Tag Archives: Students

News

Which presidential candidate will help minorites get a better education in better schools?

1 Comment

One of the major issues affecting blacks and Hispanics in America is the issue of poor-performing public schools. Because the administrators and teachers are unionized, they are immune to criticism, discipline or termination for poor performance. And many of the administrators and teachers have no real-world experience at earning money in the private sector. Who will fix it?

Here’s Daily Wire reporting on Trump in his own words:

On Thursday, President Trump redeclared his commitment to enacting school choice, a conservative pitch most popular in the black American community, many of whom have grown weary of sending their children to government-funded public schools.

Speaking at the “Transition to Greatness” roundtable, the president called upon Congress to enact school choice now, hailing it as the great “civil rights issue of our time.”

“We are renewing our call on Congress to finally enact school choice now, school choice is a big deal, because access to education is the civil rights issue our time,” the president said. “I’ve heard that for the last, I would say year, it really is, it’s the civil rights issue of our time.”

President Trump elaborated on the benefits of school choice by forcing underperforming schools to better improve their methods.

“When you can have children go to a school where their parents want them to go, and it creates competition, and other schools fight harder, because all of a sudden they say, ‘Wow, we’re losing it, we have to fight hard,’” the president said. “It gets better in so many different ways, but there are groups of people against that. You have unions against it, you have others against it, and they’re not against it for the right reasons, they were against it for a lot of the wrong reasons.”

So basically, Trump wants schools to work more like companies in the private sector that are accountable to customers. When private sector companies compete, you get Amazon, Apple, Dell, Samsung, LG, etc. Competition gives you more choice, so you can find better quality for less money. Public schools don’t work like that, and children suffer as a result.

And note:

President Trump’s push for school choice at this turbulent moment in history is not coincidental, being that black American voters routinely have expressed support for it alongside criminal justice reform, which the president helped to enact with the First Step Act.

The Washington Times reports on more differences:

President Trump is pushing schools to reopen amid the COVID-19 pandemic, saying parents want it, the children can handle it and the economy needs it.

Democratic presidential nominee Joseph R. Biden says the teachers don’t want it, the children can spread the coronavirus and the country can’t stomach another surge of COVID-19 cases he fears would result.

[…]Beyond school choice, Mr. Trump and Education Secretary Betsy DeVos have rescinded Obama administration rules on school discipline, racial disparities and gender identity, and have given states more flexibility in meeting federal mandates.

And here’s Biden:

Mr. Biden counters Mr. Trump’s parent-centered approach to education with a teacher-centered platform, promising the money will flow to public education instead.

Mr. Biden counters Mr. Trump’s parent-centered approach to education with a teacher-centered platform, promising the money will flow to public education instead.

He wants to triple federal spending on schools with significant low-income populations and require that much of that cover higher salaries for teachers. He also would increase the availability of student loan forgiveness for graduates who go on to work in education.

Mr. Biden’s campaign says he will hire up to 60,000 more psychologists for schools to help with what he warned is a mental health crisis.

His unity platform, reached with former opponent Sen. Bernard Sanders of Vermont, opposes vouchers that support private schools and takes a dim view of public charter schools.

The Biden-Sanders plan would impose bureaucratic standards for diversity and discipline on charter schools, cut off money for those deemed underperforming and impose an outright ban on federal money for for-profit charter schools.

I don’t see the profit motive as a problem, as it is profits that causes people in the private sector to produce quality goods and services for their customers – or risk losing those customers to competitors who do a better job of pleasing customers.

You can see from this chart how well throwing money into a unionized monopoly has worked over time:

Cato Institute graphs education spending against test scores
Cato Institute graphs education spending against test scores

In public schools, administrators and teachers are not paid more or less based on pleasing their customers (parents) by achieving results (student performance).

Reason.com is a libertarian web site, interviewed Education Secretary Betsy Devos. I liked this:

You are someone who has advocated for more choice, more local decision making, in education. But then you were thrust into the role of national education official. It had to be tempting to use that position to really push local governments to implement more of the ideas that you have. But your idea is that there shouldn’t be some person in charge of telling everyone what to do. Do you ever feel this tension?

I do. The previous administration went exactly the opposite direction and overreached in multiple areas. Much of what I’ve had to do is come back and undo a lot of that. But at the same time, there are plenty of folks who’ve been critical of my not implementing all kinds of conservative policies that, in my view, would be desirable for students and their families. But I think my [approach] here has been one of restraint, and that I believe is ultimately a big accomplishment.

I view this department as one that probably never should have been stood up. I think there are ample arguments for it having gotten more in the way of students and their futures than actually being any kind of value-add.

Should the Department of Education be abolished—or gradually abolished, perhaps?

I would not be at all unhappy to work myself out of a job. I think that states and local communities and, most importantly, the family has to be the epicenter of these decisions. The 40 years since this department has existed, there’s been over a trillion dollars spent to close the achievement gaps. They haven’t closed one little bit. They’ve only opened in multiple areas. So why would we continue to advocate for doing more of the same thing and expect something different?

Do you like having Betsy Devos in charge of education policy? I do. For me this is just another reason to support Trump for President.

Related posts

News

What builds character? A job in a capitalist economy, or campus “safe spaces”?

3 Comments

Dennis Prager liked this article so much that he discussed it on Friday AND Monday. A lot.

I read the article, too. And I think there is a lot to learn from it. Let’s take a look at some of it, and then I’ll make a point.

Excerpt:

During Customs week, in PAF sessions, and in everyday discourse here at Haverford, we are taught to ask for help when we feel we need it, speak up when we feel uncomfortable, and prioritize our own well being over most other things. At McDonald’s, acting in this way could have cost me my job, a job I needed to afford college. There, I, as an individual, was insignificant: The most important thing was that the customer walks away satisfied, and it didn’t matter what I had to go through to make that happen. There is something ironic about this: In order to do what was necessary to be a Haverford student, I had to act in un-Haverford-like way.

Because I worked the front counter, whenever there was a problem with an order — even though I never made the food — I was the one who was verbally abused. “One must never interrupt the customer,” and “The customer is always right,” so I would stand and listen to the entirety of elaborate rants, trying to put aside the attacks on myself, on McDonald’s, on America, and on capitalism, so that I could report the relevant details to those who actually had the power to correct the problem. These issues were usually simple, like a missing piece of cheese from a McDouble, or whipped cream on a milkshake when they hadn’t wanted any.

The customer is always right, and how you feel about the “injustice of it all” doesn’t matter. In fact, if you put your personal feelings about the need of the business owner to grow his business, you’ll probably get a talking to about how the customer is always right and to toughen up and take it.

She concludes:

I’m grateful to have worked at McDonald’s: It taught me how better to handle my anxiety and how to put myself last in the name of efficiency and a common goal. McDonald’s strengthened my character, my work ethic, and expanded my capacity for resilience, valuable lessons which could not be learned in the “safe spaces” of Haverford’s campus. We must remember that putting oneself first is the essence of privilege, and that, in order to grow, we must leave this selfish mindset behind.

So what can we say about this?

In a free market, you can't make money by greed alone
In a free market, you can’t get rich by greed alone

I don’t know if most young people really understand that the essence of the free market / free enterprise / capitalist system is that in order for you to make money, you have to make something or do something for someone else that they find valuable. You cannot greed your way to a fortune. There is no filthy capitalist dog in a top hat, twirling his long mustache and laughing evilly as money magically appears. In a free market, you have to give something to someone to get their money. And you have to give them more value for less cost than all the other competitors they can choose from. So, people in businesses have to be nice to you. That’s why Amazon and Costco don’t ask questions when you return stuff. They want a relationship with you for life, and questioning you would make you go somewhere else. And all their employees are taught that – the customer is always right.

The opposite of free market competition is monopoly. Monopolies do exist in the world, but not usually in the free market. Where do monopolies exist? Well, they exist in the government. Think of what the service is like at the department of motor vehicles, or immigration office, or the social security office, etc. The customer service is lousy, the lines are long, the unionized government workers are uneducated and rude, and they get too many benefits and too much salary for the value they offer. How are they allowed to do that? Simple. You can’t go anywhere else to get the stuff you need from them. That’s why they can underperform, and you can’t do a thing about it.

Anyway, the main point is that you should always encourage your children to take the most demanding job in the private sector they can handle. And by the way, if you know an irresponsible college student who insists on having fun, thrills and travel, the best thing you can do is encourage them to get a job that they hate. It will help them to grow their character and build their finances at the same time – making them ready for the responsibilities and obligations they will face from marriage and parenting. Working in a capitalist system is magic for your character. Even if you didn’t have the best parents, you can still grow up right just by showing up for work every day.

News

Universities limiting student employment to comply with Obamacare

Leave a comment

Well, they are certainly getting what they voted for – but good.

Campus Reform has the story.

Excerpt:

Middle Tennessee State University (MTSU) is restricting student work because of compliance issues associated with the Affordable Care Act (ACA), commonly known as Obamacare.

In an email last week, MTSU President Sidney McPhee explained that “due to our interpretation of the reporting requirements of ACA,” graduate assistants, adjunct faculty members, and resident assistants are barred from working on-campus jobs that exceed 29 hours of work per week.

Now, they cannot take on multiple campus jobs.

“[E]ffective beginning with the fall semester, we will no longer allow part-time employees, or those receiving monthly stipends from the university, to accept multiple work assignments on campus,” the email stated.

McPhee noted that violations of the law “could add up as high as $6 million” in penalties.

The Daily News Journal reports that graduate assistants are now restricted from picking up research work funded through grants to the university.

[…]As Campus Reform previously reported, the University of Kansas has reduced the number of hours student employees can work from 30 hours per week to 20, a move to ensure compliance with the ACA.

“The revised [KU] policy seeks to balance the necessity for students to make academic progress while managing potential fiscal liabilities with ACA,” Diane Goddard, KU vice provost for administration and finance wrote in an email early this month.

[…]Since 2012, at least 111 colleges and universities have limited adjunct professor course loads, capped student employment hours, or reduced hours for part-time faculty according to a list compiled by Investor’s Business Daily.

Advice for college students: next time you vote, don’t pay so much attention to what your liberal professors tell you about big, bad conservatives. Do your own research, make up your own mind. Think about what is best for you – ask yourself who is paying for all these happy-sounding promises that you hear from the left. We’ve borrowed 7 trillion dollars since Obama took office. You’re paying for it, so stop adding to it.