Judge Walter Croskey 2nd district court of appeals in the decision to ban home schooling in California unless the home schooler has a teaching credential:
“A primary purpose of the educational system is to train school children in good citizenship, patriotism and loyalty to the state and the nation as a means of protecting the public welfare.”
Holy crap people! Did he really write that? Loyalty to the State??
You know, suddenly home schooling doesn't seem so creepy to me anymore.
Here is an essay on the ruling. Here is David Friedman on the quotation.
15 comments:
One of the many reasons I am happy to have been home schooled rather than put through the drone-making machine that is government schooling.
Angus,
Why do you think home schooling is creepy?
well it should be "did think" instead of "do think" but I guess because of the lack of social interaction and the fact that most American parents are dopes!!
well it should be "did think" instead of "do think" but I guess because of the lack of social interaction and the fact that most American parents are dopes!!
and most ed. school grads are...???
lol, dopes!!!
Yeah, got to agree with Angus here. Too much of homeschooling is driven by parents who don't want their kids exposed to things like actual science.
dd,
Give me a break . . . I'll put my kids' "socialization" up against your kids' any day.
And if by "actual science" you mean stuff like anthropomorphic global warming, you're darn right they don't need to "learn" that.
It's hard to argue about American parents being dopes, but somehow we're better off by bringing inculcating Left-wing ideas in their brains in group settings? Why should we risk allowing dopes/parents to raise 'em at all?
It may be worth reminding everyone how this all started:
Angus noted that he was converted to the idea that home-schooling was better than a "public" education in which loyalty to the state is a central feature.
Finally: Angus he not have babies. At least none his wife knows about. But, speaking for Angus' dog Pluto....Pluto is EXTREMELY well socialized, and plays well with the other dogs in the neighborhood. He shows little loyalty to the state, but is extremely loyal to Mr. and Ms. Angus.
Ned, not a bad idea to teach the kiddos to look up big words before tossin' em around.
Though the thought of global warming skulkin' around like a hayseed may be scarier than the real thing.
My own dog is extremely loyal to whoever happens to have fed him most recently...
For whatever reason, I was thinking recently about how I'd educate my own (as yet non-existent) kids, and figured I'd ask. Home schooling in the hands of people who don't know what they're doing is obviously a mistake; what about educated and knowledgeable, committed parents?
While people should be allowed to homeschool if they want, let's get back to economics...
For less than an average person's income, you can buy much better schooling than any one person can possibly provide.
It's an interesting problem. I wouldn't want my children indoctrinated by the state, but I'd like them to learn chemistry and biology and stuff I wouldn't be able to teach them at home. Maybe home school in the early impressionable years and then turn the lil buggers loose in jr. high or so??
A few thoughts... The judge's notion about the "primary" purpose of public education seems to have very little to do with how actual classroom teachers are instructed, how they structure their school day and their lesson plans, how their students are evaluated, and how their own performance is evaluated.
It is--bear with me now for an example that hits close to home--as if a "research one" university president said that "the primary purpose of my university is to provide the best possible education to every undergraduate who enrolls."
Yes, it's a nice THEORY about what the goals are, but none of the incentives are aligned to make those goals happen, and many (most?) of the folks who do the actual work know what the real incentives are (as opposed to the theoretical goals).
Also BR is quite right--"For less than an average person's income, you can buy much better schooling than any one person can possibly provide."
And to add the converse--the more qualified the one person is to provide top-notch schooling, the greater the income s/he is likely foregoing to do the home-school thing.
And I would be remiss not to quote Roger Lane on the original purposes of public schooling--to train the nascent workforce of an industrializing nation to:
"...sit still, take turns, hold your water, mind the teacher, and listen for the bell."
Imperial Rescript on Education:
"furthermore advance public good and promote common interests; always respect the Constitution and observe the laws; should emergency arise, offer yourselves courageously to the State; and thus guard and maintain the prosperity of Our Imperial Throne coeval with heaven and earth".
Very similar to Judge Walter Croskey's motivation.
After World War II, the American occupation authorities (Macarthur) forbid the formal reading of the Imperial Rescript in schools... for good reason. It is the Imperial Rescript (this rescript was memorized by children in school when attendance to public schools was made mandatory in Japan, 1907) set the ideology in a culture what fueled the kamikaze pilots.
Again, are we there yet? No, but abandoning principles of individual liberty is a way to get there, and quickly given your current administration (Left or Right).
To quote Thomas A. Bowden, "For now, at least, the battle lines are clearly drawn. Are parents mere drudges whose social duty is to feed and house their spawn between mandatory indoctrination sessions at government-approved schools? Or are they sovereign individuals whose right to guide their children's development the state may not infringe?"
And for those worried about abuse/neglect, it can be dealt with very easily:
Thomas A. Bowden of AIR again: "Education, like nutrition, should be recognized as the exclusive domain of a child's parents, within legal limits objectively defining child abuse and neglect. Parents who starve their children may properly be ordered to fulfill their parental obligations, on pain of losing legal custody. But the fact that some parents may serve better food than others does not permit government to seize control of nutrition, outlaw home-cooked meals, and order all children to report for daily force-feeding at government-licensed cafeterias."
Yea, some parents are idiots so holding a child to an educational standard, say, have them take a test to assure some minimum standard. But this is not the same than as having one arrested for home schooling ones' child irregardless of the quality of that education. THAT is a radical departure from individual rights secured to us by the Constitution and Bill of Rights.
I ask again, are the motives of compulsory state education about quality of education? Please look at Judge Walter Croskey statement again(quoting of a previous case in 1961 for support).
I see at least Governor Schwarzenegger is standing against the state ruling on the home schooling ban.
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