important to be able to choose what your child studies, as well as where and with whom. Public schools notoriously waste kids’ time with coursework they don’t need, don’t care about, and which don’t go at the right pace for them.. In “Public Schools, Public Menace,” you will learn how to find an affordable internet private school that will teach your child what he really needs and wants to know at a pace designed to keep him interested in and excited by learning. Don’t waste another year of your child’s life to find out about better school choices.
It seems that school authorities and public-school employees would rather protect an irreparably broken, failed system, than risk the security of their jobs by giving parents real school choice. We can certainly understand public-school employees wanting to keep their guaranteed job security. However, should we sacrifice our children’s education and future to keep failed public schools in business?
Continue reading about School Choice Will Destroy the Public Schools? — Maybe That’s a Good Thing
So what do angry or frightened local school districts do in response? School authorities often harass charter schools by reducing their funding, denying them access to school equipment or facilities, putting new restrictions on existing charter schools, limiting the number of new schools, or weakening charter-school laws.
Continue reading about The Charter School Wars — Why Public Schools Hate Charter Schools
Today, many school authorities seem to have contempt for religion and traditional moral values. They force children to endure years of “values clarification” classes, which teach children that all moral values are subjective and meaningless. Many teacher-facilitators, as some now prefer to call themselves, teach kids that whatever feels good at the moment or whatever the group considers acceptable is a “good” value.
Continue reading about How Public Schools Assault Christian Values
In January, 2003, a group of parents sued a Sacramento Unified School District because certain teachers at their local elementary school were aggressively, and secretly, teaching anthroposophy, a religion that combines traditional Western religion with astrology and New Age religion. Pacific Justice Institute lawyers representing the parents indicated that many other public schools in California are now adding New Age and Eastern religions, including Islam, to their curricula.
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One reason public schools get away with educational murder, year after year, is because local governments violate parents’ liberty and parental rights with impunity. Local governments don’t own or run food stores, auto showrooms, office-supply stores, or pre-schools and private colleges in America. Yet they own the public schools and control 1st through 12th grade education in America.
Continue reading about Compulsory Attendance Laws Violate Parents’ Rights
As we might expect, teacher quality is far more important than class size in determining how children do in school. William Sanders at the University of Tennessee studied this issue. He found that teacher quality is almost twenty times more important than class size in determining students’ academic achievement in class. As a result, reducing class sizes can lead to the contrary effect of hurting students’ education, rather than helping.
Continue reading about Surprise — Public School Class Size Doesn’t Matter Very Much
If government schools ruin children’s education and futures with their failed policies, why give them more billions of dollars? In fact, giving public schools more money to continue their education crimes against our kids would be criminal. It would be like giving more money to a drug addict so he could buy more cocaine and do more damage to his brain.
Continue reading about Public Schools — Our Education Garbage Dump
This government-knows-best philosophy is the deepest reason why public schools get away with educational murder and can never be fixed. Many public-school apologists believe that your children’s education must be dictated by local governments and school authorities. By implication, they believe that parents are an annoyance at best, and at worst a danger to their children’s proper education. That is why public-school true believers will never voluntarily give up control over our children. They see themselves as noble idealists who know what is best for our children. That is why these “idealists” have contempt for parent’s rights.
Continue reading about Public-School Exremists with a Mission
If teacher licensing produced competent teachers, why would public-school authorities fight so hard against merit pay? The answer seems obvious-is it possible that the public-school system produces teachers, principals, or administrators who might not “merit” their pay, and might lose their jobs under merit-pay rules?
Continue reading about Teacher Licensing Benefits Teachers, Not Our Children
“The most vindictive resentment may be expected from the pedagogic profession for any suggestion that they should be dislodged from their dictatorial position; it will be expressed mainly in epithets, such as reactionary, at the mildest. Nevertheless, the question to put to any teacher moved to such indignation, is: Do you think nobody would willingly entrust his children to you or pay you for teaching them? Why do you have to extort your fees and collect your pupils by compulsion?”
Continue reading about The Absurdity of the Public School Monopoly
Bad public schools don’t shut down, and the entire system is beyond repair, because this system rests on a foundation of naked government force. Take away compulsory-attendance laws and compulsory school taxes and it’s highly likely that most public schools would “go out of business” because parents would take their business elsewhere.
Continue reading about Why Don’t Bad Public Schools Go Out of Business?
If the federal government truly wants to give parents more school choice, they should be working to remove local and state controls over education, not adding to those controls with the No Child Left Behind law and other regulations. That is like trying to cure a person dying of arsenic poisoning by giving him more arsenic. Naturally, government education officials can’t understand the fact that government control of education is not the solution, it is the problem.
Continue reading about No Child Left Behind Law Won’t Do Much For Your Child
The No Child Left Behind Act of 2001 is making the problem of cheating, low academic standards, and public schools lying to parents, even worse. Under this Act, the Department of Education now requires students to pass standardized tests. Failing schools will lose federal funding and other perks if their students consistently turn in a bad performance on these tests.
Parents, it might be wise to periodically ask your children if their teachers ask them personal questions about your family or how you discipline your children. Turning children into spies against their parents or making them afraid of their parents is not what parents pay school taxes for.
Compulsory attendance laws show contempt for parents’ rights because they are based on the notion that the state owns our children for twelve years, and that parents should have little say in the matter. In effect, these laws allow state officials to legally kidnap millions of children, allegedly to benefit the children by giving them an education (in the opinion of these officials). “Kidnap” may seem like a harsh word, yet wouldn’t you apply that word to someone who took your child by force against your will?
Continue reading about Parents’ Rights Violated By Public School Compulsory-Attendence Laws
Parents, it would not be wise to trust any claims by teachers or school authorities about your children’s alleged academic abilities, even in so-called “good” schools in suburban neighborhoods. To find out how your child is really doing, have an outside independent company test your child’s reading and math skills. If you find that your child’s academic skills are far below what your local public-school led you to believe, you might want to take your child out of public school and look for better education alternatives. There is a complete Resource section in “Public Schools, Public Menace” that explores many of these quality, low-cost education alternatives.
Continue reading about Parents — Your Children’s Report Card May Be Rigged
Compulsory-attendance laws also imply that some parents are too ignorant or indifferent to their children’s welfare to educate their kids. If this was not the case, then why compel parents at all?
Continue reading about Most Parents Are Not Idiots or Negligent
Parents, the solution is to stop hitting your head against the brick wall of arrogant public-school employees. Just walk around the wall and don’t look back. That is, consider taking your children out of public school, permanently.
Continue reading about Parents’ Complaints — Arrogant Public Schools Turn a Deaf Ear
. . . children spent on average only about 50 percent of their school day on core “academic” subjects. The rest of their time is spent on classes about sex-education, personal safety, family life, consumer affairs, AIDS and drug prevention, save-the-environment, multiculturalism studies, “cooperative-learning” projects, study halls, electives, homeroom, counseling, sports activities, or pep rallies (high school).
Continue reading about Public Schools Can Waste 12 Years of Your Child’s Life
Besides creating millions of graduating illiterates, automatic promotion tells kids that mediocrity and laziness are acceptable. It tragically sets children up to fail later in life when reality smacks them in the face — when they apply for college or a job. These are not lessons that schools should be teaching our children.
Public schools are also a drug pusher’s heaven . . . That’s why drug pushers circle schoolyards like vultures. Where else can they find groups of vulnerable victims all herded together for their convenience? Is it any wonder that drug and alcohol use is a major problem in public schools?
Parents would not be wise to trust any claims by teachers or school authorities about their children’s alleged academic abilities, even in so-called “good” schools in suburban neighborhoods. Parents should have an outside independent company test their child’s reading and math skills to find out how their child is really doing.
Continue reading about How Public Schools Betray Our Children
Unlike private schools, public schools rarely go out of business, no matter how bad they are, because they get their “customers” and their money by force (compulsory school taxes).
Continue reading about Public Schools — Bad Education Year after Year?
If your child exhibits any of these danger signals, it may be time to seriously consider taking your child out of public school and looking for better education alternatives. “Public Schools, Public Menace” has a whole Resource Section devoted to these great education alternatives.
Continue reading about Are Public Schools a Menace To Your Children? — 11 Danger Signals
“If the child can’t grasp a new word because he cannot sound it out, teach him “pre-reading” strategies,” they expound. “These “strategies” will help him “guess” what the word is. Have him look at the title of the story. Have the child look at pictures, look for “clues,” look for “patterns” in the story that make sense. Or skip the word and come back to it. Or ask a friend who also cannot read it. Or finally, when all else fails, ask the teacher. Anything,” say the learned educrats, “except actually sounding out and reading the word.”
Continue reading about Parents — Do You Want Dumb, Non-Reading Children? Keep Them In Public School
Getting your children’s real skills tested may open your eyes to the possibility that your child is getting a third-rate education, and that your local public school isn’t as good as you thought it was. Getting your children’s skills tested might be the first and most important step to giving your kids the great education they deserve.
Continue reading about Test Your Child’s Reading and Math Skills
