More Money Does Not Equate To Better Education

Mandeville, LA – Exclusive Transcript – There’s something to be said about parenting, believe it or not.  James Madison was a child prodigy, that may be true, but in his formative years he was homeschooled.  He was taught at home.  Thomas Jefferson was a childhood prodigy, I would wager, and in his formative years he was homeschooled.  Check out today’s transcript for the rest…

Begin Mike Church Show Transcript

Mike:  “80% of New York High School Grads Can’t Read.”  You’re worried about them drinking soda pop, worried about all these stupid school lunch caloric requirements and regimens, and you continue cranking out imbeciles.  David Greenfield at Front Page Magazine writes:

[reading]

Bloomberg’s big pitch when running for office was that he was going to be the education mayor. After three terms, he seems to be spending more time intervening in congressional races in other states than dealing with petty matters like hurricanes and snowstorms at home. And while Bloomy is fighting for gun control in the Midwest, Johnny Brooklyn can’t read.

The problem isn’t a lack of money. New York State is No. 1 in per pupil spending in the country blowing $18,126 per student and New York City tops that by spending $19,000 per student. And it can’t compete in literacy with much lower per pupil spending states like Utah. It can’t compete at all despite going deep into debt to pay for this public mess.

New York City may dump fortunes into its public schools, but it’s family values that make it possible for students to learn, not more teachers. [Mike: The obsession over the sodas and the sugar and the colas is misplaced at best.]

Nearly 80 percent of New York City high school graduates need to relearn basic skills before they can enter the City University’s community college system.

Officials told CBS 2’s Kramer that nearly 80 percent of those who graduate from city high schools arrived at City University’s community college system without having mastered the skills to do college-level work.

In sheer numbers it means that nearly 11,000 kids who got diplomas from city high schools needed remedial courses to re-learn the basics.

In its defense, the NYC Department of Education said it has raised high school graduation rates by 40 percent over the last seven years. And that the number of students needing remedial courses to do college work has declined slightly – by half a percentage point overall.

And there’s your problem. Promotion results in graduating students who don’t know anything.

[end reading]

Mike:  Just like here in Louisiana, we have what are called LEAP tests.  The only thing they leap is for children to leap ahead and get a couple days off after they take the test.  There’s something to be said about parenting, believe it or not.  James Madison was a child prodigy, that may be true, but in his formative years he was homeschooled.  He was taught at home.  Thomas Jefferson was a childhood prodigy, I would wager, and in his formative years he was homeschooled.

This is a fascinating story.  Jefferson is going to school in I guess Albemarle or Orange County near Charlottesville as a young buck.  He shows some promise.  He’s a good writer.  He’s a very apt and able student.  In that day, they actually promoted students based on how smart they were, not how smart they wanted them to be or how many new kids they needed to go to Louisiana State University so that the football team could get some new Nike helmets.  They actually promoted young men to university or to higher education, as they would have called it, because they showed promise above and beyond what their peers had shown.  In other words, it was specifically because they were the best and brightest.

So young Jefferson, at 16 years of age, by himself, leaves Charlottesville on a horse and makes his way south.  He just happens to pass through I think it’s Henrico County where young Patrick Henry grew up.  Because one of Henry’s relatives near the family farm where they lived knew Jefferson, Jefferson stayed over for a Christmas break and then continued on his way to William & Mary, inspiring young Patrick Henry to say: If Jefferson can do it, I can do it.  This inspired Jefferson to think that Henry was uneducated, because he hadn’t gone to university.

Jefferson goes to Williamsburg.  He rides a horse by himself, 16 years old, and enrolls in what today is still called William & Mary College.  There he studied law under the Virginia patriot George Wythe, one of the smartest, wisest men there were in the 18^th century.  They give you oral exams in order to get out.  Basically you can’t graduate until Wythe says you can.  Ultimately he graduates Jefferson who immediately shows promise as a lawyer and finds himself, at a very young age, because he is so smart and well-read and well-written, as a delegate to the House of Burgesses with a bunch of stogy old men.  It’s he and young Patrick Henry that are the two young bucks in the House of Burgesses that basically begin the Old Dominion’s rattling of sabers to try to escape out from under the British crown.

They do all this without any public education system, without any public education dollars or grants.  They do all this because of good parenting somewhere along the way, a little bit of fortune, and an awful lot of devotion to the ancient and good things.  There’s a reason why things become traditional, and it’s usually because they produce good results.  That’s why it becomes a tradition, because it produced good results.  Things that produce bad results don’t become traditions unless they are producing bad results for the federal government of the United States, then it becomes a tradition.  A bad one becomes the tradition.  We have all this stuff backwards.  Is it any wonder that New York City and public schools across the country are cranking out nitwits?  ‘Tis not a wonder.

End Mike Church Show Transcript

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