The American Spectator

home
ADVERTISEMENT
Print Email
Text Size

Special Report

Education’s Elixir

By on 5.10.12 @ 6:08AM

City’s charter schools epic failure and the future of government education.

Proponents of the charter movement as a quick fix for broken urban schools got some please-God-no news last week. The Missouri State Board of Education pulled the charters of all six Imagine schools in St. Louis. This means a third of charter schools that have opened here since 1999 have closed shop.

Virginia-based Imagine Schools Inc., the nation’s largest for-profit charter school operator, was done in by the same academic, financial and leadership failures that have finished off other charters here. At times, Imagine seemed more interested in its remunerative and successful real estate deals than in its mandate to educate inner-city children. As pathetic as exam scores have been at the city’s unaccredited public schools, Imagine’s scores were worse. (I know!) Meanwhile, the city’s other large for-profit charter operator, EdisonLearning, which manages a handful of mostly low-performing schools, is reportedly on its way out, too.

Indeed, despite receiving more taxpayer dollars per student than regular public schools and operating with considerably less regulation and oversight, most St. Louis charter schools perform worse on standardized tests than government schools.

Charters managed by nonprofit groups appear in better shape academically and financially, though here too there has been failure and corruption aplenty. One problem for parents trying to unravel the charter mysteries is that the line between nonprofit and for-profit is blurry. The schools themselves must be nonprofits; though sometimes they are founded by small, local nonprofit groups, sometimes by large, out-of-state nonprofits, and sometimes by large, out-of-state for-profit corporations, as was the case with the now-defunct Thurgood Marshall Academy, which was shuttered after its president — brought in to save the failing school — was convicted of stealing more than $7,000, including $800 in lunch money, before it closed in 2005.

Nor is small and local nonprofit status a guarantee of success. Back in 2001, state Sen. Pete Kinder and several local pastors opened two tuition-free charters. Paideia academies soon became two of the lowest performing schools in the city — and that is saying something. The schools finally folded in 2010, and its chairman stands accused of looting more than $250,000 of public money to use for a side business. Across town, the now-defunct Ethel Hedgeman Lyle Academy charter schools were so deeply in debt they were taken over by the unaccredited public school district, while owing 100 creditors more than $5 million.

CHIEF AMONG THE SUCCESS stories is Construction Careers Center (managed by the public school district), and Gateway Science Academy (operated by Chicago-based Concept Schools, a large nonprofit consulting group) whose students tested twice as high on average as regular public school students. St. Louis Charter School, managed by a large Delaware-based nonprofit, has scored slightly better than government schools. Also showing promise is the Grand Center Arts Academy, managed by the Chicago-based nonprofit American Quality Schools. (Acceptance there requires an audition and parents’ signature on a commitment form, including a promise to check the child’s homework every night.) The local newspaper, no friend of charters, recently praised the local Knowledge is Power Program charter school, managed by the nonprofit KIPP Foundation, as “the right sort of charter …”

“KIPP does charters right,” wrote the editors. “It… will be a part of the solution.”

Following the Imagine fiasco, charter school proponents, among them Mayor Francis Slay, were at pains to point out that this is how alternative education is supposed to work. Good schools survive, bad ones are shut down. Contrast that to the public schools, where no matter how bad they fail, they continue to operate.

Imagine’s closure by no means signals the end of charter schools. In fact, state lawmakers are set to vote to extend charters statewide. Rural Missourians, tired of years of school consolidation or hungry for alternative forms of public education, are demanding the same choices as their urban counterparts. Though hopefully they will meet with better success. Here, at least, the lesson seems to be that large, out-of-state, for-profit corporations may not be your best bet for a sound education. However, the fact that any schools have succeeded in this chaotic urban environment is more miracle than judgment on the failure of the free market to turn things around.

In the end, this business of school choice and charters and vouchers seems to me mere pruning round the edges, rather than hacking at the roots of the problem, which is, as we all know, the breakdown of the traditional family. When we come up with a quick fix for that, the rest may take care of itself.

About the Author

Christopher Orlet writes from St. Louis.

Letter to the Editor View all comments (82) |

Jack in Wi.| 5.10.12 @ 6:37AM

The vast majority of American Presidents have been home schooled or privately schooled, at least in part. That includes Obama, the Bushes, Biden, Reagan, Ford, Kennedy, the Roosevelts, Wilson, Hoover, Taft and all the Presidents up until, at least 1900. If private education is good enough for them, it should be good enough for the rest of us.

Alan Brooks| 5.10.12 @ 7:10AM

'The school system is pure [you-know what], only thing matters is [business]. But God gives you a sense of humor so you can laugh at the whole thing.

Barky K9 | 5.10.12 @ 8:00AM

The only solution is to divide up all the money now spent on education and give to the parents to allow them to choose schools...Only then will you have competition...Government needs to get out of education...Separation of governement and schools is a must for quality education.

Alan Brooks| 5.10.12 @ 8:17AM

No, only homeschooling can improve things.\.
People only care about their own children, deep down, though you CAN improve the collective-school situation perhaps 1.7039 percent.

Alan Brooks| 5.10.12 @ 8:21AM

remember, all non-homeschools are collective-schools; you are looking for a magic scholastic remedy which doesn't exist-- or you merely want to stand on a red white and blue soapbox.

Tim the Enchanter| 5.10.12 @ 1:07PM

OK- who let Alan Brooks out and forgot to put him back?

Seek| 5.10.12 @ 1:22PM

Love is a compliment to knowledge, but not a substitute for it. Many parents are plain flat-out unqualified to teach.

Calvin| 5.10.12 @ 2:55PM

The qualified teachers are doing such a fine job? Something is wrong with how we are using the word qualified.

Appleby| 5.10.12 @ 3:54PM

Complement.

Lesser Weevil| 5.11.12 @ 12:46AM

Thank you.

calvin | 5.13.12 @ 6:41AM

Jack; Where on earth do you get your information? Jerry Ford graduated South High in Grand Rapids with my Uncle Bob before going to U of M. News to me that Reagan was home schooled.

Appleby| 5.10.12 @ 6:37AM

Any schools that are supported by any government money are going to fail, beause nobody's actual cash is at risk, and because the people in charge of those schools do not seem to be people whose parents taught them to keep their hands off that which does not belong to them.

Put your child in parochial school, particularly one where the teaching nuns are beginning to reappear, and pay attention to what your child is learning. Remind the teachers and the children that you are paying cash money out of your pocket (hence no $400 sneakers, no $600 Smart Phones, no Nintendo Wii or Playstation 5,280, and yes to homework and practicing and wearing a uniform and obeying school rules. And don't say you can't afford it. If you can afford to pay $85.00 for ringtones and spent $1,000 playing Angry Birds, you can afford to send your child to a Catholic School.

Alan Brooks| 5.10.12 @ 10:44AM

You are bullshitting yourself:
only homeschooling can work in the long run, because otherwise one is asking someone else to take responsibility for one's own children.

Alan Brooks| 5.10.12 @ 10:46AM

... one can do a better job of educating one's own children.

Occam's Tool| 5.10.12 @ 11:09AM

My children ARE home schooled. My wife, of course, is a verified genius. ACT high enough to qualify for Mensa (I know, as I did it myself), she had two CONCURRENTLY running full-ride academic scholarships at Alabama, and graduated Summa Cum Laude in accounting. I make the money, she stays at home full time.

Make black daddies take responsibility for their children and provide their boys with a male authority figure, and their daughters with a male role model.

Everything else will follow. Liberals are murdering Black Children in multiple ways. From the womb to an early tomb.

John Navratil| 5.10.12 @ 12:19PM

Occam's Tool,

Bless your wife, and I second your prescription.

It's not just the failing schools which are a problem, but how they fail as well. There are people in the government schools who are there to disrupt and against whom no action can be taken. Kick them out. It's either a school or a jail - it can't be both.

Seek| 5.10.12 @ 1:24PM

It's more the other way around. Black children are murdering (or at least beating) whites, especially in St. Louis with their charming "knockout" game. I don't feel an ounce of pity for the blacks. It's their own kind that have pilfered their fly-by-night charter "schools."

irish19| 5.10.12 @ 1:24PM

In order to do that, LBJ's Great Society will have to go, particularly AFDC.
The whole thing is a disincentive to two-parent families and those role models you spoke about.

calvin | 5.13.12 @ 6:45AM

Razor;
Why single out bad fathers bsed on race? Whites in the USA have notthing to brag about when it comes to statistics on how their sons are turining out. And white children did not spend three hundred years having their fathers sold down the river to work in the cotton fields.

mike daniels| 5.10.12 @ 11:24AM

Alan you are full of it. What makes you think most parents are qualified to home school their children? Who schooled them? Are you looking for families that have a June Cleaver mom around to handle it? Not many exist today. The biggest problem with public school education is the utter failure of the early primary grades to teach kids to READ. We can throw some of that back on the parents also since way too few of them will take the time to teach their toddlers the basics of ABC's or to appreciate the written word. Try to teach anything to a high school junior that barely can read. I tried, I couldn't.

Appleby| 5.10.12 @ 4:04PM

Neither of my parents gradduated from high school (although Mama took the GED at age 50-something and got the second highest score in Alabama history). Daddy was taught in a two-room prairie schoolhouse where the student body recited every Friday and were also required to memorize ALL the Founding Documents -- he could recite the Constitution chapter and verse at the age 0f 80, as well as "The Wreck of the Hesparus" and reams of homespun classical poetry (The Village Blacksmith, The Ride of P aul Revere, The Highwayman, Barbara Fretchie, etc.) Mama was a grammar and spelling tyrant, and taught us phonics when the schools had a foray into the "Look/Say" method of teaching reading that did not teach anybody to read. Daddy said that with all the free libraries in the world, there was no excuse at all for ignorance, and that we should never venture an opinion without facts to back it up. All of us could read by the time we started school, and Bible School made sure with regular "sword drill" (teacher shouts out Bible verse and students race to be the first one to find it -- beware of the dreaded cry of "Obadiah!" which is a "book" that is one page long!)

Above all else they taught us that education was not only necessary, it was fun, it was unending, and that although other kids would hate us for being "smart", some day those kids would be working for us if they could get jobs at all.

There's no reason why parents can't do that today. But if they can't, they can send their kids to Parochial School. The Sisters will work with you on the price. Trust me. They will.

John Navratil| 5.10.12 @ 12:14PM

Alan Brooks,

Homeschooling is a fine choice, but NOT the only choice. I could not afford to leave my business as principal breadwinner - at least when I had to be on site for a fill day - and then come home to teach. My wife, in whom I had faith, did not think she was up to the task academically or from a personality viewpoint.

We chose private schools (we outsourced), my wife was very involved in those schools and our children received excellent educations.

If you can home school - do it. Ain't it grand that I had a real choice?

irish19| 5.10.12 @ 1:27PM

"my wife was very involved in those schools "
This is a huge part of the problem. Parents are not involved in the schools, nor do many of them value a formal education. Solve this at-home problem, and a large part of the in-school problems will go away.

fungoking| 5.10.12 @ 1:39PM

So if you or a loved is facing a life of death situation, are you going to insist on a home schooled surgeon?

Appleby| 5.10.12 @ 4:05PM

I'd rather have a home schooled surgeon than no surgeon at all.

Rick Cross| 5.10.12 @ 7:25AM

I had a brief stint as testing director for a charter school company 12 years ago. The younger kids did well, however, the program's effectiveness began to wane going into the middle grades, starting with the boys. Most of the kids were minority inner-city kids. Most were probably from broken families. It was hard not to conclude that missing fathers played a role in the demise of the program's effectiveness.

chuck| 5.10.12 @ 8:02AM

"Missing fathers". That's the reason for most inner-city problems, from crime to poor schools to unemployment, to the ghetto-like conditions of our inner cities. Until these welfare brood-mares stop popping out these little thugs, nothing is going to get better, no matter how much money is thrown at it.

Albert Constantine Jr.| 5.10.12 @ 8:45AM

More than half a decade ago, during an arrest at one of our community correction facilities, one of our secured entrances was breached by someone attempting to hinder. I was in the building because I had been called back from vacation to deal with an urgent matter, and wound up tackling the sprinting intruder en route to where the first subject was noisily being taken into custody.

The person I tackled was a 5’5” 180 lb. teenager whose first words were “I’m 17 and pregnant”. It was her mother who was being arrested for probation violation, and she was exercising her right to interfere. After receiving congratulations from witnessing colleagues for my timely clothes-lining of a pregnant girl on whom I had over a half a foot of height and at the time about 40 lbs, I returned to and completed the urgent task I was at work for, and went back on vacation.

An incident occurred with one of my staff this week that caused me to recall the above incident, so I did some checking. I discovered the pregnant teen I had tackled had been on juvenile probation for drug felonies at the time of the incident. She gave birth the next day to a baby girl.

Now, one can surmise that a baby girl born to a juvenile with a felony adjudication who the day before she was due was trying to prevent the arrest of her own felonious, drug addicted thieving mother does not have a bright future. In fact, by age three, police received a report that her mother walked in on the nine year old son of another multigenerational drug trafficker unclothed holding her naked daughter from behind.

I’m not sure where the introduction of any more money changes these outcomes. I am pretty sure that at some level, government funding enabled much of it.

PolishKnight| 5.10.12 @ 10:00AM

"When we come up with a quick fix for [broken families], the rest may take care of itself."

I have a quick fix, but none of you will like it.

It's kind of like someone saying they want a "quick fix" for weight gain and you tell them hit the gym for 2 hours a day and cut back on your carbs and they aren't interested. It's a painful, undesirable solution for them.

The quick fix is to reverse feminism possibly all the way back to Seneca falls. You can't have women getting lots of money, and social programs, and then magically have men live up to chivalrous Victorian era standards where they are disposable ATM machines and automatic door openers.

Even conservative men encourage their daughters to become doctors and highly paid women lest they "wind up alone" and then are often surprised when that becomes a self-fulfilling prophesy. I know many conservative families where the boys are slackers and unmarried and playing video games in their 30's and the daughters have empty townhomes and in the meantime, a Muslim family with 6 kids moves in down the block.

TLP| 5.10.12 @ 8:22AM

There is a REASON that Blacks committ 56% of all of the Violent Crimes in this Country.

There's a REASON that close to all young Black Males in America's Inner Cities, between the ages of 14 and 24, find themselves involved somewhere in the Criminal Justice System. In Jail, on Parole, on Trial, awaiting Trial, or awaiting Sentencing.

There's a REASON the the #1 Cause of Death, for this same Group of Black Males, is Homicide.

There's a REASON so many Black kids drop out of School.

Well over 80% of Black Children are born to Single Mothers, on Welfare.

No Fathers.

Just, don't let anybody hear you say that.

It's RACIST, don'tcha know.

Ned| 5.10.12 @ 10:43AM

The liberal icon Daniel Patrick Moynihan identified the problem in the '60s, in great detail, and even he was vilified by the screamers for daring to mention the TRUTH.

TLP| 5.10.12 @ 2:25PM

That's because the Left WANTS them to live in Squalor, on their knees, with their hands out.

On the Liberal Plantation, it's STILL A CRIME, to teach Blacks to Read and Write.

Occam's Tool| 5.10.12 @ 11:13AM

Yup. I had that conversation with my genius wife last night on why I oppose Gay Marriage (NOT Civil Unions, but Marriage.)

Children need Daddies. And Men neeed families to sublimate their aggressive urges into. Mr. Pennell, right again. You and Debbie Schlussel are the two people keeping Detroit from being destroyed by the L-rd. G-d Bless You, Sir.

Occam's Tool| 5.10.12 @ 11:19AM

Sorry, Tim---"need."

TLP| 5.10.12 @ 8:48PM

One, such as YOU, have nothing to apologize for, to anyone, my friend.

See you, tomorrow.

Seek| 5.10.12 @ 1:28PM

You're putting the cart before the horse. "Fatherlessness" is not a cause but rather an effect of pathology. Ask yourself: What black woman would want to marry these abusive, ugly black men? Blacks are more violent than whites. They married more often in the "good old days" out of expediency, not love.

Sean| 5.10.12 @ 8:43AM

Best thing a school can do is hire noncertified teachers who are masters of their subject area. Certified teachers are mostly those that have gone through the School of Education in college. They are on average academically at the bottom of the barrel of college grads.

Claypoole| 5.10.12 @ 9:29AM

Several years ago, my daughter, an attorney, thought of proposing to her school board a one semester-long high school course on basic law all adults should know. She had encountered so many in her practice of general law who were clueless regarding such things as leases, installment contracts and credit obligations that she thought a course in high school could forestall a lot of grief in later life. She was informed that, in order to teach, she would have to take the state's required hours of education courses. She declined, and now, somewhere, there is another young woman like the one my daughter had to deal with, who cannot understand why the dealership repossessed the car she made no payments on.

Vern Crisler | 5.10.12 @ 4:50PM

Not sure if hiring non-professional teachers is best. Some of these guys don't really know how to teach but just want the money. My brother had to drop out of a computer class because the "teacher" was not professional, but taught the subject in his own quirky way, including listening to loud rock music during the class.

JimH| 5.10.12 @ 9:06AM

When the government contracts with a company to provide a service, be it trash collection, education or anything else normally thought to be a government service it is sometimes termed privatization. These are often crony deals and only sometimes result in any efficiencies or improvement in services. Real privatization is when the service end users contract with the providers without a government agency acting as an intermediary.

Occam's Tool| 5.10.12 @ 11:14AM

Yes. I contract directly with my garbage pickup provider. Unlimited cans for weekly pick up once a week---cost every two months 48 and change.

WRTolkas| 5.10.12 @ 9:11AM

I agree with Ms Appleby, Mr. Brooks, and Mr. Cross. Somehow, the 60's generation and their progeny destroyed the American Public School System. One of the best schools in the nation is in the Holland/Zeeland area - Black River - is its name. Maybe the school administrators should flock to Black River. Then again maybe they should leave us alone. Whatever the fix, someone is going to need courage.

ebonystone| 5.11.12 @ 2:37PM

Yes, the public schools did a pretty good job at least thru the '50's and into the '60's. Some were excellent. Most big cities had at least one school for the gifted -- in NYC the Bronx High School of Science was a major producer of future scientists. But then in the '60's came the Great Society, beginning the destruction of inner-city families. Next was affirmative action with its quotas and demands for equality of outcome, which doomed many of the schools for the gifted, and in general dumbed down all the schools. And then Carter's Dept of Education was created, making all public school subject to the edicts of Washington. And all along there was the intervention of federal courts, with their busing orders and re-districting orders. In Kansas City a federal judge took over the KC schools for a generation, lavishing billions on the system, and in the process overturning MO state laws and MO constitutional provisions that limited tax hikes. The middle classes fled the city, and student's achievement scores steadily dropped.

MikeBee| 5.10.12 @ 10:08AM

Charter schools, in and of themselves, are not the answer. The answer is hinted at in many above posts. Appleby mentions putting a parent's cash at risk, to provide incentive for the child's improvement. More than one above poster mentions the lack of fathers in inner-city black families. Others hint at a change needed in black culture.

Note that one of the successful St. Louis charters is making demands of parents. "You must check your child's homework every night." At the very least, this guarantees that the child's homework is completed each night.

I think that we need to return to something that worked in my generation and before. Allow public schools to kick kids out, permanently. There are too many children, particularly in inner city schools, who are constantly interrupting the learning process for the majority of others. My wife, who teaches in an inner-city public school, is constantly interrupted by these problem children who are interrupting the learning process for the other kids. Kick these unruly kids out. Permanently.

Then, the only option which should remain for unruly kids is for the parent (notice the singular usage) to kick in some cash, according to ability, to send this unruly kid to a military school. Remember military schools, those old enough? Military schools were places where unruly children could be sent where they would receive LOTS of structure throughout their day. These military schools served to save the lives of many unruly children.

Today, these military schools could receive the state money that the public school was previously receiving for the child. But, a parent of an unruly child should be forced to cough up some cash for their child to attend a military school, as, for a while, the child MUST live there. Once it has been determined that the child has enough discipline, s/he may commute and the parent's (again, singular) payments cease. In fact, once the child has proven the ability to make it in a regular school, both academically and behaviorally, s/he can then return to the public school system, and the parent's payments cease.

Inner city children lack one thing in their upbringing: discipline. Discipline is normally provided in a family by a father who is present. Establishing military schools for unruly children, and allowing the public schools to kick unruly children out of their learning environment is the answer to inner-city education problems. Changing the culture in inner cities may be close to impossible. But, we CAN deal with the unruly children that the culture sometimes produces.

Rufus T. Washington| 5.10.12 @ 10:17AM

Lack of parental involvement? Lack of fathers? NONSENSE!!! It is ridiculous to continually conflat things that correlate statistically but are not causal. Human beings separated for many tens of thousands of years and evolving in wildly different environments are not going to reach identical genetic endpoints. Different races of people have different IQ's, aptitudes, and inclinations toward interests. To expect blacks to like and achieve in white intellectual activities is IDIOTIC!

MikeBee| 5.10.12 @ 10:31AM

Rufus,
What you are saying doesn't make sense and is racist. My wife teaches in an inner-city school. She teaches children who are black. Most of the children she teaches are average performers, just like most of the white children in a suburban school. She has at least one black child each year who is brilliant, performing two classes ahead of the other children. This is the same rate as found in white suburbs, also. Each year, about one or two children fail. Also, the same rate as found in white suburbs. What she DOES find is a lot of children who lack discipline. More of the children in my wife's classes lack discipline than do those in white suburban classrooms. Also, more of the black children in inner-city environments lack fathers than do white suburban children. There is a direct coorelation between the lack of a father and a lack of discipline.

Tell Thomas Sowell, Walter Williams, and Alan Keyes, three of the most brilliant men of our time, all black, that they are somehow inherently below whites. No, take your racist drivel somewhere else, like MoveOn.org, or another Democrat opinion website.

WRTolkas| 5.10.12 @ 11:25AM

Bravo MikeBee, Bravo.

Slacker| 5.10.12 @ 12:58PM

Not so fast.

If inner city kids seem to lack discipline, this does not speak well of their intelligence. The issue is dull kids need discipline much more than bright kids. Smart kids don’t have to work as hard.

Discipline can help a dull kid overachieve in a Forest Gump sort of way but, Forest remained dumb all his life.

Rufus says blacks are dumb. Mike says blacks are undisciplined, likely because they are bastards. Neither opinion is complementary.

I wish I had a nickel for every time somebody calls racism and then goes on to disparage blacks, albeit in a slightly more polite way.

MikeBee| 5.10.12 @ 1:42PM

Slacker,
Undisciplined kids need discipline in schools more than disciplined kids do. Has nothing to do with intellectual ability. My wife has encountered quite a few very bright black children who can't work up to their potential, due to a lack of discipline.

I am not slighting blacks in any way. Both my and my wife's experience shows that there really is no difference between black intellectual ability and white intellectual ability. Both races, given enough lack of discipline, will fail in schools. Both races, given solid discipline at home and at school, will succeed.

Look at poor white children from single-parent homes. Same bad results. Does that mean they are dull? Hell no. Just as poor black children are not any duller or smarter than rich white children.

Discipline and intelligence are two completely different, and unrelated factors. They both, however, are needed to combine for success in life. Look at Bill Clinton. Very intelligent guy, but lacking in discipline. The lack of discipline got in the way of his success in life.

The racists are those who believe that black people are INHERENTLY below white people, intellectually. This is absolutely not true. Seventeen years of teaching poor inner-city blacks has shown my wife that, inherently, black children and white children are intellectually the same, with the same percentages of brilliant and not brilliant kids.

What gets in the way of academic success for ALL races is a lack of discipline, not a lack of intellectual ability. Don't get the two confused. For many poor, black children, there is a LOT of intellectual ability there. But the culture will tend to hold them back from achieving all they can in life.

Slacker| 5.10.12 @ 2:21PM

No amount of discipline will ever make a dull kid smart. You can’t fix stupid. Life isn’t fair.

All we are talking about it kids scoring average on standardized tests. How much discipline should it take to be average?

MikeBee| 5.11.12 @ 9:56AM

Slacker,
You're right. A dull kid, whether white, black, or purple, will be dull. What I'm saying is that if a child is undisciplined, s/he will be unable to work up to full potential. In other words, if a fatherless child (black, white, or purple) is a bright kid intellectually, but has no discipline, s/he will be less able to display that intelligence on standardized tests. This is the real reason that inner city children score lower on standardized tests. It doesn't mean they are all dumb. That's also why, in my above post, I advocate bringing back military schools for these undisciplined children.

Kingofthenet| 5.10.12 @ 3:47PM

I see your point, but I am not sure using a former Governor, and TWO time President Of the United States as an example of someone who let lack of discipline, 'hold back' his career.

MikeBee| 5.11.12 @ 10:05AM

King,
OK. I see what you're saying about BC. How about Detroit's ex-mayor, Kwame Kilpatrick, then? Another bright guy, lawyer by trade, who will serve serious prison time for the lack of discipline he displayed during his term as Detroit mayor. They are still investigating him here. The latest is that the SEC is saying that his administration accepted bribes and favors for pension fund money.

Don't forget, though, that ANYone can become a politician. Barack Obama is living proof of that.

Lesser Weevil| 5.11.12 @ 12:53AM

Complimentary.

Sean| 5.10.12 @ 11:42AM

It is a fact that people of certain races have different IQs averages on a whole. Individuals of course can score above or below that average. So Rufus does have a point.

We also have historical evidence of all black public schools doing a fairly good job of educating. The problem is these schools approached education much differently than what is being done in modern school systems. These schools focused on strict discipline and mastery of facts. Today schools have lax discipline and are more concerned with uninformed opinion.

Seek| 5.10.12 @ 1:31PM

Some blacks are smarter than whites. But most whites are smarter than blacks. That's not "racist drivel." It's a conclusion reached in dozens of highly structured studies over the decades. I know all about Thomas Sowell and a handful of other black conservatives. That doesn't change reality.

Rufus T. Washington| 5.10.12 @ 4:13PM

The variance in values for traits and abilities within any race is large. Nonetheless, there are well-documented differences in the "mean" or average values of traits, such as IQ. The fact that some people are exceptional in any ethnic group or race is does not disprove this. So what I said does make sense and is accepted by more than 85% of cognitive scientists. It is racist only in the sense that it recognizes that "there are races." Recognizing differences does not necessarily imply that one race must be held down. Indeed, chasing sophomoric solutions like "parenting is the answer" or "everybody must go to college" won't help. Headstart began in 1965 and is a documented failure. Progressive solutions would include retaining manufacturing in the U.S. rather than sending it overseas. Not everybody can or wants to go to Harvard and become a research scientist or financial "quant." To say that is the only career path for everybody ("Everybody must be above average") guarantees that 80% of the population will be hanging out on the street drinking malt liquor rather than having a decent factory job.

Petronius| 5.10.12 @ 10:15PM

Oh tempora. Oh mores. If this is a veiled claim that refusal to learn basic skills is a racial or tribal trope, fuggetaboutit. Willful ignorance among whites has bled into the burbs among the trust fund kids who are not obliged to do anything and now lead the Occupy movement. Interest in any subject matter has nothing to do with complexion and everything to do with culture; by that I mean lack of it. I would venture to say that less than 1/4 of our populace is economically literate as the sand box mentality is now not only dominant but a default position nationwide. The character trait that leads to failure 100% of the time is personal rejection of not just subject material, but any instruction at all. Anything the pupil cannot comprehend without assistance becomes taxing, inconvenient, and painful. And we have all had that experience, be it boring lectures, pompous pontificating martinets trying to dictate belief, and especially the required courses that have no bearing or relevance in the job market.
There have been countless "think" pieces about this since we left school, and it's always the same entrenched interests preventing real education: the state, the corporate directors who want a docile work force, and the "social engineers" with their utopian obsession to "perfect" humanity. And the educrats and teachers wonder why they are so despised. But they care most about their patches of academic turf anyway.
Face it. Authority and Free thought are polar opposites, interests and motivation not withstanding. And even the inculcation of the three R's, while passe' in public schools can now be considered genius level when kids are showing up for the first day of class who are not yet house broken.
Schooling is the first great vicissitude of life. It's daunting and unpleasant. And the bottom line is individual pride: that is to say absolute unwillingness to please one's adversary to gain approval and move up. And when the consequences of obstinacy stare them in the face, it's far passed too late. How late is it? like I said before; the days of minimal pursuits of mindless occupations for inflated pay checks are gone, never to return. The young now in school must be made to understand this. Is there one teacher in any primary school who would tell them? If they did, would the warm bodies in their classrooms believe them? Hardly. The foundation of civilization is the shared common understanding of objective truth. And who opposes that? Yesterdays recalcitrant students who are teaching other people's children that reality can be repealed by wishing, advocacy, and litigation, and that their social attitudes are more important than competence because they do not possess the latter. What was this situation called in these pages a fortnight ago? Toddler lib. And are we having fun yet?
The Gods of the Copybook Headings appeared here this week. Our assignment is, commit it to memory.

calvin | 5.13.12 @ 6:56AM

Why idiotic? Then why can horses descended from blood lines livinig on continents thousand s of mile apart for thousands of years be trained with the same methods to achieve the same outcomes? Their athletic ability is different, but their intelligence and learning ability is the same.
If you reward bad behavior in people, you get a lot of it.

DWSWesVirginny| 5.10.12 @ 10:54AM

The pull quote from this article is the last paragraph: "In the end, this business of school choice and charters and vouchers seems to me mere pruning round the edges, rather than hacking at the roots of the problem, which is, as we all know, the breakdown of the traditional family. When we come up with a quick fix for that, the rest may take care of itself." This shows us what we are still unwilling to face. The breakdown of the family is due to many factors but one is related to the demise of the two-parent family (mom and dad) which is partly due to the massive participation of women in the workforce. (I now prepare myself for crucifixion for this remark!)

Historian| 5.10.12 @ 11:09AM

The problem is we know the solution but have created structures which prevent it being placed in effect. First. Ability grouping.Second Get the psychos and disrupters out. Involve parent or if impossible provide mentors. For some kids its drill drill ddrill. For others help them explore The Talmud teaches that there are 4 kinds of students,(there are probably more) but that would be a start.

Occam's Tool| 5.10.12 @ 11:17AM

Rufus: "Men are all alike; he is best who trained in the Severest School. " Thucydides.

The head of Pediatric Neurosurgery at Johns Hopkins School of Medicine is brilliant, and one of the best child surgeons of all time. He is black, and from an inner city school. But he worked VERY hard.

There are differences among individuals, of course. But do you know many Jews who complain of coming from a broken home? (Vidal Sassoon did, but he was an exception.) Daddies are important.

MikeBee| 5.10.12 @ 12:35PM

OT,
Good comment. I couldn't remember the name of the brilliant black neurosurgeon at Johns Hopkins. He is actually from the city of Detroit.

Rufus T. Washington| 5.10.12 @ 4:21PM

The exception does Not prove the rule. We are talking about statistical averages. Also, many studies have shown that when brothers and sisters are separated and raised in different families, they are much more alike their biological kin, not their adopted brothers and sisters.

THKrupp| 6.7.12 @ 2:32PM

Please cite your statistical proof that the average black person is less intelligent than the average white person. You keep saying that statistics back you up, please share all these studies you are citing.

Tina B| 5.10.12 @ 5:48PM

Would that be Dr. Ben Carson?. . . and who also funded the college education of many devout Christian kids (like Jen, the young female student from Tennessee who witnessed to my daughter at a Billy Graham crusade in Orlando, at the toughest time of her young spiritual life, and then mentored and discipled her by email for another year or so afterward) that inner city public school educated Dr. Ben Carson? . . . whose mom couldn't read but who successfully conned her kids into believing she was reading every one of the book reports she made them write each week to supplement their in-school learning. . . that Dr Ben?

Separated Siamese Twins, joined at the head, and gave them some quality of life to experience the love of a family, he did, and by the Grace of God. What a hero he should be to American Black men or any struggling minority. But who will read about him, is he in a textbook? I doubt it, he's a Christian.

MikeBee| 5.11.12 @ 10:11AM

Tina,
That's the guy. He's quite a success story.

cicero| 5.10.12 @ 11:28AM

While there is no simple answer for the disfunction in theschool system, perhaps we are missing the silver lining here. You will notice that this private provider of education was fired for imcompetence. Try that with the public school systems in Detroit, Washington D.C., Phildelphia, etc. When this happens a few times, and the contracting private education provider loses its investment and its contract, watch the improvement. There is no simple answer to the breakdown of the family in the inner cities. As I have said before, show me a social malady, and I will show you the government program the caused it or supports it. There is no mystery here, just a long road back to societal sanity. One child born our of wedlock is a mistake. 14 is an industry.

RonRonDoRon| 5.10.12 @ 12:06PM

Here's a radical (actually reactionary) thought: school systems small enough so that they can be, and are, controlled by parents - with 1 or 2 professional (and accountable) administrators.

Except for our largest cities, that was the norm in this country up through most of its history, and it worked.

Tina B| 5.10.12 @ 5:53PM

And then it became a Big Business, self propagating, and compulsory for all, and it is actually very successful. . . at creating the little automatons needed in the future to march to the drumbeat of only God knows who. Good job American Public School System.

Don Cope| 5.10.12 @ 12:20PM

You can"t make a silk purse out of a sows ear.

Tired Taxpayer PRM| 5.10.12 @ 12:35PM

I have said it before and I will say it again (probably until I die), government has NO business being in the education business.

Get all levels (yes, local too) of government out of the school business. Close the schools, fire the teachers, assistants, principles, custodians, social workers, librarians, lead teachers, etc., etc., and sadly etc. and sell the buildings. Make education the SOLE responsibility of the parents. Sure, some kids may miss out on an education due to parental neglect but that is still better than the horrid system we have today.

Let the Free Market (scary as that sounds) take care of education. How many private schools do you think will remain in business when drugs are openly sold in their buildings? How many private schools will put up with disruptive students threatening other students and teachers? How many private schools will have Half of their staff be non-teaching positions? How many private schools will continue to pay teachers to sit in “Rubber Rooms”?

The poor, poor poor will be serviced by charities and religions. Some religious schools will indoctrinate their students. Some kids won’t ever make it into a school. But that will Still be better than our current system.

Both sides of the political spectrum should be in favor of this. Liberals should worry that their kids might be taught that abortion and evolution are wrong in a government school. Conservatives should worry that their kids might be taught that abortion and evolution are right in a government school.

Either way, Parents should be the ones to decide!

Kingofthenet| 5.10.12 @ 3:36PM

Brilliant Republican Plan! Make Education Non-Compulsory and the responsibility of the Parents!
BTW: to ANSWER your questions about the whole Drugs in the school thing, well this article(if you can read) stated that the PRIVATE schools had WORSE performance than the Commie Public ones, get it?

PattyMor| 5.10.12 @ 12:45PM

The schools used to work. They have been intentionally dumbed down and along with this, they threw discipline out the door. They pander to the unions and not the kids because union members vote AND supply the money.

Home schools are best. Private schools are second best. Many Christian and Jewish schools turn out fine students. Why because the parents care, and if your kids don't behave, they throw them out.

What we need is a foundation dedicated to competing with the dismal public schools. Once they start losing students, they will have to reform. It would also ding the coffers of the Demoncrats; then watch them squeal.

fungoking| 5.10.12 @ 1:53PM

As a high school baseball coach I had one of the Imagine schools come down and play baseball at my high school here in the heart of the Ozarks (talk about culture shock!). As a mission outreach my Church had a cookout and fed all the teams and handled out FCA sport Bibles to each player. The coach was very thankful and talked about how almost all his players were from extremly poor single parent homes and their #1 need was for a good, strong, responsible male role model. The players were all very thankful and polite and wanted to come back even though they got pounded in both games. It was good for my players too, see how good they have it compared to these guys.

Kingofthenet| 5.10.12 @ 3:10PM

THIS cannot be, Conservatives have told me the 'Free market' solves all, Have i been deceived all this time? Is it perhaps TRUE that ALL private enterprise cares about is profit? I am so confused?

Kingofthenet| 5.10.12 @ 3:22PM

I know what happened, President Obummer and Randy Wineguard put STUPID drops into the Non-Union, Low Pay 'Scab' teachers at these fine institutions, to make them look bad....Sneaky Marxists.

aware| 5.10.12 @ 4:52PM

The notion that the State provide a "free" education is a classic demand of socialism, even before Marx. Yet, to question the legitimacy of the idea, or the reality, is treated as preposterous, even among "conservatives". A sign of how far the goal posts have moved.

The private market shows itself superior even under the onerous constraints imposed by the State. As long as "government" controls "education" there is no improvement possible. Only a continuing deterioration of results, even as the number of administrators and teachers expand along with pay and costs.

When the State does what is illegitimate for it to do, rot sets in. "Reformers" come along occasionally to briefly slow the slide, but the rot is never removed. It can't be because the immorality of doing the illegitimate dooms the endeavor to a shabby existence and eventual extinction.

We are surrounded by these examples of illegitimate actions by the State. All the votes, money, reforms, or misguided intentions won't change the rot.

Tina B| 5.10.12 @ 6:08PM

Can you ever imagine the bloated bureaucracy that is the NEA run school system giving up its financial monopoly in American Education? Of course not. Kill the goose that laid the Golden Egg that is the largest business in the USA (I venture to guess)?

The upcoming battle will be against homeschooling, which is booming all over, and growing exponentially. The loss in revenue to the traditional schools, in bodies that don't appear in the classrooms in the fall, and drop out of classrooms as the year progresses, will become a disaster of equally growing proportion and then the courts will try and limit homeschooling. You watch.

But that won't stop us, and by the grace of God I will be doing this myself come next fall. This retired math teacher has left the public schools and will soon be able to explain math (and everything else) from a Scriptual perspective, and with a Godly worldview. I'm divin' in.

phaedo | 5.11.12 @ 4:06PM

Examples are rampant, but we don't learn. Students have to care before there will be any success; and there has to be order before those that care will get a chance. Unfortunately caring is in short supply, and it shows - everywhere.

Tiddly| 5.13.12 @ 12:36PM

Google the pdf file: "Wanted: More race realism, less moralistic fallacy."

And read there the scientific evidence for relative differences in intelligence between human races.

It is the elephant in the room that everyone pretends not to see.

Abstract of the article:

"Despite repeated claims to the contrary, there has been no narrowing of the 15- to 18-point average IQ difference between Blacks and Whites (1.1 standard deviations); the differences are as large today as they were when first measured nearly 100 years ago. They, and the concomitant difference in standard of living, level of education, and related phenomena, lie in factors that are largely heritable, not cultural. The IQ differences are attributable to differences in brain size more than to racism, stereotype threat, item selection on tests, and all the other suggestions given by the commentators. It is time to meet reality. It is time to stop committing the moralistic fallacy that good science must conform to approved outcomes."

Remember the Bell Curve?

Negroes have their share of geniuses, as do all racial groups, but on the whole they are less intelligent. As to the Thomas Sowells, the Walter Williamses, and Colin Powells, these are often "coffee and cream" blacks with a considerable infusion of white blood in their heritage.

It should surprise no one that human races that developed in comparative isolation from one another for many thousands of years should have differing mental and physical characteristics. Trying to force races of differing abilities into the same achievement outcomes, and justifying it as moral, is always going to be an exercise in futility. What is not moral is penalizing those of high ability by putting those of low ability ahead of them and calling it "social justice."

POST American| 5.14.12 @ 12:09AM

"America better watch it or
in a couple of decades we're going
to be a minstrel show ---for RED China."
-Gore Vidal
1985
(the height of the 'Ray-gun' revolution)

These decades later, are we awake yet?

Charlotte Isserbyte, who worked in
the Reagan education dept, has much
to say on the 'poly-teching', sovietization,
indoctrination and training for 'use'
'ID--alls' implemented ---under Reagan.

---Music ---art ----painting ---literature
---theatre ---poiltical discourse ----indeed,
human conversation

--------take a good DEEP look at what
Reagan policies, Oprah programming
and the CFR---RED China handover
and takedown op have wrought.

AGAIN! ---back --back ---back! to
Goldwater

-------------or, far better yet, the capstone-wise
LATE stage of the baptised and 'quickened'
------------------George Washington.

"Washington and Adams got wise
to the Illuminati. They were kicked out
by 1800 ---but snuck back in through
the China opium family supported
Yale secret societies by 1834."

Time to clean house boys!

This is the 11th hour.

More Articles by Christopher Orlet

More Articles From Special Report

Tornado Chasers

May 24, 2013 | Claire Healey

The Inoperative Jay Carney

May 23, 2013 | Jeffrey Lord

Disabling American Sovereignty

May 22, 2013 | Iain Murray & Geoffrey McLatchey

IRS Union Chief Stonewalls

May 21, 2013 | Jeffrey Lord

Obama and the IRS: The Smoking Gun?

May 20, 2013 | Jeffrey Lord

http://spectator.org/archives/2012/05/10/educations-elixir

ADVERTISEMENT

Latest Headlines

We Will Remember

Roger Kaplan|27 comments

Real Immigration Reform Requires Free Markets

Ross Kaminsky|80 comments

Enough With the Bipartisanship

Matt Purple|45 comments

The United States of El Norte

Larry Thornberry|60 comments

Vodka = Vodka = Vodka

Daniel J. Flynn|94 comments

Laying Down My Pen

Quin Hillyer

Tornado Chasers

Claire Healey|35 comments

The Chinese Waltz

George H. Wittman|2 comments

The Spectacle Blog

The #FreeKate Narrative Melts Down: Lies Exposed in Florida Teen Sex Case

Robert Stacy McCain | 5.25.13

Jimmy Wray, R.I.P.

Aaron Goldstein | 5.25.13

The Spectator’s Spectacular: May 18-May 25

Patrick Ryan | 5.25.13

Updated: NBC News: Holder Personally Approved Fox Reporter Warrant

Ross Kaminsky | 5.24.13

Felonious Attorney General?

Kaylin Bugos | 5.24.13

Did the Boy Scouts Cave to Pressure?

Claire Healey | 5.24.13

BBC World Survey Ranks Israel Near Bottom in Global Popularity

Aaron Goldstein | 5.24.13

Obamacare is a Big and Growing Problem for Democrats

Ross Kaminsky | 5.24.13

SPONSORED LINKS

FLASHBACK TO: 1995

Clip of the Day

H/T to National Review Online

ADVERTISEMENT

Home |About |Contributors |Advertise |Donate |Privacy Policy |Contact

The American Spectator Foundation is the 501(c)(3) organization responsible for publishing The American Spectator magazine and training aspiring journalists who espouse traditional American values. Your contributions are tax deductible to the extent permitted by law. Each donor receives a year-end summary of their giving for tax purposes.

Copyright 2013, The American Spectator. All rights reserved.