No Education ‘magic bullets,’ is a commentary piece written by John Young, long time opinion article contributor in Texas and a parent of two boys. Young’s commentary article viciously attacks the system of school reform, posing the question “What has more than a decade of peacetime/wartime school reforms done to help generate that magic? Nothing. Nothing at all.”
Young continues his argument against meddling in school reform by listing the ideas of lawmakers as “magic bullets.” The first magic bullet was raising test scores to make more money; the second was paying teachers more money to work at the worst schools, third was new management, fourth was to increase stricter dress codes and finally school vouchers.
Young argues that it is better to just let the teachers supply this “magic” that is needed to reform our school system. He jokingly wrote a few years back, “that we needed a war to distract policymakers from their chronic top-down meddling in public schools.”
In closing, I have to say that as a parent to a new Kindergartener I am anxious to see what lies ahead for her in the way of education. I have already been considering private tutoring for those TAKS tests that will be looming in the next few years! This problem of policymakers interfering constantly in the public school system is a crisis. We all need to realize that it is the teachers that make the difference or the “magic” as Young would say but it also stems from home. There needs to not only be less meddling but more community involvement and outreach programs to the parents of these children. It is obvious that as a parent, John Young was trying to reach parents nation-wide to inform them of this education injustice. This is a looming issue, one that policymakers and parents need to evaluate and ultimately fix collectively.
