Category — Education

It’s now evident that the president lied about Obama Care. Nancy Pelosi’s comment, “We have to pass the bill so you can find out what’s in it,” takes on a whole new meaning. Politics and ideology prevailed over truth, as they always do with this president and deceptions, both overt and covert, abound.

The therapeutic state swallows up everything human on the seemingly rational ground that nothing falls outside the province of health and medicine. – Szasz

Until recently the Family Rights and Privacy Act protected personally identifiable student information from disclosure to outside agencies. However, in 2012 new USDOE regulations nullified those protections. Educational institutions may now release student records to non-governmental agencies without first obtaining parents’ written consent. The new rules also broaden the permissible purposes for which third parties can access students’ records without first notifying parents. Effective safeguards of student identification are noticeably weak.

The IRS and Department of Justice scandals rocking the Obama administration make this a timely review. They demonstrate the consequences of Unlearning Liberty.

The author is a First Amendment lawyer and president of the Foundation for Individual Rights in Education (FIRE), an organization dedicated to defending free speech rights on college and university campuses. FIRE is politically ecumenical, encompassing conservatives, liberals and libertarian free speech warriors. It goes to war and to court to defend students’ and faculties’ First Amendment rights at institutions of higher education.

As adequately demonstrated throughout history, impinging on individual freedoms for the common good eventually requires the use of force. But it’s not necessary to look to history. In Germany homeschooling is verboten and violating that dictat can result in forcible removal of children and jailing of parents.

The K-12 Implosion deals with the problem of an increasingly expensive and poor performing American educational system. It is a brief collation of facts and analysis about the state of American Education. It is only 38 pages of clear prose, written in large type. The K-12 implosion doesn’t necessarily provide answers to the problems facing the nation’s schools, but does document why things are the way they are and offers a range of ideas which will undoubtedly be tried to resolve the issues.

In his new book, Delbanco traces the development of colleges in the American colonies. He begins in1636 when Puritan emigrants established a New England college and named it after its benefactor, John Harvard. A fund appeal to prospective donors in England said the college would “advance learning and perpetuate it to posterity.”

Unaware of the wiles of the snake-in-the-grass

And the fate of the maiden who topes, 
She lowered her standards by raising her glass, 

Her courage, her eyes and his hopes.

She sipped it, she drank it, she drained it, she did! 

He promptly refilled it again, 

And he said as he secretly carved one more notch 

On the butt of his gold-headed cane,

Have some Madeira, m’dear.

This administration and its minions have been caught in so many distortions, exaggerations and just plain lies that keeping track is becoming a full time job. Here are a few more to add to the ever-growing list.

For those on the left, only quick answers will do. The left panders to the worst inclinations of human nature and seeks to avoid that which requires effort and discipline, like the grooming of character, adherence to a moral code, development of patience and hard work, etc. Instead. the answer is one enormous get rich quick scheme. Anything goes. And when the consequences of a profligate lifestyle become manifest, the answer is – we must pass a law against those consequences!

When critics of Barack Obama’s policies gather, the question arises: “How could we have elected such a man president?” His shaded past, that he never held a real world job or had any administrative experience at all, are issues frequently raised.

Here is the answer.