We would not have to ask the above question if public education had not become the great, costly, and tragic failure that it is. It has failed the children, but in reality it has not failed the progressives. They were the ones who engineered the dumbing-down process which parents and taxpayers continue to pay for. But it is the children who suffer in terms of becoming intellectually disabled, semi-literate, disoriented, frustrated, and terribly unhappy. But what is even a bit disheartening is that many liberals still believe that government schooling has been a noble experiment.

Perhaps Walter Lippmann, the great liberal pundit, best expressed liberal disappointment in the great experiment when he wrote in 1941, while World War II was raging in Europe: “Universal and compulsory modern education was established by the emancipated democracies during the nineteenth century. ‘No other foundation can be devised,’ said Thomas Jefferson, ‘for the preservation of freedom and happiness.’ Yet as a matter of fact during the twentieth century the generations trained in these schools have either abandoned their liberties or they have not known, until the last desperate moment, how to defend them. The schools were to make men free. They have been in operation for some sixty or seventy years and what was expected of them they have not done. The plain fact is that the graduates of the modern schools are the actors in the catastrophe which has befallen our civilization. Those who are responsible for modern education -- for its controlling philosophy -- are answerable for the results.”

Unfortunately, they have not been answerable for the results. In fact, if you read today’s slick professional education journals, you detect great pride in what they’ve accomplished. And of course, since the time Lippmann wrote as he did, we have had any number of wars — Korea, Vietnam, First Gulf War, Iraq, Afghanistan — with no end in sight. Not even Lippmann would have foreseen our war against Islamic terrorism. In fact, on September 11, 2001, the United States was attacked in a manner that no one could have predicted. It was worse than Pearl Harbor, and the reason why the terrorists succeeded was because what they planned and successfully carried out was too diabolical to be believed. It required believing the unbelievable. A well-educated people is supposed to believe the unbelievable when warranted.

Continue Reading at TheNewAmerican.com

• Greatly expand the paid volunteer AmeriCorps program and increase funding for national and community service programs to $6 billion through 2014.
• Establish an education awards program authorizing the Corporation for National and Community Service (referred to throughout the bill as “the Corporation”) to provide grants to programs that have approved national service positions but no AmeriCorps funding.
• Require states to develop comprehensive plans for volunteer and paid service by older adults.
• Direct the Corporation to plan pilot programs, including one to establish a centralized electronic citizen verification system which would allow the Corporation to share employment eligibility information with the Department of Education.

Unfortunately, not enough members of Congress have expressed concern over funding oxymoronic “paid volunteer” programs, especially considering that some of those programs have been audited and judged to be ineffective by the Office of Management and Budget.

In order to qualify for education awards funding, schools would naturally have to meet certain criteria. Here is one example taken verbatim from the bill:

(3) YOUTH ENGAGEMENT ZONE PROGRAM- The term `youth engagement zone program' means a service learning program in which members of an eligible partnership described in paragraph (4) collaborate to provide coordinated school-based or community-based service learning opportunities, to address a specific community challenge, for an increasing percentage of out-of-school youth and secondary school students served by local educational agencies where--
(A) not less than 90 percent of the students participate in service-learning activities as part of the program; or
(B) service-learning is a mandatory part of the curriculum in all of the secondary schools served by the local educational agency.

That raises a couple of interesting questions.  Is “service learning” really concerned with education, or is it really about indoctrination? And, if these programs are supposed to be about volunteerism, then why are some aspects of them “mandatory”?

The U.S. Constitution sets up the federal government to be the servant of the states, not their master. So, the federal government has no business requiring the states to come up with plans for any kind of national service programs!

One can’t help but be a little suspicious of a centralized electronic verification system that ties employment eligibility with the Department of Education. Could this evolve into a situation where individuals would be ineligible to work if they did not perform some national or community service requirement while in school?

The phrase “service-learning” appears throughout this legislation. What starts out as a bill trying to encourage volunteerism is really the thin edge of the wedge that ultimately is headed toward mandating service to the state. It is a cunning and underhanded way to indoctrinate the younger generation into a collectivist mindset, and then channeling their time and effort into projects approved by the state.

For more on this topic, see this article posted on The New American website.
 

“What do you think about when I say the word ‘freedom’?” This question was asked by 11-year-old Sara during a recent speech contest. This peppy homeschooler wowed her audience by not talking about Americans’ rights, or what it means to simply be free. Instead, Sara’s talk was about “how Americans are slowly losing their freedom".

Watching Sara’s presentation on YouTube, one would think she was actually an adult in disguise. After all, what 11 year-old understands the concept of government seizing private property in the name of environmental protection, current threats to the freedom of speech, or violations to the Second Amendment?

Watch this video to see Sara’s complete presentation.

What was Sara given that others her age seem to be lacking in today’s society? Sara was taught form a young age to love liberty and appreciate the sacrifices made by our Founders who established our form of government.

 If only more young people were in-tune with our political system and the gradual decay of American liberty!

Not surprisingly, Sara won 1st place for her excellent speech and became a source of inspiration for all who have viewed it (just read the comments left by viewers).

There are now at least 1.5 million home schoolers in the United States. Some inside the homeschool movement place the numbers nearer 2.4 million, but we won’t quibble on this. The Department of Education’s National Center for Education Statistics has reported that the number of home-schooled children is up 74 percent from 1999 and up 36 percent from 2003, based on 1.5 million home-based students.

A 2007 survey of home-schooling parents showed that a majority educated their own offspring for moral or religious reasons. But those who home school because they want a more untraditional approach are growing, now up to a possible 32 percent of all home schoolers. And fewer home schoolers are enrolled part-time in government or private schools as well. Some who might have chosen that option are now choosing online instruction for at least some of their children’s education.

This statistical data for those with home-based education programs was obtained by the Parent and Family Involvement in Education Survey of the National Household Education Surveys. Admittedly, the estimates are just that, estimates, because the National Home Education Research Institute, a private research organization, noted that home-schooling parents are “significantly less likely to answer government-sponsored surveys.”