Food for thought
Monday, November 10th, 2008 By Beth Lear 
In the next few months Ohioans will hear and read about many recommended changes to our K-12 education system. Governor Ted Strickland intends to unveil his plans for change early in the year, while the State School Board is going to be considering a plan to revamp education funding.
While it is certainly premature to judge the plans without having seen them–it would be wonderful if the recommended changes provided much needed help for children and taxpayers–I am choosing not to hold my breath. Why the cynicism? As our own David W. Kirkpatrick reports at www.freedomfoundation.us:
- Kirkpatrick’s First Law of Reform: major change rarely lives up to the hopes of its supporters or the fears of its opponents.
David and I are not the only cynics. Consider these quotes:
“One moves up the Union food chain by being loyal to the leadership who then pick people for the prized jobs. Competence is not necessarily a requirement.” - James Eterno, United Federation of Teachers chapter leader, Jamaica High School, NYC, ICEUFT Blog, October 27, 2008
”The paradox is that we want to reinvent our schools for the new century without making fundamental changes. We prefer tinkering our way to Utopia…tinkering won’t get us there.” Ronald A. Wolk, “Perspective Still Tinkering,” editorial, p. 4, Teacher Magazine, November/December 2004
”Piecemeal attempts to change the present system haven’t worked and won’t work because the present system is a monopoly. pp 83-4, Jackie Ducote, ” pp 79-88 “Strategies For Education Reform”, Harrisburg, PA: The Commonwealth Foundation, 1990
”Any reform that is acceptable to the educational establishment, and that can gain a majority in a legislature, federal or state, is bound to be worse then nothing.” Irving Kristol’s First Law of Educational Reform. The Wall Street Journal, April 18, 1994
”The near-impossibility of true educational reform has been documented in a number of studies.”…the system can’t be rehabilitated, only replaced.” Howard Good, “Losing It, The Confessions of an Ex-School Board President,” Education week, March 17, 2004
”The really central problem is the total obsolescence of our schools. The school system simulates a factory life. Its intent is to produce 40 million to 50 million factory workers for the next generation, for factories that won’t be there.” Alvin Toffler, p. 4B, USA Today, March 11, 1986
”It is simply not in the interest of the educational establishment to change, and it is politically naive to believe that this or any other bureaucracy will voluntary self-destruct.” p. 28, Edward Rauchut, “I Quit,” pp 26-27, Teacher Magazine, February 1992
”The days of the traditional big-city school board are numbered…the boards have shown that they can’t manage, can’t deal effectively with unions, and shortchange the kids. Instead, they end up serving chiefly the adults who work in the school system.” Neal R. Pierce, “Big-city schools boards endangered,” p. A13, the Phila. Inquirer, Dec 2, 1996
In spite of all this negativity, there is hope. The Buckeye Institute will be unveiling many positive, tried and true ideas at the same time as our friends in the government unveil theirs. Stay tuned. It will definintely be food for thought.
