When did conservatives decide that State government should intervene in local governments and take control? Did I get lost somewhere? Was the equation federal government bad plus local government bad equals state government good? Did I fall asleep during conservative class and miss something?
That is the dilemma we are faced with in Georgia Ballot Amendment 1. It sounds innocent enough.
"Shall the Constitution of Georgia be amended to allow the state to intervene in chronically failing public schools in order to improve student performance?"
Well, who wouldn't want to improve failing schools?
But, of course, as with most cleverly worded ballot amendments, that isn't really what it's all about. It's about the state coming and taking over school districts, and running them as they see fit. It will totally abrogate local control, and run the school system from a bureaucracy at the state capitol.
Is that what you want? For your locally elected school board and local school administrators to be overruled and controlled by bureaucrats in Atlanta? Forgive me if I'm wrong, but isn't that something conservatives are dead set against? Yet, this is what the very pointedly conservative one party state government is proposing. Why?
To answer that, I need to ask my liberal friends a question, particularly those who sometimes find themselves supporting such things as charter schools. When did liberals decide that handing a public function over to private entrepreneurs was a good thing?
Because in addition to creating a huge new state bureaucracy, in addition to stripping cherished local control, it would also hand schools over to private contractors. A tiny fraction of these contractors may have some degree of altruism to them, but the vast majority will be in it because they think they can get rich doing it. Their primary interest won't be the students. It will be how can we collect the most money at the least amount of cost? Students will receive fewer resources, teachers will be paid less, extra-curriculars will be minimized. And unless it is a completely private school, which I don't think is what's being proposed, you still won't be able to impose one religious doctrine on the whole student body.
The whole idea that this will somehow save taxpayers money is an utterly absurd fantasy. You are adding a new layer of government bureaucracy. That can't be cheap. And if anyone thinks private contractors will be less expensive, think again. Thy're going to want to make enough money to enrich themselves. They will inflate prices and sacrifice services.
They tried this in the state that I grew up in, the state of Michigan. It has failed miserably. State control of local districts has caused substantially more harm than good. They have a law that allows the state to abrogate both local city governments and school districts. Instead of stopping the decline of Detroit City Schools, it has accelerated their ruin and led to even greater corruption. The intervention and control of the city of Flint has led directly to the water contamination crisis, and will wind up costing the state a hundred times more than what it saved, not to mention the irreversible damaging effect to the health of Flint's children.
There is also an undeniable racial aspect to the law in Michigan. Virtually all of the communities affected have been majority African-American areas. I don't know. I hate to say it, but maybe some conservatives don't mind the law because they think it's about THEM and not US. They don't mind taking away THEIR local control. THEY'RE not responsible enough anyway, and not deserving of tax dollars (never mind the irony that it is actually costing the taxpayers more).
So I have to ask Georgians, conservatives and liberals and everything in between, is this really the way you want to go?
I hope your answer is no. That still leaves the question on the table - what do we do about those schools that are clearly falling behind and not achieving their best?
Although there is no one magic answer, there are things we can do. Since I have probably used up all my column space for this week, I will need to address this in a future column. Meanwhile, please research and see what you think.
There are ways to improve. But Georgia Amendment 1 is not one of them.
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