You read that headline and you think this cannot be – not in 2020. So it has to be a trick or a lie. It is neither. It may not be what they called it, but that is what it is – an endorsement of home schooling.
Certainly, this likely would never have happened without a worldwide pandemic that brought New York to its knees. The NYT would have gone on with their delusional support of their state’s public-school system costing per pupil on average $23,091. That is 89% above the national average as of 2017. The undying support of malfunctioning public schools rivals their unfettered support for unlimited abortion as something that cannot ever be questioned. In New York City, the average cost per pupil was even higher (as of 2017) at $25,199.
Needless to say it was quite shocking to read this position in the “Paper of Record.” Moreover, it was surprising the position was not being voiced by any of their litany of writers. Rather it was voiced on May 5 by James Bennet, the Editorial Page Editor. One cannot get any higher than that for something like this than perhaps the publisher.
Bennet does a daily summary called Opinion Today. This is due to the fact they think their readers cannot scroll all the way down to the editorials in the daily newspaper. They need the editorials in an easier format which provides Bennet the opportunity to humanize their daily writings attacking Trump and Republicans. He was lamenting his concern for his children getting properly educated via electronics as they are quarantined at home. Then he tells us he has a column by a writer who has a contrary view – an eighth grader.
Bennet writes “On reading the essay I was a little sorry to discover one reason the writer, Veronique Mintz, is happier with her schooling now is that she was unhappy with it before.” Let’s stop here for a second. This is the editor of the editorial page for the NYT. This is the paper every government employee who wants to leak information that should not be leaked, and they should be fired for doing so, goes to dish their info. This is the paper that the anchors of the major network news and CNN and MSNBC read in order to regurgitate as the gospel.
He just expressed shock — yes shock — that there are problems in the public schools causing legitimate students to gravely dislike their public-school experience. Maybe if he read someone other than his echo chamber he would know. Here is an idea for Mr. Bennet: hire Walt Williams. Mr. Williams writes about this subject all the time because he cares about minorities as he is one himself. In fact, the very next day (May 6th), Williams had a column on this subject. He cited that in the school year 2017-2018, there were an estimated 962,300 violent incidents in public schools nationwide. There were an additional 476,100 nonviolent incidents that year. Schools with 1,000 or more students have at least one police officer on duty. About 90% carry firearms. How many of these schools would you estimate are in NYC?
Bennet goes on to write “She describes chaotic middle-school classrooms in which some students can be so disruptive that ‘I have taken tests that included entire topics we never mastered, either because we were not able to get through the lesson or we couldn’t sufficiently focus.”
I can guarantee (I do not even have to research this) that Bennet’s editorial page and probably the lead editorial endorsed President Obama’s policy telling public school systems they cannot appropriately discipline the student troublemakers. It is not considered “woke” to enforce proper discipline. It would be racist. Letting students be violent or disruptive and not be removed from classroom settings is more important than students like Veronica receiving a proper education. This is exactly what happened in Parkland, Florida, that led to the mass murder at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School.
I suggest you go on and read the full column from Ms. Mintz. This is a 13-year-old in middle school. It is a tragic indictment of our current education system in major metropolitan areas that are run on behalf of the teachers’ union and administrators. Yet I cannot believe a single teacher endorses this mayhem or the restrictions for controlling behavior.
For me homeschooling is not a choice I made. I do believe that it is the right of a parent to do so without impediment from the existing educational structure. If my child were faced with experiencing what Ms. Mintz did, I would have my kid out of there in a flash. I would do whatever was necessary to educate them without the dangers they would be exposed to in these schools. That is without even giving consideration to the Left-wing political indoctrination going on today in most public schools.
After you read Ms. Mintz, you will come to the same conclusion that I did. The NYT times told parents that leaving their kids in the current school environment developed and harbored by the NYC school system is equivalent to child abuse. If you cannot afford a private school, home schooling is the only option. It may have been done in a backhanded way, but it was done.
Mr. Bennet, now that you are woke, maybe your paper can lead a crusade to reform the current structure and save tens of thousands of kids from endless harm at the hands of the NYC educational system.
(This column was written before Mr. Bennet was let go for running a column that the newsroom did not like despite the fact there has historically been a wall between the editorial page and the newsroom. Not anymore.)