PURPOSE:

In this proposal, I will show that the American educational system is greatly in need of improvement. By strengthening the family, we can improve primary education in America.

 

I propose that in order to fix the declining educational system in America we must begin with the family. Families are responsible to teach, lead, provide example, motivate, encourage, and not abrogate these responsibilities to the state. A public-school teacher is the state raising children. Educators are now responsible to not only teach reading, writing, science, and math but also self-discipline, personal hygiene, self-awareness, e.g., sexuality, nutrition, social relations, and have taken upon themselves the indoctrination of politics, gender identification, anti-religion and other social “norms.” Because public schooling has gradually become mainstream in America in nearly 200 years, families have lost the ownership of their own children. We pay someone else, through taxes or directly to private schools, to teach our children what to think. Teachers, although likely educated and cheerful, are strangers to our own values, hopes, dreams and aspirations for our children. Our culture has not embraced with understanding that parenthood includes the responsibility to personally teach our children. Too many parents today do not have basic knowledge, innate desire, or a lifestyle which makes it possible to teach their children.

• Modern media and technology has retarded intellectual growth.

• What is stunting our children’s education? Public school, media, music, internet, gaming, lack of responsibility, immorality/pornography, low expectations, permissiveness, absent parents, etc.

• Indiscipline in school, teachers have to deal with the personal, family, and social problems of students in the classroom. ("Indiscipline at Public School: Teachers' Conceptions on Causes and Intervention.")

 

 

I propose that the decline in the effectiveness of education in America correlates with the decline in the strength of the family. The solution, therefore, is to promote the family, instead of the state, as the foundation of society.

 

BACKGROUND:

A product of public education myself, I emerged as an uninspired 3.0 student with middle of the road performance. My children were not so content. Two of my children are savants in their own ways and needed more than public school teachers could offer. Of course, we didn’t know that until further along in our schooling, but would we have ever figured it out had they remained in public school? I think, definitely not. Joshua would have been expelled for deviant behavior and Noelle would never have realized her incredible musical gifts.

I homeschooled 5 of my children for 15 years. One of my children attended public school her entire schooling, the second started homeschool in 4th grade, the third in 2nd, the 4th after kindergarten, the last two had two and three years of high school. I have observed education from both sides of the home-school/high-school argument. There are pros and cons in each method. I myself was publicly educated in three very different states: Alabama through 7th grade, California 8th- 10th, Colorado for 11th and 12th.

I have studied a variety of homeschool curriculum and also the Common Core Standards. A work that I gained much inspiration from was written by New York State Teacher of the Year John Taylor Gatto, The Underground History of American Education.

Although I do not claim complete success in my own home-schooling efforts, I do firmly believe that instilling the love of learning is the mark of success in education and that teaching under the bureaucratic public-school system indoctrinates the “hate of learning”.

Studying and teaching as a homeschooling mom taught me a love of learning that I find indispensable in my life. Pathway students are likewise introduced to a love of learning and invited to be lifelong learners. This understanding and inspiration is a vital example for children of Pathway parents who feel how vital education is from a very young age. This culture of learning can be shared with the next generation as parents relearn their God-given responsibility to teach their children.

I am now a 4.0 student at BYU-I. I am better than the middle-of-the-road student I was in my youth. All of my young-adult children are continuing their education at BYU schools. We have a strong culture of learning in our family thanks to the courageous break we took from the “conveyor belt” of public education.

 

SIGNIFICANCE:

English majors are uniquely qualified to explore this topic and make a difference in the educational system in America because they have studied the methods of critical thinking, analysis, and examples in literature of the history and process of learning from many different sources and perspectives. We learn from fiction and non-fiction about how diverse students learn, process, react to and excel in their educational pursuits. Having endured lengthy education based on the fundamentals of reading and writing and knowing these most vital tools of learning intimately, we can use this knowledge to continue an effective dialog to develop a solution.

 

Pathway graduates are uniquely qualified to make a significant difference in the education of their children. Many have endured a public education that was substandard for their own needs, have returned to school older and with experiences which have shown them the need for education, they have had good experience with the Pathway program that has ignited a love for learning or at least a renewed appreciation for learning as an eternal principle. Many are also parents of young children who will benefit by their example of lifelong learning. This solution would be slow but would reform education without coercion and from a foundational level.

• Reform could begin with Pathway students who have received education and who understand the importance of quality education. Many of these students have families and could start a new generation with a love of learning instead of a “hate of learning” (Gatto).

• Pathway students are worldwide and participate in many cultures.

• These students understand the eternal nature of learning.

• These students understand the power of Teach One Another.

 

DESCRIPTION:

I will use primary and secondary sources.

I am using Google Scholar, ERIC and other sources from the David O. McKay Library.

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OUTLINE:

 

The decline in the effectiveness of education in America correlates with the decline in the strength of the family. The solution, therefore, is to allow the family, instead of the state, to return to being the foundation of society. This can be achieved through the efforts of the graduates of Pathway Worldwide in assuming the primary education of their own children.

 

I will enumerate the blatant problems in, shortcomings of, and systemic flaws in the state educational system.

• Teaching to the test (Excessive Testing and Pupils in the Public Schools.)

• Standardized tests are shortcuts to real teaching.

• Teachers Unions benefit administration not children (Why Charter School Leader Eva Moskowitz Endorses Betsy Devos.)

• Behavioral problems distract teaching. (Indiscipline at Public School: Teachers' Conceptions on Causes and Intervention.)

• Parents should teach basics of reading and writing to their children. (Children’s Literature, the Home, and the Debate on Public Versus Private Education)

• Public schools are run as businesses. ("Our Children Deserve Better: A Call to Resist Washington's Dangerous Vision for U.S. Education.")

• Education should be administrated on the local level. As small as the family, as large as a community. (Gatto)

• Discrimination in education. "Our Children Deserve Better: A Call to Resist Washington's Dangerous Vision for U.S. Education.")

• Parents are only satisfied with the school their children attend because they don’t pay attention and have given that responsibility to the state. (Our Children Deserve Better: A Call to Resist Washington's Dangerous Vision for U.S. Education.")

I will explain how bringing education back home will strengthen families with examples from the past and present. (Gatto) A society with strong families improves the overall health of that society.

 

ANNOTATED BIBLIOGRAPHY:

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Christakis, Erika. "The War on Public Schools." Atlantic, vol. 320, no. 3, Oct. 2017, p.

15. Ebscohost, byui.idm.oclc.org/login?Url=https://search-ebscohost-com.byui.idm.oclc.org/login.aspx?Direct=true&db=f5h&AN=125092118&site=eds-live.

 

Ediger, Marlow. "Excessive Testing and Pupils in the Public Schools." Reading

Improvement, vol. 54, no. 2, Summer2017, pp. 67-70. Ebscohost, search.ebscohost.com/login.aspx? Direct=true&db=tfh&AN=123618646&site=ehost-live.

 

Farrie, Danielle, et al. Newark Public Schools: Budget Impacts of Underfunding and

Rapid Charter Growth. Education Law Center, Education Law Center, 01 Nov. 2015. Ebscohost, byui.idm.oclc.org/login?Url=https://search-ebscohost-com.byui.idm.oclc.org/login.aspx?Direct=true&db=eric&AN=ED570344&site=eds-live.

 

Feldman, Cassi. "Why Charter School Leader Eva Moskowitz Endorses Betsy

Devos." Education Digest, vol. 83, no. 1, Sept. 2017, pp. 15-21. Ebscohost, byui.idm.oclc.org/login?Url=https://search.ebscohost.com/login.aspx?Direct=true&db=muh&AN=124671791&site=eds-live.

 

Gatto, John T. The Underground History of American Education: A Schoolteacher's

Intimate        Investigation into the Problem of Modern Schooling. New York: Oxford Village Press, 2001. Print.

 

Gray, Lucinda, et al. Public School Safety and Discipline: 2013-14. First Look. NCES

2015-051. National Center for Education Statistics, National Center for Education Statistics, 01 May 2015. Ebscohost, byui.idm.oclc.org/login?Url=https://search-ebscohostcom.byui.idm.oclc.org/login.aspx?Direct=true&db=eric&AN=ED556745&site=eds-live.

 

Grenby, M. O. "Children’s Literature, the Home, and the Debate on Public Versus Private

Education, C .1760–1845." Oxford Review of Education, vol. 41, no. 4, Aug. 2015, pp. 464-481. Ebscohost, doi:10.1080/03054985.2015.1048115.

 

Malkus, Nat, et al. Teaching Vacancies and Difficult-To-Staff Teaching Positions in

Public Schools. Stats in Brief. NCES 2015-065. National Center for Education Statistics, National Center for Education Statistics, 01 Nov. 2015. Ebscohost, byui.idm.oclc.org/login?Url=https://search-ebscohost-com.byui.idm.oclc.org/login.aspx?Direct=true&db=eric&AN=ED561224&site=eds-live.

 

Mcfarland, Joel, et al. The Condition of Education 2017. NCES 2017-144. National

Center for Education Statistics, National Center for Education Statistics, 01 May 2017. Ebscohost, byui.idm.oclc.org/login?Url=https://search-ebscohost-com.byui.idm.oclc.org/login.aspx?Direct=true&db=eric&AN=ED574257&site=eds-live.

 

"Our Children Deserve Better: A Call to Resist Washington's Dangerous Vision for U.S.           

Education." Education Digest, vol. 86, no. 4, Dec. 2017, p. 4. Ebscohost, byui.idm.oclc.org/login?Url=https://search-ebscohost-com.byui.idm.oclc.org/login.aspx?Direct=true&db=f5h&AN=125896861&site=eds-live.

 

Silva, Algeless Milka Pereira Meireles da, et al. "Indiscipline at Public School: Teachers'

Conceptions on Causes and Intervention." International Journal of Research in Education and Science, vol. 3, no. 1, 01 Dec. 2017, pp. 1-10. Ebscohost, byui.idm.oclc.org/login?Url=https://search-ebscohost-com.byui.idm.oclc.org/login.aspx?Direct=true&db=eric&AN=EJ1126690&site=eds-live.

 

The World University Rankings

https://www.timeshighereducation.com/features/canonical-texts-are-these-the-most-influential-books-ever-written/406223.article

 

Thoughtco. Https://www.thoughtco.com/literary-devices-canon-740503by Esther

Lombardi Updated December 09, 2017

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REQUEST FOR APPROVAL:

 

I request approval for this research proposal in order to further my study of ways to improve education for our children. Through using the information researched and vetted by scholars, and by infusing ideas of my own into said research, I hope this proposal will produce a respectable and implementable plan for strengthening education through family involvement.