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Task Force Members:
Robert Kozma, Acting Chair (San Francisco, CA)
Kathleen Knight Abowitz (Oxford, OH)
Kathy Emery, Ph. D. (San Francisco, CA)
Eleanore Lee (Berkeley, CA)
Bruce Menin (Newburyport, MA)
Edward L. Whitfield (Greensboro, NC)
Education is a public good. It is one of the fundamental responsibilities of government. The American people deserve high-quality publicly-funded education from pre-school through university according to their interests and aims regardless of their economic or physical conditions, gender, race, age, religious beliefs or sexual orientation. In recent years our schools have suffered along with other vital public services from tax cuts, tax diversions and excessive federal borrowing to fund ever increasing war budgets. We need to change our priorities and re-establish public services for the public good among our most important values. As the wealthiest country in the world, we can afford to provide our children with accessible and attractive school facilities, adequate and effective resources and well-trained teachers who are fairly-compensated. Our public schools need to be places where every student is able to:
These ideals need to be translated into classroom goals that guide daily practice. These ideals also need to be treated as practical criteria for judging the worth of the activities that go on in the classroom. The people in the best position to do this are those who know what the students have been doing in and outside the classroom.
Such a high-quality public education system not only provides individuals with the foundation for a rich and rewarding individual life, but one that also strengthens communities by providing opportunities for life-long learning. Every citizen must have access to education at the level they wish to study and have the opportunity and confidence to be able to get the training they need if they choose to or must change careers, vocations or jobs.
An excellent and just public education system fully educates all students, rather than providing a quality education for the elite and a poor education for the masses. Extending rich educational opportunities to every child strengthens our democracy, our communities and our economy. Public educational institutions can foster the empathetic imagination that will allow every child to become the very best scholar, citizen and human being he or she can be, and provide them with the knowledge and skills to build a better world. But this can happen only if the schools are fully funded, the teachers are well trained and compensated, and the school communities are committed to democratic ideals.
