Chapter 15

The final chapter of the book tries to bring everything together by covering up 40 years of educational policy. When thinking back on all the things that have been done for education in the last 40 years there are so many things that have occurred using one chapter really does not do it justice. Nixon felt that the American educational system was being challenged and he wanted to see the American students answer with excellence, for a time which was under the scares of Communism. When Nixon was Vice-President he laid out his plans for education, which included the role of the government and many other things which were and still are vital to education. I think going forward another interesting issue was the prayer in schools, there are groups of people nationwide who believe that the Pledge of Allegiance is a form of prayer in the schools because the word “God” appears in it. It should be as simple as you can either say it or you don’t, the separation of church and state prevents the government from imposing a religion on the citizens and if the person feels like saying “under God” is religious in any way shape or form then they shouldn’t have to say it.

This is a news story about students who were suspended because they did not stand up for the pledge, there are also people who don’t look at the flag during the pledge and get the same treatment.

http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,354864,00.html

When it comes to “No Child Left Behind” it is another big mess. I think that when passing the legislation there were good intentions, the idea definitely works out much better on paper then it did in practice. The idea of a blue ribbon school was confusing to me although I guess it was a good thing that I happened to attend a school that was awarded a blue ribbon. The only thing that “No Child Left Behind” really accomplished was having teachers teach to the test because they knew that it was important for the school have students performing well on their state exams. Teachers felt an extra amount of pressure to perform, especially if pay raises were also coming their way as a result of their students performing well. “No Child Left Behind” gave educators in the United States more reason to be corrupt having teachers help students maybe by filling in an answer or two that was wrong. Teachers should just genuinely want the best for their students whether or not a pay increase is involved.

I think this is an interesting read when it comes to No Child Left Behind. Freakonomics makes a point about standardized testing in their book for those who have not read it.

http://www.freakonomics.com/2007/12/20/what-should-be-done-about-standardized-tests-a-freakonomics-quorum

When it comes to solving the problems with education I don’t think we are necessarily closer or farther away from it. I don’t even think we have really gotten done to the real issues because there will always be people who are better off than others, there are just somethings you can’t control. I don’t think leveling the playing field for all our students is something that can be done overnight, that is assuming it can actually be done. The United States government needs to understand that there are other nations in the world that are catching up to us, others have caught up in the way of education and some as we saw in the first day of class have passed us. What are we going to do about it now? What can be said about the future of America if out competition is out performing us in education? How do we fix this? Can we fix this? The government tends to always have to lean one way or another, when it comes to education it is really that difficult to come to a bi-partisan agreement? These politicians probably don’t have kids getting their education in the South Bronx, one of the poorest counties in the United States how is it possible that a place like New York, the capital of the world is home to some of the worst performing schools in the country. It just doesn’t make much sense to me.