Are Public Schools the Problem or the Solution?

Book update at end of this post.

What’s the purpose of public schools? If you believe EdChoice, the voucher proponents who would just as soon see public ed go away, fifty people, if asked, will give you fifty answers. Let me offer a simple response.

Public schools are generally a safe space where we feed kids, teach them to become good citizens, help them prepare for careers or further education, and intervene to improve their health. Public educators strive to meet these goals regardless of the sufficiency of the resources available and without regard to the race or ethnicity of the child or whether the child has a disability. This is not true for taxpayer-funded voucher schools.

Strong public schools are obviously designed to help the children who attend them. The purpose of public education, however, is broader. Our democracy depends upon our system of inclusive public education.

The concept of informed consent underlies our form of government. It was the most critical change in moving from English and European monarchies to the concept of government adopted in the American colonies. Although dumping tea into Boston harbor was symbolic, it wasn’t the raison d’etre for the Revolution. The critical change involved moving from a society in which the population was coerced or cajoled into compliance by powerful educated elites to one in which those who governed did so only with the informed consent of the people.

The thoughts of the nation’s founders on this concept of informed consent are represented by these quotes.

-James Madison, the fourth president, wrote: “A popular government without popular information, or the means of acquiring it is prologue to a farce or tragedy.”

-Dr. Benjamin Rush, an influential signer of the Declaration of Independence, abolitionist and surgeon general to the Continental Army, wrote: “A free government can only exist in an equal diffusion of literature.” In this context, “literature” meant “knowledge.”

-Thomas Jefferson, who insisted on a system of public education through the public university level in Virginia, is believed to have said, “An educated citizenry is a vital requisite for our survival as a free people.”

Finally, my personal hero, John Adams, wrote the Education Clause of the Massachusetts Constitution in 1780. That same clause was adopted as a part of the NH Constitution in 1784. Adams wrote:

“Knowledge and learning, generally diffused through a community, being essential to the preservation of a free government; and spreading the opportunities and advantages of education through the various parts of the country, being highly conducive to promote this end; it shall be the duty of the legislators and magistrates, in all future periods of this government, to cherish the interest of literature and the sciences, and all seminaries and public schools, to encourage private and public institutions, rewards, and immunities for the promotion of agriculture, arts, sciences, commerce, trades, manufactures, and natural history of the country; to countenance and inculcate the principles of humanity and general benevolence, public and private charity, industry and economy, honesty and punctuality, sincerity, sobriety, and all social affections, and generous sentiments, among the people: Provided, nevertheless, that no money raised by taxation shall ever be granted or applied for the use of the schools of institutions of any religious sect. . . .” Pt. 2, Art. 83, NH Constitution.

“Cherish” is the word that is used to describe the duties of legislators and governors in Adams’ Education Clause. At the time and in this context, it meant to nourish or nurse up.

The NH Constitution, like many other constitutions, has two parts. Part 1 describes individual rights similar to the first ten amendments that comprise our federal Bill of Rights. Part 2 is where the NH Constitution defines our state’s form of government and it is where the Education Clause was placed, signifying its importance is more to support our democratic form of government than as an individual right.

There’s more to establish the importance of education to our founders. Some of the earliest legislation adopted by Congress established the centrality of education. The Land Ordinance of 1785 and the Northwest Ordinance adopted by Congress in 1787 stipulated in the new territories (north and west of the Ohio River to the Great Lakes) that "Religion, morality and knowledge being necessary to good government and the happiness of mankind, schools and the means of education shall forever be encouraged." The 1785 ordinance required newly settled towns to be laid out in grids of thirty-two plots with the central lot, lot number sixteen, designated for a public school.

The need for truly informed consent and an educated populace is more acute now than ever. Even those who do not have children in public schools have a vested interest in maintaining successful public schools. Charter schools and private schools financed with taxpayer-funded vouchers need not take all students who apply and need not keep all children who are accepted (though they may keep their tuitions). The “choice” in taxpayer-funded voucher schools is that of the school, not the student. If any school is engaging in indoctrination of its students, it is the private schools built on religious and wealth-based exclusionary principles. It is only the traditional public schools that strive, admittedly not always perfectly, towards the ideal of an inclusive, diverse nation of people prepared to exercise their right to self-governance.

Measles Deterrence as a School Responsibility

A second child has died in Texas (as has an adult) as the result of measles outbreaks that have infected 607 people in twenty-two states. Thirty-two percent of the confirmed cases are in children under five and another 40 percent are in young people between five and twenty. Ninety-seven percent of the cases were in people who were either unvaccinated or their vaccination status was unknown. The Center for Disease Control recommends fully vaccinating children against sixteen diseases by age two. (At least this is the CDC’s current recommendation. Who knows what Kennedy and Trump will change?)

Although health care providers address childhood immunizations for their young patients, schools are where society really checks the status of a child’s immunizations. In NH, RSA 141-C:20-a requires all children to have age appropriate immunizations for communicable diseases—including measles—before being admitted to school or daycare and schools must keep immunization records.

Except . . . NH and twenty-nine other states provide exemptions to immunization requirements for religious reasons. Another two states allow exemptions for “personal reasons.” In NH, parents must complete a one-page form to assert the non-medical religious exemption. The form need not be notarized. No statement about being religiously observant is required.

All states offer medical exemptions.

Maine does not recognize a religious exemption. Vermont has an exemption that requires annual certification after the parent or guardian has reviewed evidence-based materials about the efficacy of vaccines developed by the state of Vermont. The state of New York also does not recognize a religious exemption.

Unfortunately, two NH bills, HB 679 and HB 361, just passed by the NH House target the viability of immunization laws. The bills introduce unscientific mandates and reserve authority to a legislature to expand or contract the list of required vaccines. The bills will now be taken up by the NH Senate. Another bill, HB 524, filed by seven Republican lawmakers seeks to repeal the NH Vaccine Association (NHVA) and would forfeit the $24 million/year that the NHVA collects from private insurers to subsidize the cost of pediatric vaccines.

The Last Bake Sale book.

We launched The Last Bake Sale at Gibson’s Bookstore last week. That’s Becky Rule and me talking with the crowd. It was a packed house with eighty in attendance, including our three grandchildren.

I then headed off to the annual conference of the Network for Public Education where I was part of a panel with superstar education historian Prof. Diane Ravitch and was able to interact with public education advocates from across the nation, including 2018 NH teacher of the year Heidi Crumrine.

My next two talks will be at Water Street Bookstore in Exeter on April 10 at 7p followed by Balin’s Bookstore in Nashua on April 12 at 11a.

Invite me to speak in your community. Learn more, buy the book and contribute to the book fund at LastBakeSaleBook.com.