Public school system is a model of failure

The public school system is a failure. The model we are using to teach our youth is outdated and damaging. I could give some example and facts, and go on and on about how bad the system is but for the most part I would be preaching to the choir. If you think it’s a good system, then by all means you should vote for the levy to help support it.

For me to vote “yes” is to say the current system is working fine and there is no need to change it. My views come from working in public and private schools and from raising my four kids. From my perspective, the system stinks. The problem is both local and nationwide.

The only way to fix the educational system is to stop feeding it and let it starve. The argument goes that we must do something to help our youth. Well, if someone is hungry, I’m not going to give him or her something like a music CD instead of food and expect the person to be fed. If I was a parent of school-aged children and I wanted them to develop into responsible adults with a good education, I would not send them to public school.

There are good things happening in education. They are available right now and I’ll support them. One of them is the virtual schools and another is home schooling, some charter schools and small private schools that aren’t modeled after the old system also are showing promise.

For me, it’s not an issue of paying more or less taxes. It’s an issue of what I’m paying those taxes for. My vote against the levy is to kill a paradigm that should have died years ago.

CHUCK WRIGHT

Clark Fork