Randall Lund
For Wasatch School Board
Policy Statements
The School Board
“Directly accountable to the people, local school boards are the educational policymakers for the public schools in local communities…”
— Wasatch Board of Education Policy 106
- Public schools are to be governed “of the people, by the people, and for the people.” Power and authority flow from the people to a school board that is directly accountable to the people.
- Some people may feel that this model is not working in their schools. They may feel that the board is more interested in doing whatever the school district wants. The district often feels that the board exists mainly to give legal legitimacy to the actions of the professionals who know what is best for the schools. Some districts actively promote school board candidates who will comply with the district agenda.
- Parents and citizens can make the model work properly. They can:
- Vote for candidates who are responsive to the people and will direct the schools to function as desired by the people.
- Hold the school board accountable by attending or reading about meetings.
- Communicate with individual board members.
- Pay attention to what is going on in the schools and their children’s classes.
- When working with school personnel fails, take the issue to the board.
The Purpose of Education
The aim of liberal education is human excellence . . . It regards [people] as an end, not as a means. . . For this reason it is the education of free [people].
—Robert M. Hutchins
- Individualism vs. Collectivism. Is the purpose of education to benefit the individual or society? The answer you choose is a watershed that defines all the other choices you make.
- An individual focus on education requires that schooling enable a person to understand the world and their place in it and to act well in private and public life. This kind of learning is provided by a liberal education. The term liberal refers to the liberty a person gains from having real knowledge, the skills to use it, and the power to think clearly. An empowered individual is the end, or purpose, of education. Naturally society also benefits from having well-educated citizens.
- A collectivist view of education concentrates on shaping society. Obviously the political Left favors this notion. It has therefore been used in public schools to shape society for well over 100 years. Shaping a society in which people are good, productive citizens is one thing. But the Left has grown increasingly bold and successful in its goal of transforming society to match its ideology. The education of individuals is only a means to the end of societal revolution.
- These two views of education are often in direct conflict. The result is that our schools and colleges are a constant battleground of competing ideologies. Which view will win? Will your school teach real math, history, and science, or the approved views of the transforming society? Will your school emphasize individual cognitive skills or invest in more diffuse goals like collaboration, exploration, social-emotional learning, tolerance of diversity, and inclusion?
- A school board that reflects your views on education is one of the best means you have to direct your child’s learning.
Effective Teaching
“To teach is to create a space where the community of truth is practiced.”
— Parker Palmer, The Courage to Teach
- Great teaching is subject-centered, not teacher-centered or student-centered. The subject is the thing that brings everyone together. Teacher and learners are alike gathered around the subject, the teacher as guide, modeling their feeling for and understanding of the subject: the students experiencing the subject first-hand, finding their personal connection to it. All are one community, brought together by the subject.
- The community of teachers and learners occupies a physical, social and intellectual space that is hospitable, comfortable, inviting on all levels, defined by some shared rules of behavior, method, and inquiry.
- Teachers create these spaces by planning backward from the end goals of the course or unit to the intermediate goals necessary to get to the end, to the place the learners start at, and then designing the experiences necessary to move along the path.
- Teachers follow the three phases of learning: Understand, Practice, Apply. Learners have to understand clearly what they are supposed to know or do. They practice with feedback from self and the community. Mastery is achieved only when they can apply their knowledge or skill is real life situations, or in moving on to the next goal.
- Teachers act with courage to be their authentic selves and to engage the subject with the learners and the learners with the subject.
- Fear is the cause of much poor teaching: Will the students like me? Will I get a good evaluation? Will my students perform well? Fear causes teachers to hold tight to control of the classroom with lecturing, busy work, iron discipline, staying on track to “cover the material” and so on. On the other hand, they may abandon the discipline the subject requires by trying to be popular and accepted and showing everyone a good time.
- Teaching is a special calling and ability, but it is not limited to the most gifted. Many can do it. Good teachers are developed by education, trust and confidence in their professionalism, community with other good teachers, the freedom to use their talents, interests, and personality in teaching, and rewards for doing well, including commensurate pay.
School Choice
“The promise of public education is that every child should have access to an education that meets his or her individual learning needs.”
— J. Bedrick and A. Kline, The Heritage Foundation
- This should be self-evident: the public’s money is for the education of the public’s children. All of them. The ones in public schools, charter schools, private schools, special schools, or home schools. Naturally most of the money needs to fund public schools, where most of the children are taught. Everyone—even those with no children—has a stake in the improvement of the community through the children’s education and should help pay for it. But parents also have a right to some of their own money to help educate their share of the public’s children in other settings.
- Parents have the right and the responsibility to choose the school option that is best for their children. No one else has the same interest or information to make that choice.
- Some may argue not only that all public education money should go only to public schools, but that all children should go to public schools and nowhere else. A primary argument for this position is that if all the children are in public schools, they will all share a common view of the world. A common world view is just too much conformity for a country founded on free thinking as expressed in free speech, free press, freedom of association, and freedom of conscience.
- At the same time, all children should be able and welcome to participate in activities that only public schools have the critical mass to offer: Certain classes, extra-curricular activities of all kinds, and social activities. After all, the parents are supporting these activities through their taxes. The guiding principle is what is best for the child. Such inter-modal contact is good for the individuals, their institutions, and the community.
Enculturation or Indoctrination
“. . . systems of education . . . may implant in the minds of the American youth the principles of virtue and of liberty and inspire them with just and liberal ideas of government and with an inviolable attachment to their own country.”
— Noah Webster
“Education is Revolution”
— Dr. Bill Ayers, former domestic terrorist, professor of education, University of Chicago
- A community has an a priori right to expect that schools will pass on to the young the values and ideals of the culture. That is enculturation.
- In contrast, indoctrination refers to introducing ideas that conflict with the prevailing culture, especially by repeating them until they are accepted without thought or criticism.
- Are your schools or teachers engaging in indoctrination? Here are some test questions:
- Does the idea conflict with the values of your family or community?
- Is the idea presented as the only acceptable point of view on a problem or question?
- Is the idea founded on facts, sound reasoning, or common experience?
- Does the idea appear in unrelated subjects, for example, racism in a math class?
- Here are some ideas that are being indoctrinated in schools around the country.
- America was founded on the principle of racism.
- All whites are racist.
- Your gender is whatever you choose to be.
- If you find cases of indoctrination in your school, talk to the teacher, the principal, the district administrators, and, in any case, notify your school board. They are duty-bound to represent you.
The Cost of Education
“The finding of over 30 years of research is clear: More money does not equal better education. There are schools, states, and countries that spend a great deal of money per pupil with poor results, while others spend much less and do much better.”
— Lawrence W. Reed, Mackinac Center for Public Policy, 2001
- Update: Nothing has changed. A review of per-pupil spending and achievement in all 50 states shows that the relationship between money spent and the percent of students achieving the “proficient” rating on national assessments is ZERO (r = -0.016). In Utah in 2023, the same comparison among the districts in the state shows NO RELATIONSHIP (r= – 0.06) between spending and learning outcomes.
- The critics of this conclusion point out that it all depends on how you spend the money. Both ideas are correct. Just throwing money at something does more harm (especially to the taxpayer) than good. But spending money on things that matter makes a difference. What matters most is not the money, but knowing how to improve teaching and learning. That is why Mr. Reed can say “Others spend much less and do much better.”
- Virtually 100% of Utah income tax goes by law to education. Wasatch County residents also pay about 72% of their property tax to the school district. Spending usually increases by about 6% per year, but the education establishment always asks for more.
- If the school board adopts a goal to spend less and do better, it should be able to keep the levy steady or even lower it and still fulfill its mission of providing quality education for the people.
National Standards
Q. Where, in the Constitution, is there mention of education?
A. There is none; education is a matter reserved for the states.
— History of the Formation of the Union under the Constitution, Congress, 1943
Q: If education is reserved for the states, why do we now have national standards?
A: The government needed a proxy to act in its place. The proxy consisted of non-elected, nongovernmental organizations (NGOs). Once the proxies put together the national standards, initially called Common Core, the federal government nudged or pushed them into every state. Mission accomplished.
Q: What do the national standards do?
A: They specify what is to be learned in most subjects at the various grade levels K-12. But there is much more. Everything is aligned with the standards, including how colleges teach teachers, how teachers are evaluated, how students are tested, and what the textbooks and other materials teach.
Q: That sounds like a monopoly on education. Is that a good thing?
A: No. Centralized control replaces local control by states, communities, and parents. It facilitates indoctrination in government-approved agendas and social evolution. The one-size-fits-all benchmarks are scaled down and dumbed down, and have not improved student proficiency. Control is obtained through the force of an overzealous testing and assessment program that encourages teaching to the test. Instead of teaching a lot and testing a little, one ends up teaching only what is tested.
Q: What can we do about it?
A: Ask your local board of education to assert its authority to direct the curriculum. The Utah attorney general confirmed in a legal opinion to the governor that Utah’s state standards are not rules, and that local school boards maintain authority over the curriculum. Nothing prevents local schools from teaching more than the standards, better than the standards, and using non-standardized curriculum materials.
Elect
Randall Lund
For Wasatch School Board
