The Erasers Still Need Dusting

Yes, I‚ve kept on thinking about the teacher shortage, about the current state of education. What is changing and what is static?

What are teacher‚s issues? A recent cartoon f ustThmkm in the editorial section of the Tulsa World suggested they were low pay, ^————- lack of respect and school violence. I want to add a couple. First, long hours. Ask any teacher about coming home exhausted and staring at a stack of papers to be graded. Second, I would add limited funding to this list. Perhaps limited funding and respect overlap. Maybe. We fund in proportion to our respect. Maybe.

I can and will argue that funding is an obvious and unambiguous sign of respect. We fund what we value. Winston Churchill said, “I no longer listen to what people say, I just watch what they do. Behavior never lies.”

It seems to me that students are asked to bring any number of things that I believe schools should be supplying. I will confess I am something of a “Big Chief Tablet and Laddie pencil” guy. Yes, I know teachers are also buying a lot of necessary classroom supplies themselves. They shouldn‚t have to.

Once our public schools sat at the very core of our society. We were proud of them. Today. Well, it depends.

It seems the responsibility for educating our children has fragmented. Private schools and homeschooling have expanded. I‚d credit a significant portion of this growth to school safety concerns but that would not be true. This movement was underway well before school violence became an unrelenting concern. So, I wonder, is this the result of a loss of confidence in public education?

How much of the education problems are large city problems? Is diversity the clandestine issue we choose not to talk about?

Is even the best of our public schools painted with the broad brush of our worst? Oh, I‚m sorry, not worst but our underperforming schools.

Do private schools struggle with diversity? Our smaller rural schools? Well, now let me think. Non-urban I find the patrons of many private schools in our metropolitan areas to be reaching for the sense of community that is inherent to the smaller, rural schools. A sense of belonging that is challenging to find in the enormous urban school.

There private schools that trace their roots back to near statehood

SPECIAL TO TOUR and have achieved that goal as 4th generation students move through the curriculum. Other private schools are just emerging.

Benjamin Franklin believed, “An investment in knowledge pays the best interest.”

I don‚t have it all thought out yet but I‚m working on it. If my coke and peanuts don‚t run out, I‚ve got a chance.

I thought about Thomas Jefferson and his belief that only educated citizens could make the American experiment in self-government succeed.

We just can‚t afford to allow public education to fail. Anywhere. Think about it.

In matters of style, swim with the current; in matters of principle, stand like a rock. – Thomas Jefferson

Hal McBride writes a column, Just Thinkin‚, published each week.