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We must remember that poverty is a malady that has existed since the beginning of time. Regardless of politicians empty rhetorical promises that, if elected, they will end poverty, it will be with us forever. The best we can do is reduce it. Poverty will always exist because there are people who refuse, or are unable, to make good decisions. Poverty will be with us forever because the people we elect to solve such problems refuse to even address the root causes. They are either too stupid, too cowardly, or owned by special interest groups. In order to reduce poverty we must first accurately diagnose the root cause(s) of it. While there are numerous reasons poverty persists in the wealthiest nation on earth, the most sure-fire way to begin reducing poverty in the USA is to address the failure of our educational system.

Our educational system has been stuck in reverse since Jimmy Carter created the Department of Education (DE) in 1979. We have suffered through multiple national programs initiated by an ignominious clutch of egg heads. George W. Bush signed the No Child Left Behind Act (NCLBA) in 2001. It was utterly worthless. Then American students, and their parents were dumbstruck by the Barack Obama DE mandated Common Core Curriculum. This ridiculous program actually had the effect of moving students backward as they were forced to unlearn what they had already learned. Its methodology was so convoluted that many parents could no longer help their kids with homework. We now basically ignore this awful program. NCLBA was ultimately replaced by the Every Student Succeeds ACT (ESSA). This new program was signed into law by Barack Obama in 2015. It proved to be as worthless as it’s predecessors. All of these heavy handed, one size fits all, programs were sold as the silver bullet that would put an end to our educational failings. And yes they required multiple billions of dollars in new funding. In 2018 the DE employed approximately 4,000 people. Its budget was around $64 billion. Every year we increase the amount of money we spend from federal, state, and local, taxes on education. We are consistently in the top 5 globally in per student education spending. Yet we continued to slip down the competitive ranks of global literacy. That is because none of the above programs addressed the real problem. Our education system continues to fail our students. What follows is a list of suggested remedies to just a few of the glaring reasons our children lag their global competitors.

The first thing we must do is downsize the DE by at least 80%. We must stop paying a bunch of unelected bureaucrats who don’t know a chalkboard from a surfboard. We must keep them from creating education policy from D.C. By not specifically giving the power to educate our children to the Federal Government, our Constitution gives that power to the states. We have this wonderful system established by our Founding Fathers known as Federalism. Let’s take advantage of it. That would create 50 mini education labs in the states. It would put locals back in charge of deciding what their children are taught. Parents wouldn’t have to be screwing around with Critical Race Theory (CRT) at school board meetings. Girls wouldn’t be forced to compete with boys on girl’s athletic teams, or share their locker and shower rooms with members of the opposite sex. Parents would be more in control of what, and how, subjects would be taught. We could mandate more class time for reading, writing, arithmetic, science, history, civics, etc. And less for things like CRT education, teaching the virtues of transgenderism, ridiculing white kids for being white, and teaching children of color how to deal with the inescapable fact that they are victims. The remaining 20% of the DE would fund nothing more than a central data gathering function. Its sole purpose would be to gather info from the mini labs in the 50 states. We could thus figure out which state is having the most success in teaching each of the learning disciplines. We would be able to quantitatively discern which methods were working and which were not. That info could then be distributed to all states for their adaptation. This is how we take advantage of our strengths, and move the educational system forward. This could be done relatively quickly if the voters come together and deliver a unified message demanding the dismantling of the DE.

Nearly everyone agrees the best way to escape poverty is to get a quality education. Many of our inner city kids are being sentenced to a life of poverty simply because of where they live. The democratic party proclaims itself the protector of the downtrodden. In reality they represent the greatest road block keeping inner city kids, the most downtrodden, from escaping poverty. The National Education Assn. (NEA) and the American Federation of Teachers, (AFT) aggressively lobby against school choice, school vouchers, and the funding of charter, parochial, and private schools. They even oppose home schooling! All of these non-traditional types of education help poor inner-city kids get a better education. Teacher unions are bitterly opposed to any plan that allows poor children to escape underperforming schools if it means fewer dues paying teachers. They are deathly afraid of competition. You see, those who teach in these non-traditional schools do not belong to, and therefor don’t pay dues to, unions. Who cares what teacher unions want? Democrats do. These unions have incredible political clout. For many election cycles teacher’s unions have given tens of millions of dollars to the democratic party and democratic candidates. In fact, they have been the largest contributors to democratic candidates for a very long time. When the NEA and AFT tells the democratic part to jump, there reply is how high? It is instructive for us to remember that teacher unions couldn’t care less about our kids. Their clients are teachers. Their only reason to exist is to protect, and make life easier for, their clients.

Our kids would be best served if all stakeholders in the educational process were working toward the same goal. That being a quality education for every child willing to work for it. As currently structured, that excludes teachers unions. We must rid ourselves of them. They obviously will not go quietly into that goodnight. The best thing we can do for our kids is to get off our behinds and fight to ensure that all states become right to work states. That means we must write letters, send emails, and make phone calls, to our elected representatives demanding they vote against the PRO Act. The PRO Act, or the Protecting the Right to Organize ACT, will negate the right to work laws in the 27 states where they currently exist. In right to work states employees, including teachers, may opt out of paying union dues. If the PRO Act passes employees, including teachers, will be forced to join unions and pay union dues. Teacher unions are all in for the passage of this Bill. It guarantees them more dues paying members.

The next step is to prove to our teachers that we care about them. We have been woefully irresponsible in this regard for far too long. We must attend school board meetings and return ownership of the classroom to the teachers. We must work with teachers to see that compensation is designed to reward those who are the most successful in producing well rounded children who are prepared to face the challenges of adulthood. Unions have forever fought against merit based compensation. We must take advantage of the best and brightest teachers. At the same time we must do everything possible to assist teachers who are floundering in the classroom. Sadly some teachers aren’t cut out to handle the rigors of the job and will need to look for other employment. Now that we know how to do remote learning we must use it to our children’s advantage. When we identify a superstar history teacher, for example, in a school why wouldn’t we want to leverage that teacher’s talents to history students, and history teachers, all over the state? Compensation is a critical factor in increasing the quality of our teachers. When all stakeholders have the same goals in educating our kids, intelligent people will find ways to properly compensate our teaching professionals. When teachers are convinced they will be treated fairly, with respect, and compensated properly for their efforts, there would be no reason for them to pay part of their hard earned salaries in union dues. When union dues dry up we can say good-bye to the awful NEA and AFT. Oh, and good riddance.

I recognize that reducing poverty, and reforming our education system, are much more complex than I can cover in a blog. I never intended to solve problems with my writing. The idea is to point out what I see as a serious problem. Then to suggest a few potential remedies that I hope will get a conversation started on that topic.

I hope you found this blog informative and thought provoking. If you did please tell your friends about it. Thank you for your time.

Bob