Scapegoating the Wrong People Slowly Destroys Communities and Schools

I see disturbing parallel similarities in the way schools, teachers, and administrators are being blamed when students are subjected to punishment for incidents of misbehavior in public schools, and in the way police are being targeted when simply doing their jobs in challenging urban environments.  

 In both schools and society, generally speaking, what leads people into trouble is poor personal choices and the lack of a solid family foundation—not bigotry or poverty! 

As the genuine practice of religion has evaporated along with the nuclear family in parts of urban America today, there’s been a proportionate rise in violence, drug abuse, social decay, and failing schools in such communities. 

The Federal Government has exacerbated this problem; with ever-expanding entitlements that have disincentivized work and made fatherless households convenient and renumerative—what else did the social justice engineers that developed these “programs” expect?

The radical,so-called  social justice organizations that point fingers of blame will never acknowledge the real cause of all of these troubling symptoms:  There is a lack of functional, effective family structure in large swaths of America today. 

It remains much more salacious, newsworthy, and lucrative to instead portray teachers, cops, school districts, and police departments as “overzealousbigots.”

Police Departments are fully capable of doing their jobs if they are allowed to do so and if they’re supported by their respective cities and counties.  Policemen should be commended for doing the dangerous work they do!

Instead, the minute something tragic happens like in Baltimore or Ferguson---politicians of every stripe immediately pounce on LEOs. 

Before you know it, abracadabra, it is entirely the police’s fault that communities are dysfunctional and disproportionate numbers of minorities are incarcerated.

Next come the outlandish explanations from the ideologues that demonize police—the tactics are too aggressive, departments need re-training, they need more diverse workforces, etc. etc... 

Once these naïve rubes get exactly they want- crime rates soar.  Police back away from proactive

Universal Pre-K: Myths and Reality Part II

I've discussed this issue plenty on this blog.  Universal Pre-K, funded by tax dollars, touted as an "educational program" panacea that will benefit students throughout their lives, is a myth. It is an expensive one, to boot.

But these programs enjoy broad bipartisan support from politicians of every stripe that love the money these programs inject into their jurisdictions.  Everyone loves money, right? And if it funds a program "for the children"---- it becomes all but  unstoppable, a juggernaut.

Even if the best, most well-constructed studies debunk the lofty claims Universal Pre-K proponents espouse (lifetime benefits,7 to 1 ROI, value to communities, etc, etc. etc.) --these  ideologues married to the notion that the government must fund these programs will never stop proclaiming their view of the benefits of these programs, intentionally disguising the fact that these programs are job creating entitlements, not long-term, effective educational programs...

Earlier this week US News and World Report ran an article on this same subject.  From the report:

"Pre-K for all” has become a rallying cry for progressives, underscored last week by Hillary Clinton’s speech at the Center for American Progress' discussion on “Expanding Opportunity in America’s Urban Areas." In her seven-minute talk, Clinton emphasized the “overriding issues of inequality and lack of mobility” in America, and praised New York City Mayor Bill de Blasio’s universal pre-K program as a model for helping the struggling middle class. There’s no question that the rapidly growing cost of child care has become a huge burden on middle-class families. Since 2000, the cost of child care has increased twice as much as median income of families with children..Pre-K advocates

VPK-Myths and Reality

Just as I know charter schools are not private, but rather public schools, I also know that expending large sums of government [taxpayer] dollars into ever-expanding voluntary preschool programs is not a panacea that improves education long-term.  Is it helpful to families that are poor, of course.  Is it an entitlement program, of course.  Is it the BEST WAY to spend money to improve academic outcomes? NO

No matter who says it, and no matter how loudly it is said, the data from the very few  high quality, strictly controlled studies on VPK and similar programs simply do not show these programs as being that impactful--academically.  At least not long term.

Are these programs huge money generators for states and communities?  YES.  Do they create jobs in communities?  YES.  Are these programs a benefit to poor families?  YES.  Are these programs wildly popular due to the dollars they bring to states?  YES

But for strictly academic purposes, does the data from the most well conducted studies support the claim that these are the BEST ways to spend scarce dollars for the purpose of increasing academic outcomes for all children long-term?  NO  -according to a well conducted study of head-start by the US Government

NO, according to a recently conducted, well constructed study by Vanderbilt University.  From that report:

"For that Intensive Substudy sample, we found that the effects of TN‐VPK on the WJ achievement measures observed at the end of the pre‐k year had greatly diminished by the end of the kindergarten year and the differences between participants and nonparticipants were no longer statistically significant. The only exception was a marginally significant difference on Passage Comprehension with nonparticipants showing higher scores at the end of the kindergarten year than TN‐VPK

Free Community College For All?

President Obama has announced an ambitious plan to offer free community college for America’s students, with a formula that calls for the Feds to pay 3/4 of the costs with the states picking up 1/4 of the expense.

While on the surface this may seem like a very worthwhile idea, It would be an absolute disaster if implemented.  It stands no chance to succeed if it is pursued—particularly with the new Congress that has just been seated.

Why not?

Because somebody has to pay, there is no free lunch, and right now-we’re broke, tapped out, strapped--that's why.  Worse yet, we’re leveraged.  So to pay for this sort of a scheme, either we borrow more money, or we raise taxes.  Both ideas that are reckless and irresponsible.  That’s number 1.

Number two is a simple axiom of truth:  When we add government money into institutions –the costs go up exponentially. 

Number three is if you give something away for free, it greatly diminishes the value of that “thing.”

Look at healthcare-the idea was to lower costs, but what is happening is we are keeping costs fixed and covering millions of new enrollees with massive government subsidies, and this “reform” is just in its infancy and already the costs are skyrocketing… 

Look at the post office attempting to compete with FEDEX and UPS for package delivery services, the USPS gets shellacked.  

Everyone knows the DoD stories of $500.00 toilet seats when similar (or better) can be bought at Home Depot for $19.99.  And the list goes on.

In education-just look at the meteoric rise in the costs ofpublic universities in just the last two decades as the government has feverishly doled out student loans to many who in reality have no business going to college.  Now there are $1.2Trillion in outstanding student loans that may not be collected -creating a new bubble that could threaten our fragile economy.

Government infusions of cash into education at the college level have made public, state school tuition rise to the point that many middle class students can barely afford the tuition.   Many can’t afford it, yet they are not eligible for sufficiently affordable student loans to cover the costs.  The middle class gets squeezed once again!

So no, excuse me if I do not enthusiastically support this ill-conceived initiative.  We can’t afford it, it will only add to our historic debt, and possibly worst of all- it will entice even more students who are unprepared and in reality need to directly enter the work-force-to attend college.  Not everybody needs to go to college, and not everybody is equipped mentally or academically to be successful in