21st Century Education Solutions

No one has to be told the numerous problems of education in America in the 21st Century. Clearly, we have lost our way. America no longer is great as she once was. The American dream is nearly dead starved by whitewashing God from existence. The humanist experiment has horribly failed, and we -the people of America - are paying the dear price and will for many decades to come. Enough is enough! We are handing our children a world and way of life that is decadent, broken and bankrupt in every way. Each individual must make a decision - not collectively but one by one in our heart of hearts. Am I going to lie down to be rolled over and swept away by arrogant, lying professionals or am I going to use the common sense the good Lord gave me?

Education belongs under local jurisdiction. States need to learn how to budget wisely and return to the volunteer use of parents and grandparents to help keep the cost of schooling low, so the State can stop taking Federal funding and therefore, Federal control. Schools need to open their doors wide to parents instead of keeping the children in locked up guarded daily prison-like institutional buildings. Many say too quickly that they don't want to go back, but when we have left the basic guiding principles that made our Nation, we must return to our roots - reading, writing and math. If a student can do these three well, and are taught when they are developmentally ready instead of in herd-mentality, we will have a completely literate State - much like we did in our first century of existence. 

We need to once again define what education is. What is its purpose? Who should schools serve? Why do we have schools? And is it necessary to keep repeating year after year a system that is not only broken but worse - that is amoral! How can we expect to have citizens with hope, who believe that they can do what they are created to be, understand they have a unique purpose and appreciate their opportunities for a good future, if we insist on lying to them for twelve years of education? Darwinian thinking - survival of the fittest - is evil and cruel to anyone born less than the best - which frankly is all of us. 

Evolution of humans from animals from plants from atoms is retarded (there I finally said it - what so many have been thinking for too many years), and frankly any young child who are allowed to freely reason will come to this conclusion. A created world is obvious to anyone who truly looks, listens and wonders. Why is this point central to real learning? Because a person's drive to learn must be based on real-life, personal desires and needs. If you are an accident of nature, a mutation that came to be over millions and millions of transitions, what purpose do you have to learn? If there are no truths to be discovered, to read about or to be revealed, why study lies or maybes? No wonder self-esteem is so low, and crime is so high. What do children and teens have hope to live for when they grow up?

The parents need to be told clearly that the education of their own children is their responsibility. To help them the State will provide books, teachers, schools, classes, etc. but the parent must teach their children to apply themselves to attain their highest goal. The State is not to drag students through schooling year after year that have no desire to be taught. If education is not important in one's family, the children are dangerously positioned to not succeed academically. Parents need to be integrated into their children's learning, and be given the utmost responsibility for their child's grades. Any child, every child should be given the opportunity to come to school, but no child should be force. People must learn there are consequences to their choices and actions or lack of them. The State is not the parent, nanny, safety-net, childcare, activity coordinator, sport director, sugar daddy, or tyrant.

Schools need to always teach the phonetic basics of English and only English in schools. If parents want to teach any other languages they have the freedom to do it, but to ensure all children's opportunities are widely available, every child must speak our Nation's single native language - English! With phonetic reading, comes handwriting, spelling, vocabulary, dictation, and narration. In the youngest grades reading flows into writing naturally and it should be taught as a child instinctively learns to speak, walk or sing. In the older grades as highly abstract learning capabilities develop, student learn to question, research, and develop informed, factual essays. They can also explore the creativity of poetry, lyrics, and fiction story writing.

Elementary years need to be filled with joyful learning - not the cutesy latest gimmicks of education supply companies - but true stories of heroes found in history and science from books created not to cram in facts to be spit out on testing but to inspire and grow young minds. Outdoor adventures, walking through nature, drawing what one sees - none of this take a specialist to teach. Learning environments are not sterile, but filled with practical activities that are real life (not made up for school). Real books need to be read in lieu of textbooks - including the Bible. It doesn't take a child very long to realize if curriculum is a program or natural discovery. Children, made by God to want to learn, but their minds have to be opened by not leaving them spiritually bankrupt. They must be told they are made in God's image - not an ape-man!

Parents know their children the best, and frankly they love them the most. I understand every child doesn't have a caring parent. I did not myself, but it did not deter me from wanting to learn. I had hope to be someone special in whatever I did in life, and this came from a basic understanding that there are absolute truths foundational to life.  We all have a free will. No one can be forced to learn anything, because if one tries to force education on those who reject it, government is wasting precious money, resources and time. So, mandatory education must be removed. It is a privilege to go to school, and every State/city/county must offer the opportunity for education, but it should never be compulsory. The State must return to the fact that most parents want their children to have things better than they had in life, and the State can work with the few families (in proportion) that are inept or incapable due to abuse, drugs, or illness.

Standardized testing is a total waste of money, time and energy. A teacher and parent instinctively knows what a child can or can not do. Testing, like schooling, and textbooks having become enormous million dollar businesses. There are so many ways we can reform schools, but it will not happen on a Federal level where big lobby money controls votes. Education decisions need to take place on local levels. The mother that works at the bank, the guy that is a greeter on Sunday, and the dad that works at a car plant should sit down together making real life choices for their own children or relatives. It is at this local level that those who make selections will be held closely accountable because they will see each other throughout the year interacting in community life.

It is easy to find naysayers, negative people, "oh, that will never work," "it's impossible," and the list of those who "can't" will expand and shout loudly. But it is with faith - the size of a mustard seed - that one needs to believe it is possible to teach our children. It is a reasonable expectation to have every child learn to read, write and do math. And then they can move onto becoming what they deem they are naturally created to be, not what job someone wants them to be prepared to fill. It would be cruel for a person to be given a purpose in life, but not the innate ability to achieve it. God is not cruel. 

People have to regain hope based on truth, not shifting man-made philosophies that drift with time toward absurdity. There is lasting truth, lasting hope, and lasting solutions to our immense problems we face today, but we have to be honest with ourselves and God. It is time to soul search. We need to turn off the TV, close the web browser and stop the radio. And in the quiet stillness of time, where we can listen to the cry of our hearts we will know what is wrong, and thereby begin to ask the right questions and seek out the help we need. We have to stop playing other people's "games of life" that we know are not truth. We must be steadfast! We must believe God not only exists but that He is who He says He is in the Bible, and that He is the one source of freedoms in life.