OPINION: End federal aid in classroom

President Trump is currently working hard to rid us of the Department of Education, a department as necessary as the Department of Duplicate Dances. The DOE, started in 1979, in OUR lifetime, has grown into an amorphous behemoth much like the Environmental Protection Agency with its make-work regulations and tyrannical bureaucracies. How did we live without these departments? Seems like we got along fine before they came along. Better, in fact.

I believe most federal money has led, for the most part, to bloated school bureaucracies and fat, overbearing unions. Sure, a few pennies grudgingly dribble over to fund inedible school lunches and unreadable Marxist propaganda books but I see none of this money improving test scores in reading, math, or writing especially when the school bureaucracies dumb down tests to make things appear as if everything is all rosy and bright.

So I say end federal aid.

There is talk of sending block grants to the states in the belief that the states are smarter and would spend the money wisely. Which is, of course, nonsense. If they’re wasting money now, they’ll have more money to waste in the future. If they’re allowing our youth to squander their time on earth in meaningless educational babysitting boxes they will continue to do the same thing only with greater pride in doing it.

I believe the education of our young people is the responsibility of the people in each state. There should be no money coming from the federal government. The responsibility of teaching our young people lies in the people of each state. And it’s obvious that our $37 trillion national debt makes Uncle Sam’s further borrowing toward this cause ludicrous. You can’t borrow yourself out of debt anymore than you can spend borrowed money to create prosperity.

Let’s create competition.

The answer to our education problem is competition. If nothing has to change then nothing will change. If you want improvement, you’re going to have to do something different. School choice would go a heck of a long way to making schools accountable for their outcomes. And the best accountants in that endeavor are parents.

Finally, let’s encourage people with real world experience to teach.

If they wanted to, why wouldn’t a retiring engineer or doctor make a good math or science teacher? Why does he or she need four years of college training to say two plus two equals four or that water freezes at 32 degrees Fahrenheit? The best history teacher I ever had was in the Air Force during World War II. He knew history because he lived it. A lot of our military men and women have been in hot spots throughout their time in the service. They’d make excellent history teachers.

The purpose of a school system shouldn’t be about defending the status quo. It should be about turning out well-educated young people who will go on to lead good, productive lives still carrying within them that spark of curiosity that makes life worth living.

All we have to do is think outside the classroom.