Dept of Education caused problems

A gallon of Milk is $3.50 or so today. Guess we should blame that one on the USDA, eh?

Maybe the FDA

Cycloptichorn

He's a liberal when it comes to spending on everything. Did you forget about the Medicare bill?

Cycloptichorn

Gee, we could teach every child in the US for $600 if we didn't have to pay for teachers, schools, transportation, lunch programs, janitorial services etc.

Home schooling can cost $600 because the teacher is FREE. The place the kids are taught is FREE. (at least not included in the cost of teaching) The transportation to outside programs is FREE. There is no cost associated to feed the kids or clean up after them associated with the schooling. I bet that $600 doesn't include the costs by the state to administer and test those kids.

Yet no one except you would imply that the same thing could be done in real schools. Are you volunteering to teach for FREE?

Just take a home schooling situtation with 3 kids, give the teacher the average salary of a local teacher. Lets say $36,000. (the average teacher salary in the 2003-04 school year was $46,597) Suddenly the cost of teaching those kids is $12,000 each without books or costs of the space. We haven't even begun to add in the cost of 10% of the home for a school space or food preperation costs during the day.

As I said before, perhaps the formation of the Department of Education was as much an effect, or symptom of the problem, as it was a cause, but I think once the push of more involvement gained cabinet status, it does indeed institutionalize the license to grow and add more bureaucracy at the federal level. After all, its called justifying one's job. That is exactly what has happened. After all, who can be against education, and kissing babies?

All of this points out one thing, the Federal Dept of Education was unnecessary. We could save billions and give the schools back to the people in their local communities to run, manage, and pay for. It worked great before.

parados wrote:

Gee, we could teach every child in the US for $600 if we didn't have to pay for teachers, schools, transportation, lunch programs, janitorial services etc.

Home schooling can cost $600 because the teacher is FREE. The place the kids are taught is FREE. (at least not included in the cost of teaching) The transportation to outside programs is FREE. There is no cost associated to feed the kids or clean up after them associated with the schooling. I bet that $600 doesn't include the costs by the state to administer and test those kids.

Yet no one except you would imply that the same thing could be done in real schools. Are you volunteering to teach for FREE?

Just take a home schooling situtation with 3 kids, give the teacher the average salary of a local teacher. Lets say $36,000. (the average teacher salary in the 2003-04 school year was $46,597) Suddenly the cost of teaching those kids is $12,000 each without books or costs of the space. We haven't even begun to add in the cost of 10% of the home for a school space or food preperation costs during the day.

You are proving my argument beautifully. Something can usually be done better and more efficiently and cheaper if they can do it themselves. Yes, home schooling is at the absolute one end of the sliding scale spectrum, but federal involvement is at the other end, and in between, there is a sliding scale of increased efficiency as people themselves do something for themselves at the lowest governmental level.

Where in the world did we get this nanny state of helplessness mentality that is so prevalent anyway?

So does that mean that this statement is demagoguery then?

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All of this points out one thing, the Federal Dept of Education was unnecessary. We could save billions and give the schools back to the people in their local communities to run, manage, and pay for. It worked great before.

First you argued that it worked well before. Then you argued that it didn't work well because Fed mandates in 1965. The statement can't be true if 1965 was problematic for schools because of the Federal government.

Yep.. Home open heart surgery... It must work better than a hospital. Home road building. Home drivers license examinations. There is a scale of decreased efficiency as people do things for themselves too okie.

Home schooling doesn't work better for everyone. Home open heart surgery might also work fine for a few. But I wouldn't recommend it to the general public anymore than I would recommend that everyone home school their children.

Federal involvement is LESS in schools today than it was in 1965. Your argument is defeated by facts here okie. The facts you admit to but then demagogue the other side.

parados wrote:

So does that mean that this statement is demagoguery then?

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All of this points out one thing, the Federal Dept of Education was unnecessary. We could save billions and give the schools back to the people in their local communities to run, manage, and pay for. It worked great before.

First you argued that it worked well before. Then you argued that it didn't work well because Fed mandates in 1965. The statement can't be true if 1965 was problematic for schools because of the Federal government.

Please do not split hairs and take statements out of context.

It worked well compared to the situation now, but the process has been incremental. The feds were involved before 1979. I never said they weren't.

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It was beginning to cause problems in the 60's, but the system was still far better and worked better than what we have now.

So the system was working better when the Federal government provided MORE of the funding. That fact certainly seems to make your claim false.

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A key event was in fact the elevation of the department to cabinet level status, which signaled the expectation of further authority and influence in the school systems by the federal government. What is so difficult to understand about this?

And your evidence to support this opinion can be found where?

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Yep.. Home open heart surgery... It must work better than a hospital. Home road building. Home drivers license examinations. There is a scale of decreased efficiency as people do things for themselves too okie.

Home schooling doesn't work better for everyone. Home open heart surgery might also work fine for a few. But I wouldn't recommend it to the general public anymore than I would recommend that everyone home school their children.

Federal involvement is LESS in schools today than it was in 1965. Your argument is defeated by facts here okie. The facts you admit to but then demagogue the other side.

Learning is not open heart surgery, Parados. You keep mis-interpreting what I've said. I never claimed home schooling works for everybody. What I have said is that schooling is best done and managed by the people or government closest to the people and children. That is why we have local school boards, local schools, and local teachers and administrators. They are the ones doing the work. Why hire all of these people and then send gobs of money to Washington to send back a portion of it along with orders as to how we should run our own schools, our own teachers, and our own administrators. It is bureaucratic insanity.

Where in the world did we get this nanny state of helplessness mentality that is so prevalent anyway?

Federal involvement is less than 1965? I doubt it very seriously. Provide your hard evidence again from 1965 and 2006.

All of this points out one thing, the Federal Dept of Education was unnecessary. We could save billions and give the schools back to the people in their local communities to run, manage, and pay for. It worked great before. We had the most educated and technologically advanced country in the world before the Federal Department of Education was formed, and I don't think its been beneficial, but has simply given us a bottomless pit in which to throw more money away.

Okay, do you think the federal government is more involved now or less involved in education than they were before 1979, yes or no?

Do you think the Department of Education is a key mechanism for the federal government to be more involved in policy or less involved in policy now than they would have been otherwise if the function was kept buried in another agency? Yes or no?

Do you think more federal mandates and policy vs. local is better or worse, yes or no?

Do you think unfunded federal mandates exist in the educational system, yes or no?

okie wrote:

Okay, do you think the federal government is more involved now or less involved in education than they were before 1979, yes or no?

Do you have evidence one way or the other? I haven't seen any.

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Do you think the Department of Education is a key mechanism for the federal government to be more involved in policy or less involved in policy now than they would have been otherwise if the function was kept buried in another agency? Yes or no?

What do you think the Dept of Health, Education and Welfare did? They certainly dealt with Education.

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Do you think more federal mandates and policy vs. local is better or worse, yes or no?

It can depend on a lot of things. Sometimes yes, sometimes no. Do you think local communities should be allowed to teach without any standards? I don't. You left out a large part of the equation, STATES.

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Do you think unfunded federal mandates exist in the educational system, yes or no?

It doesn't change your demagoging on the issue if there are or aren't. You have argued they existed before and after 1979.

Deal with your statement. Was Federal funding MORE of the funding for schools prior to 1979 than after? The facts show it was. Prior to Federal funding schools were horrible unless you think the 75% attendance rate and 15% graduation rate in 1920 are an example of great schooling.

The Feds provided 7.9% of school funding in 1965. They provided 8.4% in 1970. They provided 8.9% in 1975. They provided 9.2% of funding in 1980 (the last budget BEFORE the Dept of Education came into being.) They provided only 6.2% of schools funding in 1985 and 6.1% in 1989. The last year in table 21 http://www.ecs.org/html/offsite.asp?document=http%3A%2F%2Fnces%2Eed%2Egov%2Fpubs93%2F93442%2Epdf
So your claim of "virtually everything" would mean that 91% is virtually everything. The Feds provided LESS funding as % of the total after 1979.
http://nces.ed.gov/programs/digest/d03/tables/dt156.asp
This table shows that in 2000, the Feds provided only 7.3% of the funds for local schools.
FACT - from 1965 to 1980 the Federal govt provided a larger percentage of school budgets than they did from 1981 to 2000. The smallest amount of Federal funding from 1965-1980 was 7.9%. All years but 2 were over 8.5% From 1981-2001 the highest amount of Federal funding was 7.4%. Most were under 7%.

To properly apply your argument, Parados, compare federal involvement prior to 1965 with now. My argument is that the Department of Education not only causes more involvement, but was an outgrowth of increased involvement in the 10 or 15 years leading up to 1979

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Do you think more federal mandates and policy vs. local is better or worse, yes or no?

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It can depend on a lot of things. Sometimes yes, sometimes no. Do you think local communities should be allowed to teach without any standards? I don't. You left out a large part of the equation, STATES.

When you ask if local communities should be allowed to teach without federal standards, you are assuming the federal government is smarter and more efficient and have better standards than local communities and states. I make no such assumption. Perhaps you need to provide evidence, Parados, to support your assumption. Was the Kremlin more efficient in managing and producing wheat in the Soviet Union than individual farmers in the United States?

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Do you think unfunded federal mandates exist in the educational system, yes or no?

It doesn't change your demagoging on the issue if there are or aren't. You have argued they existed before and after 1979.

Deal with your statement. Was Federal funding MORE of the funding for schools prior to 1979 than after? The facts show it was. Prior to Federal funding schools were horrible unless you think the 75% attendance rate and 15% graduation rate in 1920 are an example of great schooling.

To properly apply your argument, Parados, compare federal involvement prior to 1965 with now.

My argument is that the Department of Education not only causes more involvement, but was an outgrowth of increased involvement in the 10 or 15 years leading up to 1979. Further, my argument is that the increased federal involvement that stimulated the elevation of the department was detrimental, and the increased involvement because of department formation and increased emphasis is also detrimental. I predict more involvement and increased meddling unless more conservative leaders are successful in wresting the full control of education back to local and state management.

Furthermore, you assume federal mandates are not costing state and local governments in running their schools. We've already plowed this ground, and you can pick and choose your source to support your argument pro and con, but Parados, why are states and districts suing over this very thing if the problem did not exist?
http://www.pbs.org/newshour/bb/education/july-dec05/nclb2_8-24.html

Also, don't compare apples and oranges. The technical advancements of society and the requirements for education were far different in 1920. I would take 1950 as a better measure,

but regardless of whether you take 1920 or 1950, or 1960, our educational system had built the most technically advanced, industrialized society in the world at those times, virtually without any federal meddling in education.

I would also point out that some 1920 grade school graduates could read and write better than many of today's high school graduates. My own mother is an example of that, very proficient in writing, math, reading, and very educated in other things as well, all without a high school education.

My argument is that the Department of Education not only causes more involvement, but was an outgrowth of increased involvement in the 10 or 15 years leading up to 1979. Further, my argument is that the increased federal involvement that stimulated the elevation of the department was detrimental, and the increased involvement because of department formation and increased emphasis is also detrimental.

All of this points out one thing, the Federal Dept of Education was unnecessary. We could save billions and give the schools back to the people in their local communities to run, manage, and pay for. It worked great before.

OK.. From 1953-1965 the Federal govt contributed on average about 4.5% of school budgets. From 1965-1980 it contributed about 9%. From 1980- 1990 it contributed about 6.5% "Obvious" just doesn't cut it when compared to the facts.

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OK.. From 1953-1965 the Federal govt contributed on average about 4.5% of school budgets. From 1965-1980 it contributed about 9%. From 1980- 1990 it contributed about 6.5% "Obvious" just doesn't cut it when compared to the facts.

So what was the federal contribution in 1950? Or 1953 if you wish to use that as a baseline? Both in percentage of the total cost of education per student and in actual dollars per student?

P.S. 1965 to 79 was a transitional period of more federal involvement leading up to the creation of the Department of Education. This should be "obvious."

All of this points out one thing, the Federal Dept of Education was unnecessary. We could save billions and give the schools back to the people in their local communities to run, manage, and pay for. It worked great before.