The American Spectator

p> NEA BASICS br> Re: David Hogberg’s No Lefty Left Behind : /p>

I thoroughly enjoyed David Hogberg’s piece on our “friends” — no, not the Saudis, but the NEA. One sentence he quotes from the coalition website aptly sums up all that is wrong with the edu-tariat today:

“…we’re failing to provide too many children with the basics…”

p>Indeed. One assumes, having had a rather intense exposure to grammar in primary school, the goal of this group of loons must be to provide too many children with the basics. I applaud their generosity of spirit, but it seems to me a more laudable goal would be to provide enough, or all, children with the basics. Anyone speaking or reading the output of most modern survivors of the education gulag could only borrow a line from Macbeth “Hold, not enough!” br> — Frank Stevenson /p>

Most of the quotes attributed to NEA President Reg Weaver and to the “National Mobilization for Great Public Schools” website are inarguable. We do need to make education a higher priority; we are “…failing to provide too many children with the basics”; and the schools do need “…adequate and equitable funding, qualified teachers, and technology.”

But the solution is certainly not for the NEA to align itself with such far-left fringe groups as mentioned in the article. Radical thinking and actions rarely accomplish anything positive. And that’s one reason the NEA has gotten such a questionable reputation amongst much of the populace.

p>If the NEA would do what they should, i.e., concentrate on quality education through support of quality teachers, then they could be a fine organization. As it stands now, they are getting more radical every day.