Once in a while, a story arises that seems like it came from Mars. Here’s one such: Mayors back parents seeking control of schools! Yes, that’s right: Martian Mayors call for parents to take control of their schools! No, it was the United States Conference of Mayors. Reuters reports that they stood up to the teachers’ unions and called for radical reform of education:
Hundreds of mayors from across the United States this weekend called for new laws letting parents seize control of low-performing public schools and fire the teachers, oust the administrators or turn the schools over to private management.
The U.S. Conference of Mayors, meeting in Orlando, Florida, on Saturday unanimously endorsed “parent trigger” laws aimed at bypassing elected school boards and giving parents at the worst public schools the opportunity to band together and force immediate change.
There’s more:
In Los Angeles, Mayor Villaraigosa blasted union leaders as an “unwavering roadblock to reform.” In Philadelphia, Mayor Nutter has backed a plan to close dozens of neighborhood schools and convert many others to charters, which are publicly funded but privately run – and typically non-union.
And in Chicago, Mayor Rahm Emanuel successfully pushed to cancel a scheduled 4 percent raise for teachers and extend the school day by more than an hour. Teachers are so angry, nearly 90 percent of union members just voted to authorize a strike if ongoing contract negotiations falter.
Wow? Want more: (By the way, a parental trigger law was passed in none other than Bobby Jindal’s Louisiana!) Try this:
“We are on the path to change,” said Gloria Romero, a former California state senator who now runs that state’s branch of Democrats for Education Reform, an advocacy group that funnels donations to politicians willing to buck the teachers unions. She called the mayoral vote a “landmark” that would inspire poor and minority parents to demand change in their schools. “This is a civil rights fight,” she said.
I am back from having to lay down from the effects of reading this article. It’s not often I agree with a Democrat from California but she’s right: it is a civil rights fight. We need to go back to constitutional limits in education. Abolish the Federal Department of Education. Have more charter schools. Come up with an universal voucher system. Encourage homeschooling. Take power back from the educrats and liberals who have just about destroyed the public schools. Governor Romney, are you listening?
Thanks to Judy Morris at the Humble Libertarian!
Article written by: Elwood "Sandy" Sanders
About Elwood Sanders
Elwood "Sandy" Sanders is a Hanover attorney who is an Appellate Procedure Consultant for Lantagne Legal Printing and has written ten scholarly legal articles. Sandy was also Virginia's first Appellate Defender and also helped bring curling in VA! (None of these titles imply any endorsement of Sanders’ views)
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