The Right Cannot Afford to Abandon Public Education

[Kamaji]

The Right Cannot Afford to Abandon Public Education

Our schools and universities are ours. We built them, we paid for them, and we want them back.

By Kevin Portteus
February 21, 2023

In his latest offensive to rid Florida’s educational system of revolutionary Marxism, Governor Ron DeSantis announced what amounts to a new direction for one of the most liberal educational institutions in the state: the New College of Florida. DeSantis appointed a slew of new trustees to the college, including the anti-Marxist journalist Christopher Rufo, Claremont Review of Books Editor and political scientist Charles R. Kesler, and Matthew Spalding of Hillsdale College. The president of the New College, Patricia Okker, appeared before the board and said that she could not cooperate with the board or with DeSantis’ plan for the institution, and she was promptly terminated.

The importance of this move cannot be overstated. DeSantis’ previous efforts, outlawing critical race theory, rejecting the hate-filled mess that is the proposed AP African-American Studies course, and attacking the infiltration of LGBTQ ideology into our schools, were a good start, but they pale in comparison to this latest push.

Anyone who has ever worked in any organization, be it corporate, government, nonprofit, or educational, knows that personnel is policy. The people you put in key positions are the decisive factor in determining the character of an organization. Ban whatever content you want; require whatever curriculum you want; until you have the right personnel, and are rid of the wrong personnel, you won’t solve the underlying problem.

Educators, at all levels, obsess over curriculum and content, but these are really of secondary importance compared with who is teaching those classes. At my institution, Hillsdale College, we have an outstanding core curriculum, but the reality is that we are a bastion of learning not because we require a class called “American Heritage,” but because that class is taught by the unparalleled faculty of our history department.

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Most on the Right have all but given up on the idea of recapturing the public schools, but in giving up on the public schools they are abandoning those children who remain to be indoctrinated by the Left. Most families, for a variety of reasons, lack the ability to homeschool. Private schools are expensive and exclusive. Alternatives such as charter schools are only capable of absorbing a tiny fraction of our children. Like it or not, the vast majority of our nation’s children are and will continue to be educated in the public schools. If the republic is to survive, we need those students to become good citizens, too.

How many institutions will conservatives abandon? How much more ground will we cede? In acting on the maxim that “personnel is policy,” DeSantis has said “no more.” Our schools and universities are ours. We built them, we paid for them, and we want them back. If we don’t take them back, we cannot save our country. The Left understands that, and it’s time we did, too.

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Source:  https://amgreatness.com/2023/02/21/the-right-cannot-afford-to-abandon-public-education/

[Fishrrman]

Traditional-minded Americans of Euro/Christian background have no choice BUT to "abandon" public education. There is no saving the existing system, and there is GOOD reason for parents to keep their kids from being exposed to [what is becoming] the majority of disruptive and uneducable youths who now inhabit many "public" schools.

They should endeavour to construct an alternative education system that will exist unto itself, with as little interaction with the "public" system as can be possible.

The primary goals should be a return to the Western-oriented model, and kept as accessible and affordable as can be achieved.

[Smokin Joe]

Traditional-minded Americans of Euro/Christian background have no choice BUT to "abandon" public education. There is no saving the existing system, and there is GOOD reason for parents to keep their kids from being exposed to [what is becoming] the majority of disruptive and uneducable youths who now inhabit many "public" schools.

They should endeavour to construct an alternative education system that will exist unto itself, with as little interaction with the "public" system as can be possible.

The primary goals should be a return to the Western-oriented model, and kept as accessible and affordable as can be achieved.

Frankly, I think that depends on demographics and decoupling public schools from nationally packaged curricula. Reinstate the standardized testing regimes we went through. Math, reading comprehension, English, as core skills, and make schools local again.
CRT? irrelevant in those schools who are not in the demographic that would have you believe the white man is the source of all evil and the scourge of humanity.

Now do the math, and keep in mind that tremendous concentrations exist in the demographic landscape, and CRT and the alphabet soup gender nonsense would die a natural death in most school districts, because they would be irrelevant. After all, that demographic landscape is still dominated by groups who are not 'special interest' nor unduly influenced directly by those interests EXCEPT that they are buying canned curricula from people who are at the forefront of promoting that nonsense.
Stop that practice, and suddenly, that irrelevant crap falls by the wayside and we can reinstate curricula that focus on core skills, STEM, and even civics.