The focus is not who is at fault but the focus is on the one who doesn’t have. Currently the students are the population that is being deprived of the quality education that is spoken of. What are you going to change to ensure a different outcome?

Great post. Your idea sounds very interesting. If you wrote a book on the subject, I’m sure I would read it!

Teach2Educate,

I never said I taught in a wealthy school, just a “good school.” It’s smack dab in the middle of middle class, to be quite honest. And you don’t have to worry about a teacher like me harming your kids. You’ve probably done enough damage to them already.

Oh, and I’ll try to use smaller words from now on. Sorry.

Still, you make one important point which I entirely agree on – deficit spending is not sustainable for very long and when you’re running deficits, you either have to cut spending or increase taxes. I thought Bush’s policy of cutting taxes and increasing spending was one of the most bizarre tactics I have seen any president go for (most economists conservative and liberal I know analyzed the situation and calculated corrected that Bush’s actions would never result in the economic growth necessary to eliminate the resulting deficit). Obama looks like he wants the best of both worlds as well (neutral taxes, increased spending) which is not much of an improvement. And I’m inclined to side with you on decisions like the stimulus plan, which I thought was excessive and a giveaway to special interests (although I will point out that some elements like infrastructure spending, hospital modernization, are by themselves very smart economic ideas).

Also, an important point that people on both sides of the political aisle sometimes forget is that stability is very valuable for economic growth. If people are unsure of future tax rates, they won’t invest no matter how low taxes are right now. So, it’s actually better for tax rates to be slightly higher if you can keep it stable over time rather than a low tax rate that will jump up when another political party takes control. And that’s a big part of the current problem – we have tax rates that jump all over the place with different politicians when what we need is a signal to investors, the business world, consumers, etc. that they can make their decisions having full information of future tax rates.

I don’t have enough time at the moment to post about my VAT idea but let me just set the stage but defining it. Basically a VAT is where consumers or producers along each step of the production/sales process pay a sales tax that is equivalent to the value added at that step. So imagine some wheat being raised by a farmer. The farmer pays a sales tax to the government when he sells that wheat to a factory. The factory takes the wheat and makes it into flour. The factory then pays a tax on the additional value it created by processing the wheat (difference in the flour and wheat price). Another factory turns the flour into bread and pays tax on the difference between the sales price for bread and the input cost of the wheat. This goes on until the product reaches the consumer. If anyone is unclear of how this process works, just let me know and I will explain. VAT taxes are a lot like sales taxes except because they follow the production process so closely they result in very fair burdens across the economy and can be altered so that they are paid like an income tax with associated refunds, resulting in a system that allows for some help for the poorest.

I’m pretty sure I never said that I prefer wealthy students. Please find the quote and paste it if you can. After rereading my dialogue with philosopher and ATLNative, I am fairly certain it is you who is ignorant here. I can respect ALTNative and philosopher because they offer well-thought-out reasons for their beliefs. However, you seem content to stick with insults and ad hominem attacks.

Educators and Parents Worldwide are in Desperate need of training/Public Service Announcements in the Media, especially television and internet, to learn effective, non-violent discipline methods to teach children why what they did was wrong and to model appropriate behavior.

The TRUTH is that school children are treated differently in our great nation based on where they live. A middle school student in Texas died by having his chest crushed when his teacher sat on him to restrain him, a Texas high school student suffered deep bruising and welts to his lower back, buttocks and back of his legs when he received 21 “licks” with a wooden canoe paddle, which broke during the beating and had to be taped to continue the beating, a 9 year old Georgia 3rd grader suffered deep bruising injuries when he was paddled with a wooden paddle 3 TIMES IN ONE DAY (Decatur Co., GA affirmed Corporal Punishment Policy 9/17/09 for school children) and a Publicly Funded Charter School in Memphis, Tennessee physically punishes middle/high school boys and GIRLS weekly during a ceremony called “Chapel” by hitting them with wooden paddles and/or whipping their hands with leather straps IN FRONT OF ALL THE OTHER STUDENTS AS A DETERRENT to publicly induce shame, humiliation and fear! The school employees in the above actions have LEGAL IMMUNITY and are STILL paid by our tax-dollars to be ENTRUSTED with the care and education of our children!

Shocking News Headlines of Children suffering severe injuries by abusive practices in schools are all too common in states that allow paddling. Corporal Punishment of Children in Schools is an outmoded, ineffective and dangerous practice that has been banned in more than l00 countries. It puts school districts at risk for lawsuits for paddling injuries, which is the main reason many districts already have abandoned it.

A recent news headline reads, “Nearly 60,000 spankings in Miss. schools last year.” “Ouch! For the second time in a month, a school district in Leflore County has been hit with a lawsuit from a student alleging injuries from a paddling. An 11-year-old is seeking $500,000 from the Greenwood Public School District in a suit filed Monday in Leflore County Circuit Court. The child’s attorney, James Littleton, said photographs show deep bruising on the then-10-year-old’s buttocks and that he also suffered possible kidney damage.” “It was just unreal the abuse that this child took at the hands of a teacher,” Littleton said. Paddling has been a hot-button issue of late in Leflore County. Just last month, the guardian of a 6-year-old kindergartner filed a $500,000 lawsuit against the Leflore County School District for alleged paddlings. It was reported that a state legal adviser, who told Bristol, Tennessee Director of Schools Gary Lilly that while school principals who paddled students were legally protected from allegations of assault, they were not immune from accusations of inappropriate or improper touching.

School boards are asking for trouble to sanction a practice that is intended to inflict pain.

Make no mistake: beating schoolchildren on their pelvic area with a wooden board causes more problems than it corrects — if it corrects any at all. Teacher-training programs do not include instruction in the “correct method” for hitting students. Zero tolerance for weapons and violence is the standard that should apply to everyone in educational settings. Teachers included

What corporal punishment does accomplish is to degrade the teaching profession, drive good people away, and make the teaching field a safe haven for the dangerously unfit. Its net effect on schools is a negative one. The more that schools indulge in paddling, the higher the dropout rate, along with all the social ills that follow, e.g., gang activity, addiction, mental health problems, unemployment, etc.

The time is long over due for our lawmakers and education policy makers to apply the zero-tolerance rule universally. When paddlers complain, as some inevitably will, they should be advised to look beyond their classroom walls and see how schoolchildren are managed violence free throughout the civilized world. They should look and learn from the 30 states where corporal punishment in schools is forbidden by law. If they can’t learn, they can’t teach.

Research on toddlers and other studies following children into adolescence found physical punishment was bad for children and made them more likely to show anti-social behaviour. Children who were exposed to physical discipline most frequently were two to three times more likely to show anti-social behaviour as an adolescent, including things like getting into fights, being disobedient at home or at school, general delinquency and being in trouble with teachers. Research also indicates that spanking children lowers their IQ’s, which is counterproductive to the learning environment. “It seems highly likely that children exposed to violence would themselves use violence in reaction to situations. Violence begets violence is a lesson from history not just child psychology.” “Children are the most vulnerable members of our society. Adults have constitutional and legal protection from physical violence. Why are children still waiting?” Physical punishment of schoolchildren is NOT education’s “Best Practice” as it is ILLEGAL in 30 states.

Over 50 National Children’s Health and Education Organizations have issued position statements to OPPOSE SCHOOL Corporal Punishment including the American Medical Association, American Academy of Family Physicians, American Academy of Pediatrics, American Bar Assocation, the National PTA (Parent Teacher Association), National Education Association, Prevent Child Abuse America and the NAACP, among others.

School Corporal Punishment as it is a SERIOUS HEALTH AND SAFETY risk causing stress and impaired learning for all school children subjected to or witnessing school corporal punishment. U.S. Congress is currently holding hearings on Abusive and DEADLY practices in SCHOOLS and MUST ABOLISH Physical/Corporal Punishment Nationwide of ALL Children in ALL Schools, The Cost is $0. School paddling bans must be tied to federal funding. Doesn’t it just make sense for all of us to keep our hands off of other people’s children? Don’t ALL AMERICAN SCHOOL CHILDREN DESERVE Education’s “Best Practices”? Pushing for anything less than an outright ban on all forms of classroom abuse reveals a gap in the administration’s professed commitment to making schools better, safer, and stronger.