Teachers' Unions Have Become Partisan Dinosaurs

 Read this: Teachers' Unions STILL Want Lockdowns on Schools

There was a time when unions served a purpose. They worked to get meaningful wages, to eliminate child labor and to make sure workers had a voice. Those days are gone. Union bosses have become every bit as money grubbing and elitist as any titan of industry. Indeed many of the offspring of union bosses attend the same elite schools and universities. It should make union rank and file ponder where their membership fees are going.

This leads to our current situation where the NEA is directing via narrative and media connections, the continuing closure of "free" public education. Never mind that this impacts low income students the worst. Ignore that it makes it impossible for single parents to work. Pretend it isn't an economic drag on an already wounded economy. NEA has bigger, unstated sacred cows to gore. And their inroads into controlling the message and measures used in education in some states shows what inordinate power they are wielding.

Many doctors and scientists have said lockdowns for children are unnecessary. They have stated this view from scientific data, from witnessing the demise of too many children and on the number of students who have simply disappeared from class rolls. But the NEA and their strident, fearful minions don't care. They insist on draconian actions that no district can afford in terms of space or money. What many of these same teachers may not realize is that they are destroying their own brand. Parents need to work and most have to work. Sooner or later if the public schools don't open, parents will seek another options. It may be homeschooling, it may be charter schools or private schools, but whatever their choice it will shrink the number of students in schools. 

With fewer students, there is less interest in financially supporting public school education with higher taxes. That means in turn that whatever actions the NEA hoped to achieve such as smaller classes, higher pay, better insurance will fall by the wayside. As these advantages go away, private and charter schools will look even more attractive to parents. If you want to see this in action, look at Chicago. Chicago's taxes are insanely high and many parents struggle to survive, but this is one city where the Catholic school system is strong because parents will do whatever is necessary to make sure their kids are not in the warzone that the Chicago public schools has become.

I'm not cheering this situation. I am a product of public schools. Public schools enabled my father to move out of his Depression Era poverty and go to college. Public school enabled my Irish immigrant ancestors to learn English and become citizens. Public school education is what set us apart from our European ancestors and enabled the American Dream, where anyone can achieve anything with knowledge and hard work. As that system dies-courtesy of the combination of an alphabet soup of agencies and laws-our ability to stand apart also goes away. The American Public School was the shared American experience where we all learned the same English, Math, History and Science and that type of share knowledge is what creates a cohesive culture.

The biggest mistake NEA and its supporters have made is to allow schools to become petri dishes for social justice. Rather than giving students the tools to achieve, schools have been and are being used a means to inoculate children with "appropriate" social attitudes. Whether it is to believe in Global Warming, support "Kindness" as a blanket of acceptance for all manner of behavior or tolerating the outbursts of mentally ill students parachuted into general education classrooms the methodology is push students further apart. These obedient followers are becoming more and more liberal to the point that they can't discuss any issue. The rebels are becoming more conservative and shutting down. 

Now that we have had lockdowns, parents are fully aware of the scope of the indoctrination. While NEA lobbies even up to the White House to stay closed, many parents are opting out or moving to districts where education matters more than ideology. I believe the NEA's endgame is to get Federal control over ALL schools public and private. We're already seeing churches under attack to accept lifestyles or views that don't reflect their moral guides, so is it really so far off to think the NEA wouldn't have an underlying agenda to control ALL education? 

We will never be United Again

 I've never heard or seen so much contrived vitriol in my life. My Mom used to say "If you look for trouble, you'll find it" and that applies to racism, sexism, and every other type of victimhood set up by the Left. I thought maybe I was just hearing from the extremists that Big Media so likes to amplify. But evidently I'm wrong. Evidently the mere existence of anyone who is White is offensive. And frankly the Democrat Socialists seem intent on pulling the bandaids off until a scar so hideous is part of our shared history. I don't know how anyone is going to be able function in an office, classroom or any other group effort. It's as if the Left will not be content until we hate each other to death.

Do you doubt me? Read This

I ask you, have you ever in an urban setting had someone of a different race yet out a comment or question? If someone is looking for a COVID shot, would it be so wrong to just answer the damned question without lamenting over some overarching narrative that has nothing to do with the task at hand? I wonder if the writer is always so civil-never honks his horn in traffic, never yells when someone spills beer on him at a ball game, gets frustrated when his kids use up all the data? How is his male anger any different from an elderly white woman, who has probably wandered around to various shot locations for weeks trying to find available vaccine? Isn't that elder abuse to accuse her of asking and being denied an answer? 

It's obvious that people who hold such hair-trigger bias and prefer their own created habitat should probably seek a means to stay there. If you can't even let go of your own bias in order to score SJW Woke Points, then why should you expect anyone else to give up their own personal Shagrila?

Since When Do We Make Kids APOLOGIZE For Their Race?

 Watch this: Outrageous! 

So a student, who to the faculty of his school "looks white", is forced to APOLOGIZE for his alleged "White Dominance" even though he is biracial and being raised by his Black mother. She is standing up for his right not to be humiliated and denigrated for the sake of Critical Race Theory and a grade. How many other students are in the same situation? How many good kids are being vilified for the sake of a false and accusatory political narrative masquerading as "social justice?" Parents must stand up for their children. Many parents are unaware that these political narratives are being presented to students as factual at every level of education starting with our youngest kids. Remember, the Left has actually produced academic "studies" from soft science programs that babies are racist. BABIES!!! My three week old granddaughter likes anyone who picks her up and cuddles her. I doubt she cares much who does it although she smiles at Mommy because MOMMY FEEDS HER!!!! 

By the way, there is a way to defeat these tin star heroes of the Woke Left. And that is to refuse to accept their behavior at any level. Whether it's Antifa buring down a Federal building or woke politicians like AOC and Aryanna Pressley spreading toxic messaging via bully pulpits, it is long past time to push back and force these bullies out of the safety of their hallowed niches in Academia and Government. It's going to take effort and it's going to mean risk, but if you value your children's futures, you will stop letting the Mockingbird Media and the Leftists Ideologues set limits for the rest of us. 

Read: Beating the Woke

Woke Academia Is Destroying Our Children and our Nation

 Read this

After you've read this column consider how many parents these days blame the schools first. I'm not saying the teachers or the schools or the curriculum isn't to blame, BUT there is plenty of blame to go around. Let me give you some examples.

1. I had a student whose parents pulled him from school during semester exams for a cruise because it was cheaper for them to go then.

2. I had multiple families pull their children out of school to go overseas for a MONTH and then expect the teachers to either completely excuse missed work or stay after school until six or seven every night to allow the students to make up work.

3. When I had a student who refused to do AP Art Studio assignments doing only Anime because I was concerned she wasn't developing enough range to make her skills marketable, I was called a racist because, to quote the mother "We raised our kids that they can be anything they choose to be." That was never my concern-it's just that as a working artist back in the day I know the more skills you bring to the table, the more likely you are to make a real living. BTW, this particular oppressed child lived in a half million dollar home and her parents were CEO's of their respective companies.

4. I had a student whose mother was very socially involved. He came late every day and I'd get a perky email from Mom about how he was home sick and they were going to the doctor. The absences became later in the day and the emails arrived later as well until the student had missed more days than he attended. BTW, the parents were informed by email and phone messaging whenever he was absent. The parents were OUTRAGED when he absence failed the entire year. They said they would homeschool him. The last I heard he was in military school.

5. I had three triplets in classes and two of them did okay. The most talented one refused to turn in work to the point that if I had not relented on the last day and created a project for him to complete, that he would probably still be in high school. BTW, he was kicked off of the football team where his brothers also played. I called the parents repeatedly and never got a response.

I had students whose contact information was totally made up. I had parents who literally threatened my life. I had administrators that never ever backed up the faculty. In those conditions, no teacher is going to risk their lives or their income on a kid whose parents don't even care enough to check the online gradebook. Here's a hint-teachers can see how many times grades have been checked and by whom. In most of the cases of the kids who were failing their parents never checked grades. 

We were expected to call the parents on our own time. If you don't have valid contact information, that's impossible. And that comes to the crux of the matter-where is the education of a student going to become the property and concern of the STUDENT and the PARENTS first? I hear a whole lot of whining and frankly I've seen some teachers who need to be gone, but in the last three years of teaching I experience more belligerence, aggression and confrontation than I did in the previous 17. Woke attitudes are creating chaos for the kids who WANT to learn and for teachers who WANT to teach