Education Reform

Abstract: Education reform requires an integrated approach at the national, state, and local levels. A national clearing house can help develop campaigns, themes/messages, and educational packages and advertisements. Yet all this is for naught if we do not change the culture in our cities and localities to value education, knowledge, civil engagement, critical thinking, and excellence.

Effective education reform requires the integration of three coordinated efforts at the federal, state, and local levels. While each effort has different targets and methods of engagement, they need common messaging and themes. This effort requires a coordinated campaign plan that ties all the efforts together.

This article provides an overview of the key elements to a campaign plan. Follow on efforts need to flesh out the details for the various efforts and the cleaning house. The toughest and most important challenge is to shift various cultures to value education, knowledge, civil engagement, critical thinking, and excellence. Critical Race Theory (CRT) has no critical thinking component. The meme uses the word “critical” to convince people it does, but it is neither critical thinking, nor a theory.

Without a culture shift, all other reform is moot.

The table below provides an engagement matrix.

The campaign will require funding and expertise from foundations and think tanks. These need to be coordinated by a national level clearing house.

The clearing house should provide assessments, draft themes and messages and provide a communications and collaboration site for all working on the campaign. It will also set up specific Communities of Practice/Interest (COPI) to explore specific issues and develop educational materials and broad advertising messages. State and local COPI should tailor these messages to their local markets.

The clearing house is a center of information and coordination. It can draft policy, but it is not a central policy setting body, since it is a coalition of the willing. It will require a strong leader with a national reputation to run.

This is not a quick fix approach, though local COPIs can develop quick fixes to implement on the local level. The clearing house should help these state and local COPIs develop and implement focused pilot programs and then distribute the results.

The one aspect missing for most discussions of education reform is culture. States and local school boards and schools can design all kinds of programs, but if the cultures do not change, they will have limited effect.

School cultures need to adapt to educate vice indoctrinate and set and maintain standards that educate. They need to value critical thinking vice propagating specific memes. Ideally, they will implement capstone programs that require integrating skills from civics, math, literature, history, and science together to assess issues and develop solutions.

The campaign plan also needs to address home schooling. How do we effectively integrate home schooling into an overall education system? What standards are required for home schooling and how should they be monitored and enforced? How do we ensure our home schooled children can compete for the top tier universities and have a holistic experience that prepares them for it?

City and local cultures need to change to value education, civil engagement, knowledge, and excellence. If parents do not teach these values in the home, there is very little schools can accomplish. THIS IS THE NUMBER ONE OBSTACLE in education today. And yet the dialog barely mentions it.