EDUCATORS
HAVE NOTHING TO LOSE BUT YOUR SCHOOL SUPPLIES
By
Frederick Meekins
August
23, 2002
NewsWithViews.com
The thrill of another school year is in the air
as stores across America hope to put customers in the scholastic mood
with strategically placed displays of academic paraphernalia. Little do
these merchants realize that these implements of elucidation might not
even be used by the progeny of those purchasing these items.
Last year, I published two commentaries about a
trend at many public schools where pupils don’t get to keep their supplies
but must instead relinquish them into a communal stash. You know, each
according to his ability; each according to his need. We’ve heard it all
before.
The articles generated a robust response. This paradigm
ran so contrary to human nature and common sense that a number thought
I had made the whole thing up. Others, sadly, knew exactly what I was
writing about as their own offspring had fallen prey to similar forms
of sophisticated thievery.
Evidence for my argumentation had been culled from
the experience of my cousin’s child at Patuxent Elementary in Lusby, Maryland
--- a school my detractors insisted didn’t exist (the building looked
pretty solid to me) --- and from supply lists for various schools made
available for shopping convenience at local Walmarts. The conclusions
were drawn by synthesizing these accounts. For example, unless some elementary
students has a really nasty drug habit, why would any school request eight
gluesticks and four bottle of glue unless for redistribution among the
masses? One school required forty-eight pencils. It’s doubtful even Tom
Clancy would require that many pencils for any given nine-month period.
Some of these schools are growing bolder about expressing
their intentions behind these copious supply lists. The most brash thus
far has to be that compiled by Annapolis Elementary School, in none other
than Annapolis, Maryland.
Beneath the list for a number of classes it reads
in bold print, “All supplies are considered community supplies and will
be shared with the class.” One almost expects those words sprawled across
the barn in Orwell’s Animal Farm underneath the slogan about all animals
being equal with some more so than others.
Just as arrogant is the supposition that parents
and child will obsequiously comply with these demands simply because someone
with a fancy degree pulling down a hefty administrative salary makes them.
Since public schools seem so keen on immersing students in a socialistic
milieu, it’s about time pupils learned a little lesson in revolt.
But rather than pursuing this along the lines of
the Communist model seeking to overturn all legitimate expressions of
authority, it would be best to utilize America’s Founding Fathers as the
overriding example. For as with the citizen’s relationship with government,
the obedience of students to their teachers ought not be absolute, but
rather limited to matters bearing directly upon classroom discipline not
infringing upon the jurisdictions of other social authorities, namely
parents.
Come the first day of school when these proto-socialist
thugs will stand before their classes compelling students to surrender
their property for the sake of the community, these students ought to
respectfully refuse to comply with this lyceum larceny, clutching their
notebooks and pencils in their little hands in defiance. Better yet, since
the public schools seem so bent on wallowing in the axioms of Communism,
perhaps these pedagogical subversives should be taught how socialist economies
really work.
The equal distribution and access to resources for
all has always been the grand delusion promoted by compulsory collectivism.
In practice, this has ended up meaning all those living under its yoke
end up equally miserable. Workers realize there is little reason to exert
themselves since there’s no opportunity to get ahead honestly.
Students could symbolize this universal truth by
refusing to provide any supplies whatsoever. If they do, they should be
the shoddiest they can find, like those non-Crayolas that smear across
paper. If students don’t own their own supplies as the list indicates,
you can’t really chastise them for not brining to class what the school
fails to recognize as the legitimate property of the student.
At the Libertarian convention, Neal Boortz noted
that the purpose of any school is to inoculate its ideological perspective
into the minds of its students. With schools making these kinds of material
demands of students’ families, little question remains as to the ideas
embraced by government educators and why parents should withdraw their
children from these institutions if at all possible.
© 2002
Frederick Meekins- All Rights Reserved
Frederick Meekins is a student in the distance
education program of Trinity Theological Seminiary pursuing an MA in Apologetics
and Philosophy. He has published commentaries on websites such as WorthyNews.Com,
The Freedom of Religion Coalition of Maryland, and the Christian Portal
Homepage and in newspapers such as the Prince George's Journal.
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