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Yes, Senator, Parents Can Educate Their Own Kids

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High school-educated, working-class parents aren’t capable of overseeing their own child’s education, a state lawmaker said last week.

New Hampshire state Sen. Jeanne Dietsch, D-Peterborough, made the comment at a committee hearing last Tuesday while promoting a bill that would stop the state Board of Education from creating a new way of allocating high school graduation credits.

“This idea of parental choice, that’s great if the parent is well-educated. There are some families that’s perfect for. But to make it available to everyone? No. I think you’re asking for a huge amount of trouble,” Dietsch said.

Dietsch’s remarks represent a growing trend among leftist politicians to belittle, even vilify, a parent’s role. The trend stems from an ideology that insists the nanny state is superior to parents.

Dietsch’s political commentary was a full-on attack on parental rights and education in America, with a side of elitism to boot.

A fellow legislator, state Rep. Glenn Cordelli, R-Tuftonboro, asked the obvious question of Dietsch.

“Is it your belief that only well-educated parents can make proper decisions for what’s in the best interest of their children?” he asked.

Dietsch went on to explain that her views on what makes a parent qualified are based on her personal history, which seems like a biased way to examine a legislative proposal:

In a democracy, and particularly in the United States, public education has been the means for people to move up to greater opportunities, for each generation to be able to succeed more than their parents have. My father didn’t graduate from high school, so it was really important that I went to college.

The presumption that a state senator would know what is best for families across the state of New Hampshire reeks of hubris. It shows a misunderstanding of the role of family, not to mention demonstrates an elevated, starry-eyed view of public education.

For starters, plenty of Americans without a college education are intelligent problem-solvers and successful people. Often, they own their own businesses or are in blue-collar trades such as plumbing, electrical work, construction, and the like.

Of course, additional education—particularly in professions such as medicine and law, or certain businesses—can be necessary, but it’s not vital for every industry.

Not everyone is wired for a vocation that requires a Ph.D. To presume a parent couldn’t teach his child what is necessary to go to college or to thrive in a blue-collar field—jobs that are disappearing and in high demand—smacks of the sort of self-righteousness we have come to expect from too many politicians on the East Coast.

Although state public education is ideal for many families, it does not work for everyone. For some families, including those who travel a lot or are in the military—or, heck, look at kids in Hollywood—homeschooling is best.

I once knew of a family who homeschooled because their child wanted to be a professional surfer—so he preferred to do school online Monday through Thursday and surf the rest of the days.

Elected officials should applaud the many educational choices available to families today and help families become empowered to make the choices that are right for their children.

Dietsch’s comments are typical of leftist politicians who want to subvert the role of parents and replace them with the all-knowing state. One hallmark of progressive ideology that Democrats such as Dietsch clearly subscribe to is the view that the state is superior to the family—including, and especially, when it comes to education.

State officials, politicians, even law enforcement, know best and many moms and dads are just ignorant rubes who can barely feed and clothe their kids, let alone teach them. This mentality reminds me of the kind of socialism that caused the collapse of nations before our eyes: Both of our major political parties should reject it.

A basic tenet of America’s founding principles is that “we the people” wield the power, make decisions, and hold elected officials accountable for their roles, not the other way around. The state doesn’t exist to squelch the family, but to empower the family.

Particularly today, when blue-collar jobs are necessary to fill in obvious gaps, parents with a high school education who want to encourage their children to take a similar path should do so, and with confidence.

State lawmakers should encourage families to choose an educational path that’s right for them and leave their own elitist opinions out of the debate. (For more from the author of “Yes, Senator, Parents Can Educate Their Own Kids” please click HERE)

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Teachers Unions Say Active Shooter Drills Traumatize Children

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A report from the American Federation of Teachers and National Education Association says that active shooter drills are traumatizing children. . .

The report, which was compiled in part by Everytown for Gun Safety and released Tuesday, insists that such safety drills negatively impact students’ mental health.

The report suggests that better ways of preparing students for active shooter situations include training teachers how to respond to a threat rather than putting it upon students to engage in drills.

Lilly Eskelsen Garcia, president of the National Education Association, said that such traumas are not healthy for students.

“Everywhere I travel, I hear from parents and educators about active shooter drills terrifying students, leaving them unable to concentrate in the classroom and unable to sleep at night,” she said. “So traumatizing students as we work to keep students safe from gun violence is not the answer. That is why if schools are going to do drills, they need to take steps to ensure the drills do more good than harm.” (Read more from “Teachers Unions Say Active Shooter Drills Traumatize Children” HERE)

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The Sexual Swindle in Youth Sports: ‘We Have Truly Lost Our Minds’

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Girls’ basketball season has ended in my state, and grandchildren are beginning to speak of track and field tryouts. All our track meets in this region are outdoors, so we schedule them in the Spring and hope for good weather. But some states have indoor facilities and have already had major competitions.

Connecticut, for example, had its state meet in mid-February. There, juniors Terry Miller and Andraya Yearwood ran away from the competition again, just like last year. No Connecticut girls even came close. Miller set a new state record for the 55-meter dash at 6.95 and Yearwood came in at 7.01.

Their competition was way back, bunched behind a girl who came in at 7.23 seconds. That’s not especially surprising, because Miller and Yearwood are males, and all the others are girls. A photo of Yearwood reveals a thickly muscled young man with a moustache.

Miller’s time would have landed him 17th in the Connecticut meet if he had competed against boys like himself. Two boys from his own high school had much faster times. Only one boy ran a slower time in the preliminary heats. Yet Miller is the third-ranking runner in the nation against girls.

Yearwood, whose time would have made him dead last in the boys’ preliminary heats, is tied for 7th-fastest nationally against girls. Both young men are competing against girls, of course, for college scholarships.

Runner Selina Soule, for example, finished 8th in the Connecticut race, and thus missed qualifying for the New England regionals in Boston by two spots. Miller and Yearwood occupied two of those spots. Soule will not advance to race in front of college coaches in Boston because hirsute young men have crowded her out of the event.

Your heart has to break for the young women who have worked hard to excel at their sport and to attract the attention of college coaches, only to be crushed by politically correct adults who lack the integrity to protect them from “transgender” fraud.

We might as well repeal all drug and doping laws if we allow males to crash this boundary. In fairness to the girls, they too should be allowed abundant testosterone, thick muscles and moustaches.

It wouldn’t be the first time.

Get on your computer and Google images of Jarmila Kratichvilova. She set an astonishing world record for the 800 meter run in 1983 although she was in the twilight of her career. It has never been broken, the oldest unbroken world record in men’s or women’s athletics. She never popped dirty on a drug test, but we do know that her country was notorious for doping during her career.

The mainstream media have been the guardians of dirty Iron Curtain female athletes. Sports Illustrated called American swimmer Shirley Babashoff, 19, a sore loser and a poor representative of the Olympic spirit after she commented on East German competitors’ deep voices and masculine physiques.

It was so obvious that Saturday Night Live did hilarious skits about hairy-chested East German women who took home 11 of 13 swimming golds from the Montreal Olympics. Yet the adults in charge of the Olympics were too cowardly to take action.

A younger Olympian said she kept her mouth shut after she witnessed the media’s abuse of Babashoff. And the pressure is unmistakable for female athletes to keep their mouths shut today about boys invading girls’ sports. The Associated Press wrote of Soule’s complaint as if it was just her “belief” that the two young men had crowded her out of the Boston showcase, subtly discrediting her view as the envy of an also-ran.

The AP article used feminine pronouns for the two young men, and parroted their absurd excuses. The lead suggested that most criticisms arose, not from female athletes, but from gossipy adults who were talking behind the champions’ backs.

There is certainly no shortage of cowardly adults. Seventeen states permit gender-dysphoric boys to compete against girls, no questions asked. Another seven permit it if the boys have taken some kind of hormonal therapy or surgery to transition, thus enforcing sex reassignment against wavering adolescents. And several states have no policy at all.

Sometimes a state policy has unintended consequences.

In Texas, a high school wrestler must compete under the sex listed on his or her birth certificate. Mack Beggs is a girl who is taking testosterone as “therapy” to transition to a new male identity. She has requested to wrestle against boys instead of girls, but this is prohibited under the Texas rule. So she has wrestled against girls.

This year Beggs completed her final high school wrestling season, ending the year 35-0. In fact, she has never lost a high school wrestling match. Last year, two girls forfeited rather than fight her. This season one forfeited, citing fears of serious injury.

Chelsea Sanchez, a tough but normal Texas high school wrestler in Beggs’ weight class, probably would have won back-to-back state titles in her sport, but instead she lost to the testosterone-flushed Beggs in the championship round, two years running.

Would the state of Texas tolerate Chelsea Sanchez taking the same steroids as Mack Beggs, not to “transition” her gender, but to bulk up and become a more powerful athlete? Not likely. Didn’t we hound Mark McGwire, Sammy Sosa and Barry Bonds for using the same kind of drugs? But they were just hitting baseballs, not endangering teenage girls.

“Boo all you want,” Beggs said after spectators reacted in disgust to her second tainted victory over Sanchez. That comes from a position of depraved and invincible privilege.

We have truly lost our minds.

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The WV Teacher Strike Wasn’t About Students and Teachers. It Was About Protecting Unions

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School choice is dead in the state of West Virginia, at least for now. That’s the main takeaway after state lawmakers in the Republican-controlled legislature buckled to demands from teachers’ unions after two days of striking earlier this week.

It’s not surprising that teachers’ unions banded together to kill a school choice proposal. What is surprising is how much West Virginia teachers were willing to sacrifice to keep even the smallest market-oriented innovations out of the state’s education system.

The massive education reform bill contained a five percent teacher pay raise, on top of the pay raise that the state’s educators got out of last year’s teacher strike. It also included a $2,000 bonus for certified math teachers, a $250 tax credit for school supply purchases, and around $145 million in total investment in the state’s public education system.

A summary of the final amendments made to the bill can be found here, while full text of the tabled version can be found here.

So what did the pro-government monopoly crowd take issue with? The bill also provided for the creation of seven (as in fewer than 10) public charter schools statewide and the creation of 1,000 Educational Savings Accounts (ESAs) for children with special needs or who had undergone documented cases of bullying.

Yes. That’s all. That’s why one union boss claimed that West Virginia educators were “left no other choice” but to strike. It’s why schools across the state closed down for two straight days. That’s what was worth passing up a pay raise, bonuses, and all the other investments that lawmakers were willing to put into the state’s public schools.

Seven Charter schools and 1,000 ESAs. That’s what made it a “dangerous education privatization bill” that had to be defeated at the cost of public education investment. But hey, any market-oriented innovations mean competition, and the best way to protect a monopoly racket is to make sure competition never makes it to market.

“The defenders of the status quo, the enemies of progress, won, and the losers were the teachers, students, parents in West Virginia,” Republican West Virginia Senate President Mitch Carmichael told Blaze Media just hours after the bill was scuttled on Tuesday, “by not accepting the reforms and the massive investment in public education in West Virginia.”

“It makes no sense,” Carmichael said when asked why public teachers’ unions would be opposed to that kind of investment. “It’s not a logical analysis of the provisions of the bill. It’s more a fearmongering by the union bosses.”

“This is a way to flex political muscle,” explains Garrett Ballengee, executive director of the Cardinal Institute for West Virginia Policy, a think tank that supported the reforms.

The point school choice opponents made, he says, was that “to some extent, at least as it relates to education policy, that education unions will dictate what kind of education policy that we have,” despite the Republican control of West Virginia’s House, Senate, and governorship.

“Extortion is a strong word,” he added, “but if the definition fits, I think that’s exactly what we saw here.”

According to national school choice organization EdChoice, West Virginia is one of a remaining handful of states in the U.S. that doesn’t have a single educational choice program of any kind. Meanwhile, the state’s public education numbers were near the bottom for 2018.

“We want to do what other states have done to implement positive change,” Carmichael told me, noting the success of the charter school movement in other states. If a football team were coming in last in its conference every year, “you’d change something,” he continued. “And yet we tolerate a last-place finish in our education system.” (For more from the author of “The WV Teacher Strike Wasn’t About Students and Teachers. It Was About Protecting Unions” HERE)

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How Public Schools Indoctrinate Kids Without Almost Anyone Noticing

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Many people have long suspected that governments sometimes attempt to indoctrinate their people to increase the government’s own power and influence. Unfortunately, ambitious governments will not stop at merely controlling what their people can do; they must control their minds.

Indoctrination happens through many channels—entertainment, speeches, and censorship––but its main instrument is the school system. Teachers have a captive audience of malleable young minds for several years. They may not have figured out how to make students smart and productive, but they can at least make them submissive and obedient.

Judging by results and from most people’s experience, indoctrination is not only a problem with rogue regimes, but also a distinctly American problem. However, here it is difficult to determine the extent of indoctrination, how it works, or even if it does work.

Most Americans might receive a mediocre education, but this education may be so mediocre that the intended brainwashing might not even be effective. True, some will feel the Bern and join the Socialist Party, and others will become feminists and beat up women who protest abortion. A precious few may even become conservatives. Most, though, seem content to remain disengaged from politics, religion, and most ideas in general, and allow the mainstream media to think for them.

Far from resembling a unified collective, society has become more polarized and tribal. Some might see this as evidence of the failure of indoctrination, and the insuppressible human desire for freedom and justice, but they are mistaken. Indoctrination does work, and it is one the main reasons America is so divided. (Read more from “How Public Schools Indoctrinate Kids Without Almost Anyone Noticing” HERE)

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As School Starts, Military Company Slammed With Orders for This Specific Item

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The latest accessory for heading back to school has more to do with survival than grades.

An Israeli company that developed a bulletproof backpack is seeing sales soar as American schools open for the new school year.

“In two months we have sold hundreds and are gearing up to increase production rates to 500 units per month,” said Masada Armour chief executive Snir Koren, according to Yahoo News.

Koren said the American market was the impetus for the product.

“We designed a bulletproof backpack at the request of our distributors in the United States after the huge trauma caused by the February shooting in Florida,” Snir Koren, CEO of Masada Armor, told AFP on Thursday, according to the Times of Israel.

Seventeen people were killed on Feb. 14 in a shooting at a Parkland, Florida, school.

Protection is not cheap.

The standard model backpack, weighing about six pounds, protects students against 9mm rounds. It sells for $500.

The company also makes an 11-pound version to protect against rounds from an AR-15 or an M-16. That one sells for more than $700.

Masada Armour is developing models for younger students as well.

“We are developing a lighter model for their type of morphology,” said Snir.

Not everyone is sold on the idea.

“We don’t believe in sending teachers to schools with guns and I don’t believe in sending students to school with armor,” said Stamford, Connecticut school board chair David Mannis, according to the Stamford Advocate.

Parent Shira Tarantino called bulletproof backpacks a “Band-Aid.”

“If parents want to buy their kids those items, that’s their prerogative,” said Tarantino, project director for the Stamford Pediatric Gun Safety Project. “I don’t think it changes the safety any way in the schools.”

Joe Curran feels differently. His Massachusetts-based company, Bullet Blocker, sells protective backpacks.

“We see an uptick in sales anytime there’s violence worldwide, and not just gun violence — any violence,” Curran said. “With Parkland and Newtown, we saw a very large upswing. We’ve consistently had growth over the years and we always get a growth at back-to-school, but this year is larger than the past.” (For more from the author of “As School Starts, Military Company Slammed With Orders for This Specific Item” please click HERE)

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Hillary Clinton Tweets to 11-Year-Old Pledge Kneeler: ‘Keep up the Good Work’

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On Wednesday, Hillary Clinton praised a young student who was disciplined for kneeling during the Pledge of Allegiance.

Clinton commented on a NowThis report on Mariana Taylor, an 11-year-old sixth-grade student from Maryland who refused to stand for the Pledge of Allegiance in class. Clinton said Taylor had “courage” for kneeling during the Pledge and told her to “keep up the good work.”

In February, Taylor was inspired by the NFL protests instigated by Colin Kaepernick and decided to echo those national anthem protests. The Washington Post reported that after Mariana had written a paper about Kaepernick for her English class at Catonsville Middle School, she began kneeling for the Pledge of Allegiance.

Taylor claims that she was reprimanded by her teacher in response, and the American Civil Liberties Union of Maryland became involved in her case, arguing for her right to protest the Pledge. The school denied punishing Taylor in a statement.

“We know of no [Baltimore County Public Schools] student who has been reprimanded or punished for nonparticipation in patriotic observances,” the school said. “We fully support students’ rights and encourage student voice as articulated in board policy.” (For more from the author of “Hillary Clinton Tweets to 11-Year-Old Pledge Kneeler: ‘Keep up the Good Work’” HERE)

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School Board Wanted to Drop Pledge of Allegiance and Have Students Recite This Instead…

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The Atlanta Neighborhood Charter School decided this week that the pledge of allegiance would no longer be part of their morning meetings. Instead, parents and students would be encouraged to say a new “Wolf Pack” chant. It would be an allusion to their school mascot and an attempt to be more inclusive, helping them promote “school family, community, country, and our global society.”

“Students will continue to lead the meeting by asking our community to stand to participate in our Wolf Pack Chant together. Students will also be given the opportunity to say the pledge at another point during the school day within their classroom,” the school’s elementary campus president, Lara Zelski, said in the original press release.

So, citing “some miscommunication and inconsistency in the rollout,” the ANCS has reversed course and is returning to its “original format.” Governing Board Chair Lia Santos released the following statement:

Atlanta Neighborhood Charter School has and will continue to provide students with an opportunity to recite the Pledge of Allegiance each school day. In the past, the Pledge of Allegiance was recited during our all-school morning meeting, but at the start of the school year, the daily practice was moved to classrooms. This change was done in compliance with state law [O.C.G.A. 20-2-310 (c)(1)] and aligned Atlanta Neighborhood Charter School with most other schools in the state who also say the Pledge of Allegiance in individual classrooms. However, it appears there was some miscommunication and inconsistency in the rollout. Starting next week, we will return to our original format and provide our students with the opportunity to recite the Pledge during the all-school morning meeting.

(Read more from “School Board Wanted to Drop Pledge of Allegiance and Have Students Recite This Instead…” HERE)

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Federal Judge Dismisses Transgender Bathroom Lawsuit: Students ‘Do Not Have a Fundamental Privacy Right’

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By Conservative Review. A federal judge dismissed a lawsuit against Oregon schools’ policy that allows boys in girls’ restrooms and locker rooms and vice versa, LifeSiteNews reported Tuesday.

U.S. District Judge Marco Hernandez dismissed the case against the policy, saying it was not a violation of privacy rights for males to be allowed in female restrooms.

“High school students do not have a fundamental privacy right to not share school restrooms, lockers, and showers with transgender students whose biological sex is different than theirs,” Hernandez wrote.

So, teenage girls in high school have a fundamental privacy right to kill their unborn children, but not to their own bathrooms? This is progressivism. (For more from the author of “Federal Judge Dismisses Transgender Bathroom Lawsuit: Students ‘Do Not Have a Fundamental Privacy Right’” please click HERE)

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Judge Upholds Transgender Bathrooms

By Life Site News. Boys will continue to be allowed in girls’ restrooms and locker rooms in Oregon after a judge dismissed a lawsuit against that policy, saying, “high school students do not have a fundamental privacy right to not share school restrooms, lockers, and showers with transgender students whose biological sex is different than theirs.”

Students who are unwillingly subjected to seeing students of the opposite sex are not having their rights violated, U.S. District Judge Marco Hernandez wrote.

This ruling “reveals everything people need to know to understand the utter corruption of our court system,” Julie Quist, Board Chair of the Child Protection League (CPL), told LifeSiteNews. “Decency and respect for our children…are being cast aside for the political advantage of a militant political force that is systematically violating the innocence, dignity and freedom of our children and all of us.”

The lawsuit against Oregon schools allowing boys in girls’ restrooms and vice versa was filed by parents and students in Dallas, Oregon. This gender-free policy caused “embarrassment, humiliation, anxiety, intimidation, fear, apprehension, and stress produced by using the restroom with students of the opposite sex,” they said in the lawsuit.

The problems began when the Dallas School District allowed a girl to change in the boys’ locker rooms. She didn’t like changing in the gender-neutral bathroom because it was too far away and other students noticed, according to the Washington Post. (Read more from “Judge Upholds Transgender Bathrooms: Female ‘Students Do Not Have a Fundamental Privacy Right’” HERE)

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Teacher Gets Prison Time for Firing a Gun Inside a Classroom

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A Georgia teacher was sentenced to two years in prison after pleading guilty to charges related to him barricading himself in an empty classroom and firing a gun, WXIA-TV reported.

The teacher, 53-year-old Jesse Randal Davidson, pleaded guilty to first degree criminal damage to property, carrying a weapon within a school safety zone, and disrupting the operation of a public school. . .

In addition to the prison time, Davidson will be on probation for eight years after he gets out. He won’t be able to possess a gun or work in school or supervisory roles that put him in charge of children. He will also be banned from Whitfield and Murray counties while on probation, and will have to undergo mental health treatments regularly.

Davidson brought his gun to school, taught his first period class as normal, then locked his door during the planning period. When students arrived for third period, Davidson refused to open the door and warned students he was armed. . .

The long-time teacher had been described as “delusional” by police in the past, after confessing to his role in an apparently nonexistent murder of a woman he said he was having an affair with. He also told police he was thinking of hurting himself, and that he was on depression medication. (Read more from “Teacher Gets Prison Time for Firing a Gun Inside a Classroom” HERE)

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