Education Reform

Everybody knows that our current educational system is broken.  It is broken at a fundamental level.  But all the fixes I've ever seen just nibble around the edges.  School choice and vouchers are important, but not enough to cure the rot.  (Money doesn't teach children.  Good teachers do.  And the teachers' unions are the enemies of education.)  We need to end the State-run daycare system that substitutes parenting with systematized socialist indoctrination.  Naturally, I have a proposal.

Children should not begin school until they are 8 years old.  They need their childhood to run around outside, play, and learn their culture from their parents.  If they can't sit still and focus (and 5 year olds cannot), they can't learn.  Discipline must be enforced in the classroom, for the betterment of the individual and the health of the group.  Spankings (administered by the school Principal) are a healthy, natural way to teach children to obey.  (Corporal punishment has worked for thousands of years.  We've seen what happens when you don't punish children for misbehavior, and it isn't pretty.)

Primary school should last 5 years.  Children would finish this stage when they are 13 years old - when they are no longer really children.  Five years is enough time to teach everything important, especially since most children will already know how to read and do basic arithmetic before they start.  More importantly, beginning formal education at a later age will not teach children that they are too dumb to learn, just because they are late bloomers.  Math is only difficult to most kids because we expect too much of them too soon.  Kids aren't stupid, but their minds don't work the way adult minds do.

What subjects to teach?  Mathematics, of course.  We should be able to teach them up to introductory algebra and basic geometry before they're done.  English: reading, writing, spelling grammar, the classics of children's literature.  (I include Terry Pratchett's novels here.)  Social studies: how our society works, and why America is the greatest place in the world.  (Yes, this is a bit of propaganda.  Kids need this, just like they need heroes and role models.  "We are the children of children and we live as we are shown.")  History: real, positive stories of America and the world.  (History is not a list of names and dates.  It is the story of how we got here, and why things are not otherwise.)  Geography, to go with the history and social studies.  (Different people are the way they are for reasons.  Humans are the apes that swim and eat fish!  Every major city in the world is on a river or coast.)  Safe gun handling and marksmanship.  (Start with Nerf guns and work them up through soft air guns to BB/pellet guns.)  Gym, including dance, organized sports, and marching in formation.  (Dodge Ball is mandatory.  It teaches valuable life lessons.)  Music, especially singing.  (You have to have marching cadences, of course.)

After completion of primary school, every young person would then move on to their choice of apprenticeship.  This would consist of 3 to 5 years of a mix of formal education and practical work experience.  The formal education would have a few common elements, such as classes in home economics (cooking, cleaning, sewing, child care), civics (voting, paying taxes, how the government works), and economics (paying bills, balancing a checkbook, how banking and the stock market work).

What apprenticeships to offer?  All the building trades.  Entrepreneurship.  Computer skills.  Nursing.  Police work and firefighting.  Nail and hair grooming.  Child care.  Primary education.  Farming.  Ranching.  Truck driving.  Heavy equipment operation.  Surveying.  Mechanical drawing/CAD/architecture.  Whatever the local community thinks is worthwhile and can afford.  (Political apprenticeships, with the mayor or town council?)

College prep is just another form of apprenticeship.  However, it should be limited to the top 15% of students at a maximum.