Saturday, September 09, 2006

Let's kill the schools to save them...

www.courierpostonline.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20060813...

The answer to failing public schools is not to take away all their funding. I'm not quite sure why the government should be subsidizing the failing Catholic school system anyway. This whole thing seems to boil down to the diocese begging the government to bail them out after years of so-so education and outrageous tuition drove many of their students to public schools.

This is going to create a situation where parents who want their children to be indoctrinated in a religious philosophy will be able to send their children to private school while those who don't want their kids coming home and saying all gays are going to hell will have to leave their children in horrible hell holes stripped of all funding and quickly falling apart. It's going to be the most obvious public sanction of a particular religious philosophy. How many Jewish or Muslim all-day schools are there in this country? A few Jewish ones in New York maybe, perhaps a few Muslim ones in Detroit. To the best of my knowledge most religious Jewish children attend after school Hebrew schools akin to CCD in Catholic Schools. I don't recall even seeing any all-day Jewish schools in this area and there is quite a large Jewish community around here.

This is going to create a situation where the Christian faith will be advanced to the detrement of the rest of the community. It's going to throw the entire idea of public education on its head (public schools were created to be a religion-neutral place where all children regardless of race, income or religion could enjoy a good education free of prejudice or hatred). With vouchers, those kids who are not religious will be forced to attend public schools with ever dwindling student populations (all those who are religious will leave) and will suffer because of the lack of funding. The very idea of public schools will become extinct. We'll end up with a situation where the rich and religious will be able to get the best education money can buy and the poor and secular will be left behind.

And how about this quote:
"I think it's good for the kids in Camden, not so good for the people who worked very hard to buy a house in a good area with a good school system," Cinnaminson's Grace Porrini said.

Yes, how dare those people who don't make enough to live in Cinnaminson expect to have a decent education. It's enough to almost make someone support the vouchers just to shut her stupid, Republican elitist mouth up.