Last year when I was recruited to run for public office, I almost laughed out loud -- why on earth would I want to do this? I often joked that I fell off of something and hit my head way too hard, and in my concussion-induced state, I went to the Iron County Clerk's office and signed up to run for office.
I have always been a person who has tried to find common ground, who was not happy with the status quo arguments -- I have always wanted to find out for myself how I feel about an issue and not commit to *anything* until I know what I felt to be right in my heart. In my life I have never been accused of not listening - on the contrary, there are many times I have been accused of trying to bring all sides together to a common ground.
I guess this is why the comments of last anonymous who posted on my "education vouchers" entry cuts me to the quick. It is clear now that I have far too soft a heart for politics. I care too deeply what people think and am wounded too easily when I am misunderstood.
Politics sucks.
I have always been a person who has tried to find common ground, who was not happy with the status quo arguments -- I have always wanted to find out for myself how I feel about an issue and not commit to *anything* until I know what I felt to be right in my heart. In my life I have never been accused of not listening - on the contrary, there are many times I have been accused of trying to bring all sides together to a common ground.
I guess this is why the comments of last anonymous who posted on my "education vouchers" entry cuts me to the quick. It is clear now that I have far too soft a heart for politics. I care too deeply what people think and am wounded too easily when I am misunderstood.
Politics sucks.
21 comments:
Don't let these people get you down, hand it right back to them. I call them the whinniest generation. The greatest generation didn't constantly complain about paying for public education because they knew that public education was necessary to live in a great country and pass the American dream onto the next generation. They wanted America to be great while the whineketeers could really careless what condition they leave our state in for the next generation. These people refuse to make the investment in public education to allow the next generation to enjoy the same standard of living that we currently enjoy.
At one time a generation took pride in the fact they were leaving our country in a better condition for the next generation. And we wonder why we can't compete in a global economy when we have these people refusing to make the basic investments to allow the next generation to enjoy the same standard of living that we currently enjoy.
They refuse to spend the money to leave our state the same way they found it. These people are truly the most selfish breed I have ever encountered. They think starving our public education system is no big deal to them because they have got theirs so the hell with everyone else.
Each generation has made investments that have made our country and state great. These investment paid for all of things we now take for granted. Paying for public education is necessary to keep the standard of living that we enjoy in America and Utah. Our country just didn't just magically get this way. Previous generations made wise investments that allowed our country to become what it is today. If you want to live in some third world country and not pay for public education you are more than welcome but I would like to keep our country just the way it is and yes that means paying paying for public education, I am so sorry.
The greatest generation didn't constantly complain about paying for public education because they knew the importance of passing on a great country to the next generation. Now the whinniest generation constantly complains about paying for public education, they don't care about what condition they leave our country because that they don't care about our country.
Marshall,
You couldn’t be more wrong –
My generation does care about education – we are just frustrated at how many resources go to waste in the public school sector and how the education bureaucracy, unions, the uea and the nea have taken away parents voices in making policies and decisions that effect children.
Parents want a greater say in how their tax dollars are being spent, and question a re-distribution in wealth of tax dollars, when parents are better able to make decisions as to money is spent verses the government.
We are in no way trying to say that education should be denied to children. Every child has a right to an education, but, taxpayers fund those schools, and if I feel my tax dollars are better off paying for a private school in lieu of a public school government should give the right choose; just like I have a choice as to where to grocery shop, or travel or what car I drive or what airline I fly.
It’s about choice – the parents making the decision, not the teachers. Not the educrats.
It’s about having a say on how my tax dollars are spent.
Emily,
As a great democrat once said,
“If you can’t stand the heat….get out of the kitchen”
Pres. Harry Truman
Anonymous -
I can stand the heat and I don't plan to leave the kitchen. I just might have a melt down in there ocassionally.
Anon -
There you go again. Are you saying that without a voucher system parents don't have any choices? That's what I keep hearing... but to my knowledge, parents had choices before there were vouchers and will have choices long after they are gone.
Emily,
What does "..cut the quick" mean?
It's an idiom that means "deeply hurt" and "upsetting" - so I was deeply upset that someone thought I wasn't listening.
Emily,
As I’ve said before the fundamental question is; who makes better decisions at spending money on education – me or the government?
I want the freedom to see my hard earned money go towards the education of my child in a private school – not a public school. As parent, I have more of myself invested in my child’s education and my community by working with a private school – I have teacher’s who actually care about my children and it’s an environment that I want my children in.
As a mother, I’m doing what is best.
Wow,
Words can hurt in the blog world
Anon -
And you have that! You can already decide that is the best for your child -- a private school works for you. If I had a private school to send my child to, that might work for me too. But it is irrelevant because there are no private schools here.
And because public schools are all we have here, this is why I advocate that we have to make them the very best thing around -- I can tell you for certain that Iron County has *very* active parents who are *very* involved in what goes on in Iron County school district. I can promise you that UEA does not have the presence here that it might on the Wasatch front. Parents are involved in the school board, in the PTA, in the classrooms and in their children's lives.
Therefore, the point I have been trying to make is that public school is all we've got down here and it is my personal mission to work hard to make sure that my kids squeeze every last opportunity out of it.
It is not about anything but making sure my kids get the best opportunities... it's exactly the same thing that you're advocating.
Vouchers are meaningless to communities like Cedar City, where the average salary is $25,000 and the average price of a home is $250,000.
So even though vouchers may be about "choice" and "marketplace" - it is not an option here, and I don't forsee it as an option any time in the future. It's simple economics - families here can't afford private schools, and therefore a private school would never survive.
Except you already have the freedom to put them in a private school--why use OTHERS' taxpayer money to subsidize your personal choice? Since it is OUR tax money for that personal choice, I want my choice to say where and when a voucher can be used. Do you think I can have my choice?
As a mother, you have one of the best "choices" there is--that of being a parent. That is just something that seems like a distant dream to me at this time. Nonetheless, I plan to work my tail off for several years so that I can have that basic "choice" or rather "privilege." I'm not going to expect anyone else to subsidize me or foot the bill. AND in the meantime, I plan to serve others as much as I can.
You have LOTS of choice already. Why do you need a voucher to tell you that?
If I even get the "choice" to raise even one child, I won't have time to complain about some "lack" of choice. I'll be too thankful that I have the "choice" I do.
I'm sure you're doing your best, but aren't there OTHER parents doing their best too--even some whom you want to pay for your personal choice? Do not others work just as hard for their children?
My parents didn't need a voucher to know they were the main influence in their children's lives and the main determiner of what kind of education their children got.
Politics can hurt, but when you are doing it for the right reasons it can also be very rewarding.
You are doing this for the right reasons and your anonymous attacker wins when we give their piercing words strength.
You are exactly what Utah needs, and you are a Hero in my eyes.
Consider the source Emily. Who is anonymous? Who cares.
Anonymous:
Let’s use your logic across the board then. I believe that this administration is wasteful in expending its resources in fighting the war on terror. I should get a voucher back to spend on private contractors that I determine for myself how I want to protect myself from the war on terror.
I think the court system is inefficient, lazy, slow, and incompetent. I want a voucher to pay for arbitration and mediation so I don't have to pay for the courts.
I live in a older run down neighborhood. I think I don't get enough police protection. I am sick of the cops patrolling the rich neighborhoods instead of mine. I want a voucher so that I can hire my own security to protect me from local hoodlums in my neighborhood.
I have an old piece of land without improved roads. Even though my land is private and the public is not allowed, I don't use many of the roads in other parts of the state and I view them as a waste. I want a voucher so that I can pay to improve a road that I will use on my private land.
I hate the public pool. It is dirty, stinky and the life guards are incompetent. I want a voucher to build my own private pool in my back yard because my family deserves better than those people at the public pool.
You voucher people are greedy and selfish. Your design is to create segregation and entrenched caste systems. You have choice and you should pay for it. My tax dollars should not finance your private endeavors.
To anon Emily, not you--we were writing at the same time. :)
Rob, I wish to heck Emily had won and I'm a Republican. She has a lot more genuineness to her and more integrity than a lot of politicians.
Parents want a greater say in how their tax dollars are being spent, and question a re-distribution in wealth of tax dollars
Anon,
This is what the issue of vouchers is really about, the rich in this country were given opportunity after opportunity to help them succeed in life and now they want to take those opportunities away from others.
These people are only interested in doing something if it helps them and them alone, they don't consider for one second that others helped them get where they are and maybe they should do the same thing for others so they have the same chance to succeed.
Public education helps ensure that everyone has the tools to experience the American dream yet the rich in this country have done everything in their power to avoid making the same investment in the next generation that was made in them by the previous generation. They have got their, the hell with everyone else.
And you only want to talk about the free market when it fits into your mythical vision of it, look at how marvelously the free market has working in our healthcare system, for decades we have heard how the free market will take care of all our healthcare problems, and now we have 40 million plus without healthcare, that is the free market forces for you folks. And now these same geniuses want to do the same thing for our education system.
Well I have had enough, the free market has its limits and I am done playing theoretical games when the reality has shown that the free market will frequently leave people out of the equation, while this might be ok when you are selling cheeseburgers, this situation would be a disaster when it comes to something as fundamental as educating our kids.
When people throw this market BS stuff out I just simply say 'if you love what the free market has done for our healthcare system just wait until they get a hold of educating our kids'.
I remember studying at Cambridge University in England and seeing how govt managed healthcare didn’t work, people waiting 1 yr to see the dentist, pregnant women unable to see a qualified obgyn, it really changed my perspective on the good government can do.
Don’t get me wrong, government does a lot a good, our roads, prisons, justice system, transportation, securities, defense, even the post office.
But, somewhere along the lines, things went wrong with public education, the emphasis went from the child to more selfish needs. Activists judges order busing away from local schools, teachers become more concerned with union rules than they do children.
Somewhere along the way middle class moms like me lost our voice in our child’s education, maybe in smaller communities like yours Emily things haven’t changed drastically, but in SLC they have, look at the rash of private schools opening, and look the waiting lists for those schools, parents are consumers and they marching away and abandoning local public schools for private schools – the state legislature sees’ this and supports vouchers.
How do explain parents walking away from public schools Emily?
Can you fault them for wanting what is best for their children?
What’s wrong with parents acting like consumers when it comes to education?
Want to be a parent -
I knew who you were talking to. It's all good.
:-)
Anon -
You seem to imply that I don't think parents should enroll kids in private schools if the public school isn't working for them -- On the contrary... I say go for it, that is a choice you have and have always had. Vouchers didn't suddenly become available and all of a sudden create a private school choice for you -- and you also seem to imply that because I don't feel so good about vouchers that also somehow means that I don't feel so good about private schools - that is not the case. I have nothing against private schools and have always supported every parent's right to choose for their kids.
This discussion was supposed to be about making public schools *better* -- but it has gone through a death spiral about why people should be abandoning public schools altogether. And that completely defeats the point of my post.
Obviously, you don't think you have a voice. But I say that we do have a voice until we give up. I am not going to give up fighting for public schools -- that doesn't mean you shouldn't have the right to choose a private school, if you have the means and desire to do so. More power to you! My best friends attended private schools in California, and all of us went to college, all of us had great jobs when we graduated, all of us are now moms with kids at home. None of us who went to public schools were any worse off than the private school kids.
Finally, I'll say just this. Life is so short. I don't want to argue with you about this anymore. I respect our differences of opinion enough that I can see that argument is going to get us nowhere. You clearly don't see that I agree with you --and that I hear you and encourage you to make choices for your kids and their education. For me, my choice is working hard to make improvements within the public education system.
I agree,
Life is short we can agree to disagree.
Anon:
You keep saying that parents know how to spend their money better than government.
Nice theory, but for vouchers, it is a selfish one. In other words, YOU want the rest of us to support your "choice", even though you have the resources to make that choice. In the mean time, tax dollars are being pulled away from public schools. If public schools are so bad, then why don't we concentrate on fixing the problem instead of running away from the problem by giving you my tax dollars. We're all in this together, parents, neighbors, teachers, families and government. Public Education helps everyone.
I apologize for being so callous towards you, but vouchers just do not make any sense what so ever. And no, it's not me that "doesn't get it". Public schools helps everyone, vouchers helps no one but for a few wealthy. (think about it; the Parents For Choice campaign,spent 1/2 million to get vouchers passed)
By the way, I remember you saying that teachers are over paid, and since you claim to be a professor, how about taking a cut in your salary to help pay for those tax paid vouchers?
Who is Anon ?
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