Governments, and the elites, at every level in this nation have forgotten that they derive their power from the governed. School boards have forgotten that tax payers pay their salaries and they work for the people not the other way around. When schools say they want parental involvement it has come to mean they want parents to surrender their natural rights to direct the education of their children and offer their drone like compliance to any decisions the elitist experts deem worthy and appropriate. When will parents stand up in mass and remind them what it means to be a parent and to exercise that God given right to direct the education and upbringing of their children.
Today I interviewed with the local CBS station in Baltimore as just one more parent like Robert who is seriously concerned about the stealth implementation of Common Core. A half hour before this story aired the Baltimore police department dropped the charges against Mr. Small. In my work advocating for parents and families I have seen this kind of scenario play out over and over. The law is too often used to intimidate parents into being quiet and compliant to the agendas of public education systems. In my experience it is only when they (state officials) get caught that they drop the charges and run. Parents, don't be fooled. This abuse is common place not a once in a while thing. It only gets attention when someone faces the intimidation that keeps everyone else quiet and speaks up, and only when there act of bravery happens to find it's way to YouTube.
Parents have a right to be involved in decision making at the local school level. Common Core threatens local governance of schools and threatens to be the final step in pushing parents out. We could learn something from this father, do we have his courage to stop following like cattle. He challenged parents to do their own research of Common Core and to ask the tough questions. He asks us not to allow ourselves be silenced or our constitutional rights to be trampled on. We better heed his warning and meet his challenge or there will come a day when we will lose all our innate rights as parents to direct the education and upbringing of our children.
When I posted similar comments about the CBS story on the Stop Common Core in Maryland page a teacher commented in a way that I believe sheds profound light on just why a Superintendent feels himself justified in having a father removed and arrested: "While I agree with parents having a right to have a say in education... it has to be an educated right... I can't listen to all parents.... sometimes my soon to be TWO Master's Degree's outweigh your thoughts as a parent." -- AN EDUCATED RIGHT -- Are those rights you only get if you're educated? And who "educates" you and "tests" you to determine your fitness for that right? The government? Sometimes I am just appalled at how some people think.
Even ignorant parents have a constitutional right to direct the education of their children. This is well established. I think it is a dangerous line of thinking to doubt whether one parent is less worthy of this right than another. And what of the one less worthy? Should they then be denied this right which is not only a natural God given right but a Constitutional right? I understand that public school teachers often struggle with absent parents, belligerently involved parents, and yes, even ignorant parents, but I am dismayed how often the existence of so called "bad parents" are used as an excuse to limit or even eliminate the rights of ALL parents. We must not be tempted by this excuse, to say that because some people abuse their human rights, their God given responsibilities, we should divest everyone from them.
One thing is certain, if parents feel belittled and disrespected by the teachers who serve their children, if parents are expelled from the decision making process within their school districts, we will NEVER solve the problems we face. No matter how humble, or ignorant, or how poor a parent may be, the attitude that dismisses parents because they don't hold masters degrees -- or even collage degrees -- the attitude that has a parent expelled and arrested for demanding answers of those he has elected to run his children's school (those he pays to run it), is an elitist attitude that doesn't respect anything but accredited learning. It dismisses the wisdom of life long learning, of experience, of intuition, creativity, the intrinsic wisdom that is born of love for your child. This elitism throughout history has proven dangerous to freedom, it has proven to seed tyranny in society, a tyranny of the type C.S. Lewis wrote of when he said:
"Of all tyrannies, a tyranny sincerely exercised for the good of its victims may be the most oppressive. It would be better to live under robber barons than under omnipotent moral busybodies [I would substitute accredited elitist experts]. The robber baron's cruelty may sometimes sleep, his cupidity may at some point be satiated; but those who torment us for our own good will torment us without end for they do so with the approval of their own conscience.”
Today I interviewed with the local CBS station in Baltimore as just one more parent like Robert who is seriously concerned about the stealth implementation of Common Core. A half hour before this story aired the Baltimore police department dropped the charges against Mr. Small. In my work advocating for parents and families I have seen this kind of scenario play out over and over. The law is too often used to intimidate parents into being quiet and compliant to the agendas of public education systems. In my experience it is only when they (state officials) get caught that they drop the charges and run. Parents, don't be fooled. This abuse is common place not a once in a while thing. It only gets attention when someone faces the intimidation that keeps everyone else quiet and speaks up, and only when there act of bravery happens to find it's way to YouTube.
Parents have a right to be involved in decision making at the local school level. Common Core threatens local governance of schools and threatens to be the final step in pushing parents out. We could learn something from this father, do we have his courage to stop following like cattle. He challenged parents to do their own research of Common Core and to ask the tough questions. He asks us not to allow ourselves be silenced or our constitutional rights to be trampled on. We better heed his warning and meet his challenge or there will come a day when we will lose all our innate rights as parents to direct the education and upbringing of our children.
Even ignorant parents have a constitutional right to direct the education of their children. This is well established. I think it is a dangerous line of thinking to doubt whether one parent is less worthy of this right than another. And what of the one less worthy? Should they then be denied this right which is not only a natural God given right but a Constitutional right? I understand that public school teachers often struggle with absent parents, belligerently involved parents, and yes, even ignorant parents, but I am dismayed how often the existence of so called "bad parents" are used as an excuse to limit or even eliminate the rights of ALL parents. We must not be tempted by this excuse, to say that because some people abuse their human rights, their God given responsibilities, we should divest everyone from them.
One thing is certain, if parents feel belittled and disrespected by the teachers who serve their children, if parents are expelled from the decision making process within their school districts, we will NEVER solve the problems we face. No matter how humble, or ignorant, or how poor a parent may be, the attitude that dismisses parents because they don't hold masters degrees -- or even collage degrees -- the attitude that has a parent expelled and arrested for demanding answers of those he has elected to run his children's school (those he pays to run it), is an elitist attitude that doesn't respect anything but accredited learning. It dismisses the wisdom of life long learning, of experience, of intuition, creativity, the intrinsic wisdom that is born of love for your child. This elitism throughout history has proven dangerous to freedom, it has proven to seed tyranny in society, a tyranny of the type C.S. Lewis wrote of when he said:
"Of all tyrannies, a tyranny sincerely exercised for the good of its victims may be the most oppressive. It would be better to live under robber barons than under omnipotent moral busybodies [I would substitute accredited elitist experts]. The robber baron's cruelty may sometimes sleep, his cupidity may at some point be satiated; but those who torment us for our own good will torment us without end for they do so with the approval of their own conscience.”
This "torment without end" is exhausting, and more so because those of us who stand against it are so few. Those of us in the ring, those of us who have taken up the fight in our little corners of the world can't hold on forever unsupported. We are getting tired and we need reinforcements. It will take a volunteer army of parents, in numbers much larger than the elitist oppressors. So, If you have casually followed but haven't put your hat in the ring, now is the time.
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