From the Academy

At this writing, the Senate of Michigan is considering a bill, already passed by the House of Representatives (House Bill No. 91), to give the Michigan superintendent of public instruction virtually absolute power to determine the boundaries of school districts. The practical effect of this measure would be to abolish rural school districts and to consolidate a large number of small high schools with those in big towns.

Why is it that, in every state, the educationist lobby has been working energetically to consolidate small schools with big, to nullify or abolish local school boards, to make country children go to school in towns, and (though this last is not often openly advocated, as yet) to unify a whole state into a single school district, governed by the superintendent of public instruction? More than this, indeed, the intention of the educationist backers of the behemoth education-bill now before Congress is to put the federal government in charge of the whole educational system. If these people continue to have their way, within a few years or decades there will be but one school district remaining, its boundaries identical with those of the United States of America. In the name of “education for democracy,” local and parental control of schools will have been abolished.

RK

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Russell Kirk

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At this writing, the Senate of Michigan is considering a bill, already passed by the House of Representatives (House Bill No. 91), to give the Michigan superintendent of public instruction virtually absolute power to determine the boundaries of school districts. The practical effect of this measure would be to abolish rural school districts and to consolidate a large number of small high schools with those in big towns.

Why is it that, in every state, the educationist lobby has been working energetically to consolidate small schools with big, to nullify or abolish local school boards, to make country children go to school in towns, and (though this last is not often openly advocated, as yet) to unify a whole state into a single school district, governed by the superintendent of public instruction? More than this, indeed, the intention of the educationist backers of the behemoth education-bill now before Congress is to put the federal government in charge of the whole educational system. If these people continue to have their way, within a few years or decades there will be but one school district remaining, its boundaries identical with those of the United States of America. In the name of “education for democracy,” local and parental control of schools will have been abolished.