The Terrible Choice and Other Peoples' Children
For much of our history, Americans have operated under a simple premise -- we will educate other people's children.
Educating your own offspring is an old idea; human beings have done it for most of history. This has had many implications. You can't teach your own children things you don't know. If you're not wealthy (or even wealthy-ish), you can't hire people smarter than yourself to teach your offspring; if you are well-to-do, you can hire those smarter people -- and since they're your personal employees, you can tell them what sorts of things you want your children to be taught.
But from the beginning, some American communities provided schools for all their children. The system was not remotely perfect from Day One (for one thing, it was only for white children). But the idea was established -- as members of the community, we join to educate all children. We join to educate other people's children.
This commitment was part of a long, slow-motion argument. Only educated folks should be full citizens. No, every person should be a full citizen. Therefore all folks should be educated. It's a simple progression, but it took us a couple of centuries to work our way through it.
It is a point of American pride that we have set that task for ourselves. It is a point of American shame that we have tried to weasel out of it.
Our commitment to educating other people's children has collided with the class divide and the racial divide, like an Evel Education Knievel who can't quite clear the row of school buses, stacked too high and wrapped in a big sign that says, "I've got mine, Jack."
If I've got to spend money educating other people's children, can't I just buy them the absolute minimum? I don't really want to spend the money to educate Those Peoples' Children. What -- you want to take my tax dollars to educate Black Peoples' Children?!
Over the past several decades, our unwillingness to educate other peoples' children has stretched and trained the system. Well, parts of the system. Just as the rich have made sure they have good security and fine infrastructure in their isolated communities, they have also made sure that their own children are well-educated. But as the public system (you know -- the one for educating other peoples' children) has The Terrible Choice and Other Peoples' Children | Peter Greene: