The Myth of Our Failed Education System

School Administrator, Sept, 1998 by Forrest J. Troy

FORREST J. (FROSTY) TROY

A veteran newspaper editor speaks unashamedly in support of public schools because of the largely successful work they perform

On a return to earth, Dante almost certainly would establish a new rung in hell for those attempting to obliterate public education. It is the most lied-about, misreported story in America. Newsweekly magazines, mindless editorial pages, television newscasts, talk radio and televangelists malign public education with a ferocity usually reserved for serial killers.

Why? What is it about this 200-year-old institution that makes it a lightning rod? Is it the tool of gluttonous unions as depicted by Rush Limbaugh? Is public schooling the "place of darkness" that Jerry Falwell has termed it? Is it the total academic failure painted by two ex-secretaries of education, Republicans Lamar Alexander and William Bennett?

Name one other institution that flings open itself to all comets--a perfect microcosm of our nation. Every autumn the miracle of America takes place when the doors of those 87,000 schools are thrown open, welcoming the genius and slow learner, rich and poor, average and developmentally disabled. Among them are the loved and unloved, the washed and unwashed.

Those who savage the public schools tear at the heart of this country. Every-thing America is or ever hopes to be depends upon what happens to those 46.3 million students in public school classrooms.

Myths Versus Facts

I unashamedly speak for public education-warts and all-and have done so for 30 years, delivering more than 2,800 speeches. My remarks are not Pollyannish. Public education has serious problems in the inner cities, and I don't ignore that. I'm not in the self-esteem business.

I've spent 40 years as an award-winning journalist, including a Pulitzer Prize nomination, dealing with hard facts and how those facts are interpreted. But outside of the major cities and rural pockets of poverty, America has a superbly successful public school system--certainly among the best in the world.

Myth: Teachers teach only nine months so why do they bellyache about low salaries?

Fact: Repeated studies show this isn't true. If you count hours worked, the average teacher does in nine months what it takes regular 40-hour workers to do in 11.5 months.

Myth: American students score less well than kids in almost every other country.

Fact: This is the biggest canard of them all. America's smart kids are as smart or smarter than those in any other country. Test scores have recovered after a huge dip due to integration of public education. Separate was never equal.

Myth: Twenty-five per cent of students drop out, evidence of how ineffective public schools are.

Fact: More horse hockey. The dropout rate last year was 11 percent. Add to that a record-high graduation rate and a whopping 450,000 GEDs issued last year and America is among the best educated nations in the world.

Myth: We have students graduating from public schools who can't even read their diplomas.

Fact: You bet! They are among the nearly six million children in special education--most will never read well but they're getting their chance based on whatever gifts they bring to school. It's the best unreported story in America.

Myth: Unions are running the public schools.

Fact: Don't extrapolate to more than 14,400 school districts the mindless contracts (and overpaid janitors) in cities such as Cleveland, New York City or Chicago.

Myth: The PTA is a tool of teacher unions.

Fact: This had to be dreamed up by someone who never has been to a PTA meeting. I ought to know. I am not only a PTA veteran, but I hold the National PTA's Distinguished Service to Children Award.

Myth: Teachers are recruited from the dregs of college graduates.

Fact: Nearly half of the three million teachers in public schools have master's degrees. The political climate is so hateful toward public schools, a third quit within 10 years. Who can blame them? The committed stick, and most perform magnificently.

Myth: Public educators are afraid of competition. That's why they oppose charter schools and vouchers.

Fact: Only a nitwit public educator would favor vouchers, which suck funds from public school systems. Voucher is another way of spelling "segregation"--this time along class lines. Even the charter school movement is hardly the howling success predicted. Been to Arizona? Checked Michigan test scores?

Myth: Kids can't read today because schools don't exclusively use phonics.

Fact: America's 4th-grade readers just outperformed every country in the world except Finland, according to the National Assessment of Educational Progress. Phonics isn't the only way to learn to read. As any good reading teacher knows, this skill often requires a blend of whole language instruction with phonics.

Myth: Look how few American kids make it through college.

Fact: America is second only to Japan in the college graduation rate (by two percentage points). America exceeds every country in the world in graduate-level completion.