New Hampshire, which has become a laboratory for crazy the past few months, is upping the ante:
New Hampshire’s House is scheduled to vote this week whether to repeal a law requiring public schools to offer kindergarten.
The House Education Committee is recommending keeping the requirement, but a minority on the committee is fighting to repeal the law. State Rep. J.R. Hoell, a Dunbarton Republican, argued the bill isn’t about eliminating kindergarten but about giving local voters the control over whether to offer programs.
Why stop there?
anticontrarian
They won’t.
BGinCHI
This is going to put lots and lots of money into the coffers of Big Daycare.
The Kochs got any investments there?
Triassic Sands
Kindergarten is a waste of time. These (lazy) kids should just get a damn job and quit feeding off the public teat.
morzer
Is it too late to offer bids for the contracting work on the Great Wall of Massachusetts? I feel that we really do have to secure our borders from the unkindergartened hordes who are bound to try and sneak into our state and steal our jobs, before dropping their economic terrorist anchor babies in our superior medical facilities.
General Stuck
When I was in Kindergarten, we had at least one collective nap time each day. Everyone together. Obviously, soshulist indoctrination. And don’t get me started on all that commie toy sharing shit.
JGabriel
John Cole:
Because that would destroy the illusion that you can do whatever you want as long as you’re willing to make the effort (and have the money).
.
ThatLeftTurnInABQ
We will be greeted as liberators. They will shower us with milk and cookies.
Spaghetti Lee
New Hampshire: Live Dumb or Die!
jwb
@anticontrarian: Agreed. How many people really need high school these days—or middle school? Since McMegan seems destined to become economic pundit of choice, we should probably make sure most of the population doesn’t take elementary school either, since they would learn basic arithmetic.
Just Some Fuckhead
If this is true most Republicans need to go back to Kindergarten.
BGinCHI
OK, I’ll say it:
Are there no workhouses?!
srv
Hey, they’ve only had that ‘right’ since 2009.
Where’s that epic Swiftian libertarian snark where the guy argues why his 6 year old should have a job already?
MikeJ
Why pick on kindergarten? Why not pick some other grade at random? No 4th grade! K-3, 5-12. That’s what god wants.
eric
@BGinCHI: haz we been misreading a Christmas Carol all these years. hevans!
RedKitten
Yes, because the answer to America’s ills is LESS education.
/headdesk.
Basilisc
As I said in the other thread, this is all part of the geezer-ification of the Republican party. They don’t have kids in the schools, so they don’t give a f— about schools. For anyone.
morzer
@MikeJ:
Hell, who needs K-3 when you can have KY Jelly? Worked fine for George Washington, didn’t it?
Violet
Anyone want to place bets on when debtors prisons become a Serious talking point?
Violet
@Basilisc:
But don’t any of these geezers have grandchildren?
Citizen_X
If we’re going to dismantle society, can we just skip ahead to the part where we’re reduced to being mohawk-sporting savages, riding around on motorcycles and killing each other with crossbows as we fight over the last of the oil? Because that would at least be exciting.
morzer
@Violet:
Stage one will be further “reform” of bankruptcy laws. Arguably, the student loan non-bankruptcy law was the first stage in that particular scheme.
JPL
@BGinCHI: Some think that child labor laws are unconstitutional.
Many five year old children could become guinea pigs to test a range of medicines and food products coming on the market. That way they could save their money for a good private education.. Who needs these public schools anyway.
Citizen_X
@Violet: I’ll take Wednesday.
morzer
@Violet:
I’ll bet you that a surprisingly large number of older white Republicans fear quite deeply the idea of their kids and grandkids knowing more than they should and disrespecting their betters.
JGabriel
Future Republican Quote:
Future “Truth-Buster” Web Site:
.
Poopyman
@RedKitten: Uneducated masses are less likely to get uppity, like them Wisconsinites.
Hey, it’s worth taking a shot, in their minds.
ThatLeftTurnInABQ
Could somebody please Tivo this reality TV show “Craziest State” for me? I want to skip to the end to find out who wins but I’m not sure I have the stomach for watching every episode.
MikeJ
@ThatLeftTurnInABQ: And people laughed when Washington chose to have the horse fuckers. I’ll bet New Hampshire isn’t laughing now.
(Nor are the helicopters.)
JGabriel
morzer:
They should fear a shortage of doctors more.
.
Martin
They aren’t stopping there. Utah has proposed eliminating 12th grade.
PurpleGirl
@Violet: Their grandkids are in different school systems (different state) or private schools.
Cris
A perfect distillation of libertarian anti-engineering.
We’re not eliminating public transit, we’re giving local voters the control over whether to operate their own bus.
We’re not eliminating environmental regulations, we’re giving mining companies control over whether to stop dumping arsenic in the water.
rapier
Free universal public education is a goner and that has always been the goal. The large city systems will be the first to go. I suppose suburban systems may persist. They would have been gone long ago in the South except for the football teams.
jwb
@Martin: I won’t be surprised if, before the year is out, some state legislature entertains a serious proposal to get the state out of public education.
BGinCHI
Moved to next thread.
Superluminar
It is not surprising that you leftists would complain about this as your unions are heavily invested in profiting off the taxpayer, irregardless of whether the private sector can provide a better service. I know you probably don’t want to hear this, but results show that independent kindergartens do better than public ones, so your stance here is nothing more than protectionism dressed up as virtue, a position I’m sure you’re all familiar with.
Steve
Chris Christie derided pre-K as “babysitting.” I guess this means he’s a moderate Republican.
jwb
@BGinCHI: And what happens when it all comes crashing down at once? A good chunk of the right wing capitalists will not escape the collapse either.
Chyron HR
@Superluminar:
You forgot to randomly assert that public schools violate the constitution.
Martin
@jwb: Utah is pretty close now. There’s a pretty ugly spiral about to begin. If public education cuts really starts to show through in results (it isn’t yet, but it may in a few years) then it’s going to impact the ability of higher education to operate, which are under comparable assault. That money being slashed out of public universities first and foremost takes out any remedial instruction they may provide. Public universities are going to be forced to consider those remedial students to be non-competitive, and those students will be forced to turn to private education. Ultimately, the higher-end public institutions are going to be forced to turn away from broad population support and support for undergraduate education, and increasingly focus on graduate education. And who is going to have to fill that gap? Private and for-profit universities, and most privates are pretty small.
Anyone know what the largest private non-profit university in the US is?
negative 1
@ThatLeftTurnInABQ: New Hampshire wins. Texas may get more attention, but it’s much bigger and has more resources. New Hampshire gets this done with basically no taxes and very few people. Hell, they’re trying to start a state militia in case someone attacks them. Massachusetts? Vermont? Who knows. But they’ll have a state militia.
Mike in NC
@Basilisc:
Nailed it. We see and hear this every day in our selfish little community:
Public schools — are you kidding? We see our grandkids at Christmas and on their birthdays, and that’s plenty!
Highways and bridges — don’t need ’em because WalMart is just a mile away and we can get there on a golf cart.
Parks and beaches — don’t use ’em because we can sit in our air-conditioned condo and watch TV all day.
Public transportation — our 1999 Cadillac runs just fine if we need it. Riffraff and criminals use buses and trains.
Public libraries — we subscribe to NewsMax and get all the information we need from those nice young men Glenn Beck and Sean Hannity.
Napoleon
@jwb:
I thought Scott in Fla is basically proposing that.
evinfuilt
@Citizen_X:
You must not get cable, because thats what Discovery channel seems to be now a days.
Aredubya
As a resident of the fine state of New Hampshire (in all sincerity, I really like it here), it’s par for the course amongst the GOPers that are back in charge. In the moderate sized suburb I reside in, their biggest concerns seem to be for cutting property tax rate (along with corporate tax, the only real taxes collected in the state), despite property value dropping, decreasing tax receipts on already stretched-thin local budgets. Rather than raise taxes, they level funded the budget, which amounts to a year-over-year cut. Was that enough though? Nope, they want more. To try to limit the sway of a vocal minority over school budget priorities, we enacted a quorum of 500 voters required to show up to vote at a yearly meeting (called the Deliberative Session) for specific school budget line items. We have 20,000+ residents, so it doesn’t seem that onerous. Less than 500 turn out each time, so the school administration gets to do what they want to with the money allocated to them. Y’know, like how administrators normally do things.
However, for the scant few that want to cut the budget more, they’ve gone out of their way to sue the school and town over the quorum, using every sob story in the book:
“Quorums are unconstitutional” (they are constitutional, actually)
“The voters don’t get their say” (we’ve voted in favor of keeping the same quorum 3 times in the last decade)
“Our struggle is just like women’s suffrage or the 14th Amendment” (really, no shit, they’ve said this)
What they want is another 2-3% off the school budget that’s already been cut so they can say save another buck or two per mille. That 2-3% means cutting all non-high school sports and after-school activities. As others have said, the GOPers could give a shit because their kids are either long out of school, or privately/parochially/home schooled to keep them away from the liberal tendencies that public schooling would force on their wunderkinds. I’ve lived here for 9 years now, and am immensely proud that my tax dollars pay for good public schools, and I top it off with contributions to the local college scholarship drive every year. My first son’s barely a year old, so it’ll be 14 years’ worth of my tax dollars paid into the system before I begin to see any benefit of it. And you know what? I wouldn’t have it any other way. Good schools benefits the community at large, leading to brighter, better kids who’ll count change correctly at their after-school job, show up and give a crap. They’ll graduate and flourish here or elsewhere. And screw the GOPers who’d try to crush that dream for a few bucks a year.
Suffern ACE
Kindergarten has always been a foreign implant on American soil, started by the Germans and all and brought here in 1848 by failed revolutionaries. I believe the first one was in Wisconsin.
Corner Stone
@morzer:
Yes, it is already too late. The kangol hordes are marching.
JPL
Stuckinred mentioned that Detroit has to close half of its’ schools and that means sixty students in each high school class. Good times. Cut those teachers pay, those uppity elites.
opie jeanne, formerly known as Jeanne Ringland
@MikeJ: My mom grew up in Missouri during the depression. The Independence school district decided to skip sending kids to 8th grade, 7th graders when straight to 9th grade, to save money. I am still trying to wrap my head around how this saved money.
Mike in NC
@Superluminar:
Um, there’s no such word as ‘irregardless’ but apparently they never taught you that much in school.
Uloborus
@Basilisc:
That’s a good point, but it’s a pitch to the Cultural Conservatives. The idea is… well, clannishness. Absolute local control of their local world so that they can enforce their own standards.
Uloborus
@Superluminar:
Ah, well, here is the problem:
That’s great for the people who can afford to pay for it.
Your assertion that poor people do not deserve the same opportunities for education will be taken in mind.
Suffern ACE
@opie jeanne, formerly known as Jeanne Ringland: At the time, only 8th grade education may have been mandatory. For my Grandfather, it was onthly mandatory through grade 6. It saved money by allowing students to drop out of school is my guess.
JPL
@Superluminar: Kindergarten is only valuable if you can afford it?
I live in a town where they have excellent private schools, in fact Pres. Bush was afforded an elite education. For most people this is not attainable. Can you link to the study that shows private kindergartens are better? It need to be a state comparison though.
opie jeanne, formerly known as Jeanne Ringland
@Suffern ACE: Mom would be 90 if she were alive. Is that about the same as your grandfather? Her parents made sure all four kids graduated from HS; they had had only grade school educations.
WyldPirate
@Martin:
The Univ. of Southern California?
dennis
Who needs an outside enemy to come in, conquer us, and turn us into a 3rd world country, when a sizable chunk of the population seems to be willingly doing it to ourselves?
Martin
@WyldPirate: Liberty University. USC is #3.
Zifnab
I see we’ve decided to add “Fuck the Young” to “Fuck the Poor” as our libertarian slogs of choice.
piratedan
@Superluminar: lovely concept, am guessing that the teachers are paid more, have fewer pupils and as such have access to more materials and can spend more time with each student. Scary how that translates to a better eductaion. Never give a sucker an even break right?
geemoney
@Superluminar: “irregardless” isn’t a word. See also: refudiate.
piratedan
@Martin: that’s because the profit came first, to get the tax write off Falwell had to do “something”.
geemoney
@Mike in NC: You win.
Punchy
Nobody graduates junior high. Ergo, no expenses for diploma paper, chair and ribbon set-up, microphone rental, or Hawaiian Punch.
Arclite
Given all that we have learned about child development over the past several decades, and our falling rank in education on the world stage, we should be ADDING preschool to the mandatory education list, not eliminating kindergarten.
Here in Hawaii, we have kids who go through kindergarten twice b/c they don’t pass the first time. I can’t imagine how bad it would be for them in the first grade if KG was eliminated.
Yutsano
@Superluminar:
Link or GTFO. And no Heritage nor CATO count.
opie jeanne, formerly known as Jeanne Ringland
@Punchy: Haha, no. They didn’t have graduation ceremonies for jr high back then.
Dork
@Mike in NC: Uh, yeah there is
And from the link, so apropos:
Take that, Grammar Nazi
morzer
@Dork:
There is also such a word as arse-mustard, but one doesn’t use it in polite company.
Decorum, please.
Suffern ACE
@opie jeanne, formerly known as Jeanne Ringland: My Grandfather would have been 102. Truth be told, when you look at the proposed “Child Labor Law” repeal in your state, it is really going to go hand in hand with the kind of reform that will go back to 8 years of education for working class kids. No one is actually talking about having 5 year old factory workers. But 14 year olds in the workforce is a possibility that we have not dealt with in 50 or 60 years. Unless something changes politically, I can see a lot of states opting for the 8 or 6 and done model and it will be sold as a way to ease the burden on parents who will need their teenaged children of the poor to help fund their own healthcare costs, and for that matter, the healthcare costs of poor old grandma who no longer recieves medicaid when her assets are gone but she can no longer take care of herself.
It will be sold as welfare and good for families. And it will be eaten up by the elite as being a serious proposition for hard thinking people.
Poopyman
@Zifnab: Makes sense. The young and the poor are powerless.
So fuck ’em.
RSA
@Martin:
You may be surprised. There are more links to entire systems; this one is to campuses, sort of.
fasteddie9318
At this point, is there any reason not to start actively looking for employment opportunities abroad?
Arclite
Not funding education is so short sighted. When old people need a doctor, a nurse, a cook, a mechanic, an architect, a lawyer, etc. etc., don’t they know that the children of today will become that worker in 10 years? Don’t you want the best people doing that job for/on you? Just because you don’t have kids and I do, doesn’t mean that my kids won’t be taking care of you in some capacity when you get older, even if it’s just having a more productive job that adds more money to the tax base.
Sebastian Dangerfield
@RSA: Holy creeping fuck! Liberty University has higher enrollment than NYU. We’re fucking doomed.
That decides it. I’m moving somewhere civilized. The Caucuses look pretty.
Yutsano
@Sebastian Dangerfield: I’m thinking Australia myself. Hoping the IRS decides to go for a compliance division in Canberra. If not Berlin will do.
Karen
Who needs kindergarten? Are there no workhouses? Are there no prisons?
Cat Lady
@Arclite:
This. Also property values. The better the school system, the more desirable the town, and the more valuable the real estate. The best investment you can make for yourself is in your local school system.
morzer
@Sebastian Dangerfield:
The Iowa Caucuses?
JGabriel
Arclite:
They assume they’ve already got the doctors, etc., they need for the rest of their lives, and that good professionals for the next generation is: the next generation’s problem.
.
JGabriel
@Zifnab:
It’s pretty much an orgy at this point, of rich people inflicting rape and pillage on the rest of us.
.
opie jeanne, formerly known as Jeanne Ringland
@Suffern ACE: I have never lived in Missouri. She got the heck out and moved to California after WII. I grew up there and just moved to Washington, near Seattle.
I’ve spent a lot of vacation time there because of family, but I couldn’t live in Misery, as we call it.
I’ve met some of the fine specimens of their educational system who came out of that time period and they were all cheated.
opie jeanne, formerly known as Jeanne Ringland
@RSA: Liberty didn’t even make the top ten in 2009 but in 2010 it’s at the top of the list.
Sebastian Dangerfield
@morzer: Can’t spell well enough to distinguish strange tribal anointment rituals from mountain ranges. I blame public education.
Cacti
Jesus never went to kindergarten.
Sebastian Dangerfield
Balkans also a good choice. Gorgeous countryside, stellar beaches, the architecture of Italy without the tourists. Not due for a brutal series of wars for another 25-30 years. And no extradition treaties with the U.S. Citizen_X: I have a shit-hot motorcycle to sell if you want to ready yourself for the mohawk-and-crossbows portion of the century’s entertainment.
morzer
@Sebastian Dangerfield:
Well, if the GOP had only saved you from the soc.ialist hell of kindergarten, just think how great your edumacation might have been….
Ash Can
@Basilisc:
@Steve:
Republicans can be counted on to wage war on public education for a variety of reasons. Basilisc nails the selfishness component. Chris Christie hits a two-fer — he ignores the established fact that children who attend pre-school programs do better in later grades, and he shows his contempt for education of the masses as well.
But there’s an additional, and very large, problem with this way of thinking — eliminating pre-school programs sticks it to working parents too, especially working mothers, since the lion’s share of child care usually defaults to them. If our local public grade school eliminated its pre-K and kindergarten programs, I can guarantee that a large number of moms who work outside the home would go looking for whomever was responsible, and those bodies would never be found. And this is in a reasonably affluent neighborhood — people in poorer neighborhoods would be far worse off in the face of something like this.
It all ties in — the war on minorities, the war on the poor, the war on women, the war on the middle class. Attacking public education is a chillingly efficient way to advance the right’s cause.
opie jeanne, formerly known as Jeanne Ringland
@Ash Can: Cuz staying at home to mind yer kids is God’s Law.
nhdemocrat
@morzer: As someone from New Hampshire, we would be better off with a wall as well. The most Republican friend areas of the state are almost entirely along the South/Southeast Mass border. It’s Massachusetts immigrants (along with the batshit crazy Free Staters) that are pushing the state further right. The areas with the fewest Mass immigration are easily the most liberal parts of the state. The clincher, as someone who was born and raised there, was hearing them confidently proclaim that they (with their 2 years of residency) were protecting the “New Hampshire way.”
morzer
@nhdemocrat:
Seems like we need a very carefully constructed wall then. You bring your map and I’ll bring mine. 50/50 on the building contracts?
Corner Stone
@Sebastian Dangerfield:
Tell me more.
Corner Stone
I am totally pissed no one went for my “kangol hordes” bit.
nhdemocrat
Done and done. Of course it would have to be a privately funded project as God knows we don’t have money for public works in NH. We haven’t adjusted our gas tax since some time in the early 1980s.
morzer
@Corner Stone:
I am afraid I missed the reference. But if you’d like to unpack it, I would enjoy learning more…
Also too, we might be able to give you some work on the Great Wall of Selected Bits of Massachusetts and New Hampshire.
Stefan
Balkans also a good choice. Gorgeous countryside, stellar beaches, the architecture of Italy without the tourists.
The womens. Tell me about the womens.
Chad N Freude
@Sebastian Dangerfield: I am overcome with lust for Spain, in whose language I can occasionally form an intelligible sentence. Art, History, Art, Architecture, Art, gorgeous and varied countryside, Architecture, and oh, yes, Art. Did I mention Architecture? And Barcelona, Disneyland For Grown-Ups (I mean that in a positive way). Seriously photogenic country.
Although with the European economic bust (caused entirely by the Fed), la chica más bella is losing some of her attraction.
ETA: And Mediterranean beaches. Did I mention Art and Architecture?
Reader of the Most Depressing Blog Evah, Formerly known as Chad N Freude
Getting serious for a moment, I am appalled and mystified by the lack of any sense of commonality, common interest, or common good. A free public school system is supposed to create an educated populace, which is GOOD FOR EVERYBODY. Why this is no longer recognized is a mystery to me. Although, thinking conspiratorially, maybe not so mysterious.
Sly
@Superluminar:
Private programs that select for low-cost students have better outcomes than public programs that are required by law to accept anyone regardless of cost?
No fucking shit.
Next you’ll be telling us that hospitals that are permitted to kick out cancer patients will have better outcomes than hospitals that are required by law to treat everyone.
Arclite
@Chad N Freude: Dude, my bro married a Spainiard and now lives in Mallorca. Jelly?
Chad N Freude
@Arclite: Your bro is seriously lucky. What is the meaning of
Arclite
@Chad N Freude: The answer to “You jelly?” can be found at Troll Science.
Arclite
@Chad N Freude: Moar Troll Science:
trollscience.com/troll/view/2930
James Gary
That decides it. I’m moving somewhere civilized. The Caucuses look pretty.
I bet you’re just saying that because you’re Caucasian.
Chad N Freude
@Arclite: Found this at the Urban Dictionary:
Now I’m more educated.
The answer to the original question is “Si, estoy muy jelly.”
Jonny Scrum-half
New Jersey doesn’t require districts to offer kindergarten. Neither does New York, Pennsylvania, New Hampshire and several other states.
Arclite
@Chad N Freude: =D
Bill Arnold
@Mike in NC:
Perhaps somebody is practicing their trolling. Maybe DougJ. Pitch-perfect conservatardish “facts” derived from libertarian axioms, somewhat off-topic, and “irregardless” thrown in to adorn it with broken pretentiousness.
Sebastian Dangerfield
@Stefan: It is a veritable Hotchickistan.
Angry Black Lady
@ThatLeftTurnInABQ: Brilliant.
Angry Black Lady
@Yutsano: I thought that comment was parody.
Reader of the Most Depressing Blog Evah, Formerly known as Chad N Freude
@efgoldman:
I think you’ve got “educating” confused with “eating”, but they do look similar.
Exurban Mom
I know it’s late in the thread which has already been superceded by many others, but can’t resist chiming in:
Our school district is looking at eliminating senior year of high school. Many of our students begin to get HS credit in 8th grade, and are able to complete the required credits for our state’s rules by the time they finish junior year. Quicker we get them out of our building, the less it costs us.
Budget realities mean we are cutting offerings to the bone, so not a lot of electives to take anyway. I have a friend going into her senior year who wants to compete in sports, and is having trouble finding 5 classes to take to maintain her eligibility.
And the tea baggers in our community would be thrilled about this, because it’s a cutting edge way to save money and they don’t want to open their pocketbooks.
The last levy put before our voters would have increased their taxes about $360 a year on a $200,000 home. It went down 60/40. Another dollar a day to make sure your kids can have an actual senior year? Too much.
Kindergarten elimination will make the jobs of first grade teachers exponentially harder, and that’s already the hardest job in an elementary school. If kids aren’t reading proficiently by the end of 2nd grade, that kid is in real trouble. We need that K year to get a jump start on reading especially.
I’m starting to believe it’s all a huge Neocon plot to dumb down the populace as much as possible.
Yutsano
@Angry Black Lady: Idiot’s been shitting teabagger bullshit all over the place today. It’s possible, but please forgive my skepticism.
Reader of the Most Depressing Blog Evah, Formerly Known as Chad N Freude
Seeing if a typo in my new nom d’ecran puts me in moderation.
Reader of the Most Depressing Blog Evah, Formerly Known as Chad N Freude
@Reader of the Most Depressing Blog Evah, Formerly Known as Chad N Freude: Seems to have worked.
debbie
How is it the people who scream American exceptionalism are the same people who go all slash and burn on education? The only thing this achieves is a nation of exceptionally stupid people.
Peter A
New Hampshire went more most of the 20th century without public kindergarten and did just fine. Maybe ‘early education’, and school in general, is not all it’s cracked up to be.
@ 90 – that’s crazy talk. The immigrants have brought the state to the left for the most part. In the 1970s my area of NH (the Lakes Region) was far more anti-tax and anti-government than it is now. When you went to town meeting in the 60s or 70s you’d hear the same Bircher nonsense you hear on Fox News now.
Peter A
I’ll just add something – when I was a kid in the 70s I remember very clearly that many NH parents were against funding better schools because they didn’t want their kids to get fancy ideas and move out of state. And from that narrow (selfish perspective) those parents were completely right. Most of my friends, and myself, did leave New Hampshire to find more exciting work elsewhere. People vote conservative when they are scared.
YellowJournalism
@Exurban Mom: I was skimming this thread hoping that someone would bring up the fact that new proficiency standards have changed the functions of kindergarten and created a “need” for pre-k for some children. The requirements for a child in kindergarten are far more academically rigorous than the playtime/naptime/show and tell days of our youth at the expense of important social and gross motor development. When Christie calls pre-k babysitting, it shows he has no idea what goes on the pre-k and kindergarten classrooms. (Although his other opinions on education and teachers show that he has no idea what goes on in the upper grades, either!)
Peter A: Most of the 20th century did not have the academic requirements of modern early education. ETA: That’s not necessarily a bad thing, though.
Diane
I was a School Nurse in a very poor district in Vermont, before they required Kindergarten.
I was appalled at how unprepared these kids were for school. Some had never seen a scissor or knew what a crayon was for.
These kids were supposed to start to learn to read. Some of them had never held a book.
If you are concerned about America and want her to be the best country in the world, why would you want to destroy the best vehicle to achieve that, the education system?