public v. private
Quality Education as a Constitutional Right
A Joint Policy Statement of The Algebra Project, Young People’s Project, and Quality Public Education as a Constitutional Right as presented by Ryan Mason and Megan Sherman of the Baltimore Algebra Project:
Just as voting rights were required for full citizenship in the United States forty years ago, economic access is required for full citizenship today. In the 21st century, education is the essential pathway for young people to that economic access. Unless young people gain economic access through high quality education and meaningful employment, they and their children will be confined to the margins of life—often the criminal justice system—and caught in a relentless cycle of disenfranchisement.
A recent study by the Bureau of Labor Statistics reports that the top seven jobs of the future, in terms of income and growth, are computer/technology related jobs. National programs such as The Algebra Project have been at the forefront of improving math literacy as a prerequisite to this expanding part of our economy. The Young People’s Project employs high school students to tutor junior high school students in math and to lead community math games through the groundbreaking Flagway program. However, even innovative programs such as these are not nearly enough to secure opportunity for all children.
Most work to improve public education is school, district, or state based. 45 states are currently engaged in lawsuits that confront educational inequity. For decades, youth advocates and research institutions around the nation have worked to challenge the over-emphasis on testing as the dividing line between school success and failure. Educators have fought to diversify curriculum and improve teacher preparation and training. Youth-led organizations have struggled to improve the food our children eat at school, the buildings our children learn in, and to increase opportunities for arts education. A national movement that aspires to guarantee high quality public schools for all children could offer media coverage, technical assistance, resources, and information to bolster this critical local work. This is part of the mission of Quality Public Education as a Constitutional Right.
Every community in America needs free, high quality public school education to thrive. A national movement is essential to connecting people from different communities so they can leverage their power into a force that could counterbalance the current trends toward the privatization of education in America.
The movement to replace public school education with private schools and quasi-public charter schools has money, momentum, and political power. The current national conversation on education is centered in the dominant narrative of ‘the failing public schools’ and the need for ‘school choice.’ According to a recent Washington Post article, George Bush, as part of his plan to reauthorize the No Child Left Behind Act, has proposed that for each public school student that transfers to a private school, the federal government would divert up to $7500 of public school funds to private school scholarships. A recent report called Strategic Grantmaking: Foundations and the School Privatization Movement, states that “Privatizing public education transforms the educational environment from one that builds a sense of collective purpose and nurtures democratic ideals to one that emphasizes individual choice and makes education a commodity to be produced and consumed in the marketplace.”
We believe that education is too important a public function to be run by corporate and private interests with any bottom line other than educational excellence for all students. We believe that a free, high quality public education is a fundamental civil and human right that should be protected by the United States Constitution. We believe that the foundation and core of a democracy is an informed and engaged populace, and that the development of an informed and engaged populace requires a free, high quality public school education for every child.
We are committed to community driven education action and reform:
We support local communities in discussing educational issues in ongoing community forums;
We partner with local youth, education advocacy, and service organizations to promote student, parent, teacher and other community member’s active participation in improving local public education;
We promote civic engagement in historically disenfranchised communities;
We build the skills of young people and other stakeholders in developing action research to support local, regional, and national organizing and advocacy;
We promote a national conversation about the state of public education in America as a strategy for building demand for a constitutional amendment guaranteeing high quality public education for all of America’s children.
Our question to President Elect Obama is:
How will you protect and improve access to high quality, public education and do you support a constitutional amendment guaranteeing high quality, public education for all of America’s children?
This post was submitted by Omo Moses.
Public schools
You owe it to your children and all the children of America to put your fabulous daughters in a public school. My daughters are close in age to yours and are in urban public schools (San Francisco). They are the better for it and so is their school. Just as you kept your home in your community and didn’t flee to a remote enclave you should do the same with your school choice. Your daughters are bright and well adjusted and their presence in a public school would raise all ships with the tide, not only locally but nationally. That’s huge. And they would be so proud of that as a legacy.
This post was submitted by leslie straw.
If public schools are not good enough for the Obama kids…
President elect Obama has voted with his feet and is sending his girls to a private school. This should be viewed as an opportunity for public education leadership in DC and all over our country to work with Obama and the new administration to fast track public education reform. How many of our powerful politicians and education policy wonks send their kids to public school? I believe that public school reform must include a community conversation about what folks want from their public schools and that school and district leadership must be enabled to move FAST. Public education is not really public if it is only for some.
As a public school parent and activist I strongly believe that public education should be framed as our children in our schools - not those children in those schools!
We must demand excellence in all our public schools - replicate the many successes that are happening all over the country, shout out about what’s working in public education and educate our leaders on why public education is vital to the future of democracy. Hopfully, the next time a school choice has to be made by the Obama family the public system will be considered as a viable option.
This post was submitted by Sandra Halladey.
