Issue Position: Fixing the Education System

Issue Position

I was speaking recently to a teacher at my daughters' school who said that things have really changed for the worse in the last few decades. She said it was continually getting harder to offer a good education. Their budget has been reduced, but more than that, the government and union regulations imposed on them make it very difficult. She felt the unions, and I quote, "had done a lot for the teachers personally, but really weren't helping improve education".

In addition, in many states including California, there are many children entering the schools that don't speak English. This takes extra time to overcome that disadvantage and distracts from teaching math, spelling, history, etc. I don't want these kids to fall through the cracks and I also don't want them hurting the quality of education for those who already speak the language.

I would support offering an accelerated English class for new students that don't speak the language that they must attend before or as soon as they enter the school system. It could be on Saturdays and use the already existing school facilities. Kids would have to bring their own lunches (I don't think that is too much to ask). It would not have to take more than 6-12 months to get them fluent. Maybe we could hire private educators outside of the union so it would not have to cost so much. Then the teachers could focus more on making sure all the children got an equally effective lesson each day and they wouldn't be slowed down by teaching to basically, two levels of students.

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