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Throwing Money At Public Education Is Not The Answer, System Change Is Needed

Posted on January 14, 2009 by Mike Bock

Thomas Friedman in his column printed in the Dayton Daily News today advances, what sounds to me, a really dumb idea. Friedman says that federal income taxes should be eliminated for all public school teachers, “so more talented people would choose these careers.”

I fully support the notion that our public education system needs transformation via the application of radical ideas. And Friedman’s idea is radical. But, simply pouring great gobs on money into our public education system — via teacher tax breaks or any other method — is not the answer. Increasing teachers’ status to even higher levels as pampered and privileged government workers will not result in the transformation that is needed.

I agree with Friedman’s thinking, when he says, “J.F.K. took us to the moon. Let B.H.O. take America back to school.” But Friedman should give more thought as to what a transformation of public education would really mean, and how such a transformation might be accomplished.

Friedman’s comment about JFK reminds me that, last May, I wrote, Barack Obama’s ‘Go To The Moon’ Challenge For Our Time Should Be: Transform Public Education. The post was in response to statements Obama made that U.S. citizens should be guaranteed “an education that will allow them to fulfill their God-given potential.”

Defining education in terms of the development of individual potential would require vast changes in our educational system. It would be a truly stunning goal, of the same magnitude as Kennedy’s go-to-the-moon goal, because, a system of public education centered on understanding and fulfilling individual potential would require a revolution in our system of public education.

The starting point for any meaningful discussion of educational reform is a recognition of the basic reality of public education: public education is based on a system that is very flawed, and it is the system itself that must change. What is needed is radical change in the system itself, not tinkering in the system. Such radical change would require making new system structures and would require a well thought plan to transition from the present system to a new system.

I expressed some of these thoughts recently on David Esrati’s web-site, and, a respondent on that blog, Gene, asked, “What are the real alternatives Mike? Pointing out the problem is easy. What is the better system that would work for Dayton in particular?”

But I disagree that “pointing out the problem is easy.” Most people don’t see the problem of dramatically improving public education as a system problem. Most people focus on the elements — a curriculum problem, a teacher qualification problem, a discipline problem, a disengaged parent problem — and come up with tinkering ideas. They don’t see that the elements are really just part of one big system problem.

In, Strickland Should Use Charter Schools To Help Fulfill His Promise: “Reform and Renew the System of Education Itself”, I compared our system of public education to the system that produced the notoriously deficient pre-1989 East German car, The Trabant. I wrote, “The Trabant factory was organized inefficiently and was kept going by government subsidies. Tinkering with the Trabant production — through imposing ever more government inspections or through new rewards and punishments for its workers or through new management rules — failed to change the Trabant into a quality product. Only a vast change in organizational structure could have had the quality impact that was needed and the political will to make such massive change never materialized.”

Recognizing that the problem is the system is a first start. No amount of tinkering in system processes would have fixed the Trabant — and doubling the pay of all the workers wouldn’t have fixed it either. The aim of the Trabant system was to keep communist bosses in power and for many years the aim of the system was accomplished. The actual aim of the system never was the production of a quality automobile.

We need to recognize that the actual aim of our public education system, as many see it, is simply to provide jobs to a multitude of government workers. This aim is accomplished brilliantly.

The ostensible aim of the system, as opposed to its actual aim, itself has degenerated. Schools used to have wonderful statements of philosophy of purpose. I worked on several school committees where we argued purpose with passion. But now, the acknowledged purpose of public education, as asserted by local boards of education, is to produce test scores. Today’s school purpose is not one that would have even been considered adequate by yesterday’s philosophy of purpose committees. But, even though the aim of producing test scores is much too low and much too trivial, this aim seems to have a lot of public support.

A lot of people seem impressed when, according to government standards, their schools are deemed “excellent.” Such designations are all about test scores. But high or adequate test scores are not sufficient to indicate an adequate education. I expanded this thought in To Transform Our System Of Education, We Must Redefine The Aim Of The System.

Gene asks a great question — “What is the better system that would work for Dayton in particular?” A better system, I believe, would first of all be focused on accomplishing a worthwhile aim — “an education that will empower every child to fulfill his or her God-given potential.” Then, a better system would find a way to structure opportunities that would effectively motivate new levels of hard work and creativity in both teachers and students and new levels of focus on accomplishing the aim of the system.

A capitalistic system with freedom for the individual is the system we say we believe in. This is the system that has been proven to effectively motivate individuals to higher levels of hard work and creativity. Yet our school systems are quite the opposite of the capitalistic system. A better system, I believe, would move away from the hierarchical, bureaucratic, system already in place and would create structures to encourage entrepreneurial initiative — initiative empowered to accomplish the aim of the system.

Isn’t Dayton spending in excess of $12,000 per year per student? That’s a lot of money. A reasonable proposal, I think, would be to let the system keep $2,000 per student, for overhead and administration, and, then, use the other $10,000 per student to establish a competitive Request For Proposal (RPF) system. I’m thinking that if teachers had the opportunity to respond to an RFP and were challenged to design an educational program that would highly motivate ten students, funded with $100,000, there would be a lot of viable ideas come forward that are not now being considered. A lot of new teacher talent would come forward, at higher levels. If teachers were given new levels of opportunity and accountability, I believe, many would rise to the challenge. This idea, of course, needs a lot of work — but it speaks to the quality and type of system change that, I believe, is needed.

Posted in M Bock, Opinion | Tagged school reform | 12 Comments

Newt Gingrich Compares Hamas To Nazis, Suggests There Should Be No Limit To Israel’s Violence In Gaza

Posted on January 13, 2009 by Mike Bock

Newt Gingich, on George Stephanopoulos’ Sunday program, compared Hamas to the Third Reich, and said that like the Third Reich, Hamas has completely forfeited its right to exist.

Gingrich said: “Hamas wants to eliminate Israel. … We’ll say, ‘Let’s have a conversation,’ they’ll say, ‘Terrific, we want to destroy Israel.’ We’ll say, ‘Now that we are having a conversation, let’s have respect for one another.’ They’ll say, ‘Terrific, we want to destroy Israel.’ … This area (Gaza) has forfeited any right to self government, for the near future. We didn’t say to the Nazis, ‘Gosh we’re a little irritated with the 3rd Reich and we think we should negotiate a little right now.’ We basically said to the Nazis, ‘We’re going to eliminate your right to exist.’ ”

To compare Hamas to the Nazi regime is amazing. But if you are willing to think of Hamas in Nazi terms — a urgent, demonic and horrible threat — certainly it is a small step to conclude that Israel is well justified to rain down unspeakable violence on Gaza. It is easy to conclude that Israel is justified to kill over 900 fellow humans, including 300 children, entire families; justified to destroy mosques, schools, homes.

Gingrich made his Nazi comments as part of Stephanopoulos “Roundtable.” None of the other “Roundtable” participants challenged Gringrich’s wild comparison. The other participants were: George Will, Peggy Noonan, Thomas Friedman and, of course, George Stephanopoulos. Not a peep from anyone.

No-one on the “Roundtable” asked Gingrich the logical follow up question: Is Israel, therefore, justified in pursuing any level of violence against Gaza? Is there any limit to the level of violence against the Gazans that Gingrich would see as unacceptable?

It sounds like Gingrich’s likely answer would have been: “There is no limit to the measures Israel should take to destroy Hamas, just like there was no limit to the measures we were willing to take to destroy the Nazis.”

Gingrich’s thinking excuses state terrorism, and is a thinking common to war mentality: Our enemies are so evil, we are justified in taking any measures, however evil, to destroy them. Gingrich on the “Roundtable” advocated thinking that has always been the rationale used to justify, during war, inhuman levels of violence and unspeakable war atrocities. And the other panelists made not a peep in response to Gingrich.

Someone on the “Roundtable” should have raised the issue of State Terrorism by quoting Bill Moyers to Gingrich. Moyers said “Yes, every nation has the right to defend its people. Israel is no exception, all the more so because Hamas would like to see every Jew in Israel dead. But brute force can turn self-defense into state terrorism. It’s what the U.S. did in Vietnam, with B-52s and napalm, and again in Iraq, with shock and awe.”

Posted in M Bock, Opinion | Tagged gingrich, nazi, violence in gaza | Leave a comment

Bill Moyers Accuses Israel Of “State Terrorism” In Its Conduct Of Gazan War

Posted on January 11, 2009 by Mike Bock

Bill Moyers says that by pursuing the war in Gaza, Israel is “waging war on an entire population,” and that such Israel’s use of brute force in Gaza can be seen as “state terrorism.”

Moyer compares what Israel is doing in Gaza to “what the U.S. did in Vietnam with B-52s and napalm and again in Iraq with shock and awe.” Moyers says, “By killing indiscriminately – the elderly, kids, entire families by destroying schools and hospitals — Israel did exactly what terrorists do and exactly what Hamas wanted. It spilled the blood that turns the wheel of retribution.”

Excerpt from Moyers’ comment on his PBS program, Bill Moyer’s Journal:

“Yes, every nation has the right to defend its people. Israel is no exception, all the more so because Hamas would like to see every Jew in Israel dead.

“But brute force can turn self-defense into state terrorism. It’s what the U.S. did in Vietnam, with B-52s and napalm, and again in Iraq, with shock and awe. Hardly had Israeli tank fire killed and injured scores at a UN school in Gaza than a senior Hamas leader went on television to announce, ‘The Zionists have legitimized the killing of their children by killing our children.’ Already attacks on Jews in Europe are escalating — a burning car crashes into a synagogue in Southern France, a fiery object is hurled through a window in Sweden, venomous anti-Semitic graffiti appears across the continent, and arsonists strike in London.

“What we are seeing in Gaza is the latest battle in the oldest family quarrel on record. Open your Bible: the sons of the patriarch Abraham become Arab and Jew. Go to the Book of Deuteronomy. When the ancient Israelites entered Canaan their leaders urged violence against its inhabitants. The very Moses who had brought down the commandment ‘Thou shalt not kill’ now proclaimed, ‘You must destroy completely all the places where the nations have served their gods. You must tear down their altars, smash their pillars, cut down their sacred poles, set fire to the carved images of their gods, and wipe out their name from that place.’

“So God-soaked violence became genetically coded. A radical stream of Islam now seeks to eliminate Israel from the face of the earth. Israel misses no opportunity to humiliate the Palestinians with checkpoints, concrete walls, routine insults, and the onslaught in Gaza. As if boasting of their might, Israel defense forces even put up video of the explosions on YouTube for all the world to see. A Norwegian doctor there tells CBS, ‘It’s like Dante’s Inferno. They are bombing one and a half million people in a cage.’

“America has officially chosen sides. We supply Israel with money, F-16s, winks and tacit signals. Our Christian right links arms with the religious extremists there who claim divine sanctions for Israel’s occupation of the West Bank. Our political elites show neither independence nor courage by challenging the consensus that Israel can do no wrong. Although one recent poll found Democratic voters overwhelmingly oppose the Israeli offensive by a 24-point margin, Democratic Party leaders in Congress nonetheless march in lockstep to the hardliners in Israel and the White House. Rarely does our mainstream media depart from the monotonous monologue of the party line. Many American Jews know, as Aaron David Miller writes in the current Newsweek, that the destruction in Gaza won’t do much to address Israel’s longer-term needs.

“But those who raise questions are accused by a prominent reform rabbi of being ‘morally deficient.’ One Jewish American activist told me this week that never in 30 years has he seen such blind and binding conformity in his community. You’d never know,’ he said, ‘that it is the Gazans who are doing most of the suffering.’

“We are in a terrible bind — Israel, the Palestinians, the United States. Each greases the cycle of violence, as one man’s terrorism becomes another’s resistance to oppression. Is it possible to turn this mindless tragedy toward peace? For starters, read Aaron David Miller’s article in the current Newsweek. Get his book, The Much Too Promised Land. And pay no attention to those Washington pundits cheering the fighting in Gaza as they did the bloodletting in Iraq. Killing is cheap and war is a sport in a city where life and death become abstractions of policy. Here are the people who pay the price.”