Knowledge Base

Take Back the Schools? From whom?

by Tammy Drennan

"Don’t just hammer public schools. Go in there and take them back."  - Finn Laursen, Christian Educators Association International, quoted in an AP article in The Boston Herald, 9/2/06

Take them back from whom?  The government?  Other parents?  The taxpayers?  The teachers' unions?  The textbook publishers?  The special interests?  The school boards?  The religious community?

You see the problem. State schools, financed by the public at large, cannot be taken "back" by any one group. They don't belong to you or anyone else. They're up for grabs. Hundreds, if not thousands, of interests, ranging from social to religious to business, vie daily for their share of the public school pie. The highest bidder wins and everyone else plays by his rules until someone topples him from his perch and the rules change yet again.

The real tragedy is that by turning education into a state function, we have shot ourselves in the foot big-time. By asking the state to educate our children and our neighbors to pay for it, we have offered up our progeny to the public to do with as it pleases. The results have taken some nasty turns over the years, and now it's getting downright scary.

Our mistake was in granting the state control of our children to begin with. The only way to rescind the grant is to take back our children. Taking back our children is something we can do today - quite literally. Taking over the public schools is a battle of world war proportions in which the main casualties would be the very children we purport to save.

Don't sacrifice your children on the altar of "free" education. Take them back and rise to the occasion. They're your children. Aren't they worth your money as much as your love?

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Last updated September 8, 2006