One area where I don't feel very well versed is that of the effectiveness of the Dept. of Education. I'd like to hear some thoughts on the pros/cons of this department's performance. It seems to be, along with the Dept. of Energy, a favorite target of those who want to shrink the size of the Federal Government. What would happen if the DOEducation was either eliminated or drastically down-sized with much of the power returned to the States? Thanks...
You cannot determine the effectiveness of the DofEd unless you know the mission/goal of public education. I am unaware of any such mission statement or goals. If we cannot know where it is we wish to be at some time in the future, it is unlikely we will get there...
First off, the USA has individual States and each State runs it's own education systm. The spin of it being a federal program with federal powers is just BS. Each State has failing schools. It cost the taxpayer more each year for less performance. In the USA State tax money is not enough to pay for annual operation cost to fund public education. The largest part of your state tax money goes to funding failing schools. There are tons of stats on how the USA rates among the 30 or so advanced nations. And the USA comes in last in almost all of them. To do away with public education and convert it to private education (where the elite kids go to), is just a dream that will never happen. For several reasons: 1) the largest union in the USA (government union paid for with tax money), makes a lot of money off the taxpayer, and they have more political power and lobbiest in each State than the insurance or medical industry combined. 2) you will never get educators to work adult hours. They will never work more than 5 or 6 hours a day. Plus they have tenure, and you cant get reid of the losers. 3) The elite welthy and powerfull will not have the masses of common consumers be associated with their kids, nor will they allow the common people to compete with their protected privilage lifestyle. 4) The political power of the School Unions are so powerfull, that they own the people and the politicians, so you can expect no laws or changes in the status quo. The reality of the USA public schools is a dismal one. It is the reality you must live with and accept. The schools have been dumbing down the past two or three generations of Americans, so now you have masses of idiots who are at odd with eachother and they can't see beyond their own nose who is realy screwing them. Other countries have learned from the bluprint of failure of the USA public school system. And if they are smart they will avoid the massive administrative buerocracy of eductors and the power of the public school unions. You can only hope other countries fall from the same problems of the USA public schools so that we can have some company. It is lonely at the bottom.
Here on PF you can tell by the dismal responses that public education is a low priority for Americans. We have the same pathetic results year after year and nothing ever is modified to obtain acceptable results. The discussion is always about money...NEVER about the design or effectiveness of the current public education system. This should tell us that it's all political BS...and our kids suffer...and our nation suffers...and few care...
True. the condition of public education is a failure that is so broke and people know it can't be fixed. Hence my observations on a broken system that will not change. Change would be like asking a unmotivated lazy stoner to get a job and realy do some work. Just not going to happen. As long as the lazy and useless educators who have tenure can make money and doing nothing for almost no work, they will not change. This is capitalism, all for one and all for self. Screw the rest.
Not sure about American schools, but on a non economic perspective, how about not pushing students through for sensitivity, emotional scarring, (ie, at the root level of a developing child stop instilling in them poor performance gets you ahead equal to good performance)
I worked with the dept of education extensively between 1997-2000. I worked for a science curriculum software publisher in Seattle. The effectiveness of the DOE is directly realted to how much congress and the president care about them. They monitor the effectiveness of federal funds being awarded to schools, and to nutshell what they do...they're the eyes and ears for our government in public schools. If the right gets their way, and education in America is privatized, they should be eliminated.
Perhaps not directly, but indirectly it is. It is for people to profit off, and that is the bottom line. More money is all they ask, and less work to do.
some do believe the US Public schools are biger than life. But they are not. It as the individual level on each educator to make a differnce. Again, some accountability needs to happen, and as you can see, there is a lack of accountability for performance. It is always easy to follow the simple 8th grade cognitive level thinking of it's the governments' fault. I disagree. It is the fault of each person who gets paid a wage or salery to do the job. It is realy a team. And the failures of the educators are the problem. But when you pay them big money to do nothing, and put them on a pedistal for failing, you only compount the negative behavior. But dumbing down the Masses and making them great consumers has been the only success of USA public schools. For that, we can say that all those hundreds of billions each State pays each year is not all wasted. The US Fed has little to do with performance. It is the State level and their unions that own the taxpayer and the government. So if their is a government entity to blame, so that you can put aside accountability of educators, go look into State educaton systems of the USA. Massive failures to be found. But their failure is an investors profit. Follow the money train if you can.
But money is free for the US public education system, there is always more that the taxpayer is willing to pay. There is no price limit for US public schools. Their State Debt is my gain. The US Public schools are a bottomless pit of financial debt. There realy is no cost to running public schools, the money is digital and free, just like the national debt. It's virtual.
