Monday, May 11, 2009

Okay Class, Today We’re Going to…


Years ago one of my children had a high school class assignment in which they were to document how they’d spend a million dollars. They had a weekend to come up with documentation showing the purchase price of each and every item.

I told my daughter the exercise would have been much more meaningful had the assignment been geared toward reality; instead of a million dollars, have these kids figure out how to pay for an apartment, insurance, utilities, car payment, food, clothing and all on what could be made at minimum wage. Wouldn’t that have prepared these young people for that next level of citizenship better than squandering money they didn’t have; or was the teacher trying to recruit future congressmen?

This morning I read where a teacher up in Colorado had her 9th grade class test the waters of terrorism .

“A group of Colorado high school freshmen were asked to plot an act of terrorism by a foreign government on American soil as part of a lesson on terrorism, TheDenverChannel.com reported.”

“More than 110 students at Pueblo County High School were given two minutes to come up with their history project, the Web site reported.”

Excuse me; but how much of a “plan” would you expect anyone to come up with in only two minutes? Depending on how fast their internet connection was, it would take that long to Google even one site which might be helpful. They’d want explosives in various sizes, rifles, pistols, rocket propelled grenades, remote detonators, explosive vests and hallucinogenic drugs for the suckers picked for that job, special clothing to disguise the weapons and explosives, layout drawings to indicate where to inflict the most amount of damage, personnel files to determine the best targets, maps of the area to determine approach and escape routes and a host of other important factors. Two minutes would hardly be a serious test of the student’s ability to launch any meaningful terrorist attack.

How about some other social studies projects for the leaders of tomorrow?

Have them figure out how many days of work each year will be needed to pay for the national debt before any of their efforts go toward their individual needs and expenses. My goodness, that would be so much fun!

What about the cost of energy; a comparison study of how much electricity, gas and oil cost over extended periods of time starting in 1980 through the year 2020, with explanations to include Cap and Trade penalties planned by the Obama administration and Democratic controlled Congress. A gallon of gas will cost upwards of $ 5 to $10 dollars and we won’t want to run the A/C at home because the utility bill would be more than the mortgage payment.

Have the class figure out how much it costs to permit illegal aliens in our communities; include medical costs, education, housing, jobs and all other aspects of illegal immigration. Give the class at least 6 minutes to work on the project so they will have had at least 3 minutes more serious effort on the issue than our Congress.

We could give high school kids an entire weekend to explain the loss of individual liberties from the implementation of “hate speech controls” over the right to express criticism, private property and use as compared with ecological intervention, individual gun ownership for protection of property and life itself, the carefully orchestrated removal of rights guaranteed under the Constitution. These young people would out of necessity have to read the Constitution and understand the intent of the Founding Fathers; something which the public schools may find at odds with the socialist agenda now in place.

Heaven help us if one of these children happened to mention God as the Author of our nation, the only Being grand enough to bestow individual rights to His children which stands in direct conflict with the communist expression of entitlements from an all powerful and ever growing central government. That would cross the delicate line of tolerance for anything religious, much worse than tossing a hand grenade into a crowded classroom of eager young minds soaking up the State’s propaganda

I know, and this will likely be the next serious challenge to our young people are given while in the care and custody of the public school system; have the teacher hand out copies of Where’s Waldo. Break the kids into groups and let them point when they’ve spotted our hero. That way they can waste more precious time that could have been spent developing skills which might actually help them once they enter society.

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