25 October 2011

By Bill Korach

In the new bio Steve Jobs,  by Walter Isaacson, Jobs says: ” Until teacher’s unions were broken, there was almost no hope for educational reform.” By any measurement, Jobs made Apple a phenomenal success. Apple’s market value is greater than any company on the face of the earth including Exxon. Apple’s products are hot and the Apple stores are packed even the middle of a sluggish economy. Apple has been a huge contributor to the public school usage of computers and access to the internet, millions of Mac’s have been distributed to public schools. So when Jobs attacks unions for protecting bad teachers and preventing principals from hiring good teachers, he speaks from profound experience. Jobs tended to support Democrats, but on this issue, he was pure Tea Party.

Since the founding of the teacher’s unions and the Department of Education in the 1970′s, a creature of the teacher’s unions, educational spending has skyrocketed, while student performance has plummeted. This year the DOE will spend $80 Billion, and not one cent will educate a single student. Instead, the DOE mandates politically correct textbooks, supports UN global mandates over the Constitution and provides political cover for the unions. Last year, high school seniors scored the lowest SAT’s in history. The performance of American students in math and science ranks 25th among developed nations according to a 2010 McKinsey study.

Textbooks that trash America’s Judeo-Christian Heritage, promote Islamic propaganda, a socialist welfare, and UN’s agenda 21 are a product of the unholy marriage of the DOE and the union. Break the union stranglehold on American schools or continue to watch the deterioration of our schools and our country. Steve Jobs was right about more than Apple, he was right about America’s schools. We should heed his advice. Read more about our failing schools in The Report Card