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Katy Citizen Watchdog$ |
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We’re Taxpayers. It’s Our Money. |
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An Explanation Of Outcome Based Education - Part I |
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Often I am asked why I am so persistent in challenging every single thing the Katy Independent School District does. The answer to that question lies in my belief that the effort to reform and restructure public education includes an agenda that if everyone understood, there would be rioting in the streets. The restructuring of education manifests itself in all sorts of ways, and some are quite obvious, and others are obscure. Suffice it to say that I believe that just about ALL school district matters are tied to this restructuring effort. Opposing the recent bond initiative was important to me because so much of the bond money winds up supporting and perpetuating activities that are not revealed to the public and which instead enable the dumbing down of our children.
It is my sincere belief that there are those who have joined together to take away from our young people the right to an academic education. I have seen proof of that effort in many places. Some who are pushing this agenda are deliberate and guilty. Others are just witless pawns. Together these people have manipulated the system and are already successful in their efforts. I, however, cannot simply let it go. I am compelled to fight them on every front. I have worked on my explanation of the agenda for a long time. It begins with my attempt to explain what it is that has been changed over the years so that parents and students can understand what is wrong. The Katy Independent School District is a microcosm of the national and international agenda and is analogous to the larger systemic change.
There are many components to the agenda. It includes curriculum which is primary, but it also includes funding, and building construction, and taxing, and legislation, and political beliefs, and power, and greed.
An effort to briefly explain Outcome Based Education (OBE) is not an easy task. (Outcome Based Education is the system of education that we now have in our Katy schools.) Whatever components are explained only create more questions and requests for additional information. However, to help parents with understanding, one must start somewhere.
The term “outcome based education” was created by William Spady, a social scientist who never taught school. His idea for changing education was originally phrased in terms of mastery/non-mastery learning, but when the public realized the significance of that concept, Spady changed the term to OBE. Since OBE has become anathema to parents, other terms have been created by educationists. Restructured education, educational reform, and outcome derivatives are all examples. The list is endless, but the message and the meaning are the same.
The idea for outcome based education is a rehash of secular progressive educational initiatives that have been tried in our country and others for decades. OBE ideas were tried in the ‘30’s, the 50’s, the ‘70’s. They didn’t work then; they were discarded, and now they are being recycled. Those who want this agenda never give up.
Outcome based education is a catch-all phrase that PARENTS choose to keep because it encompasses a great many ideas and factors that have come together to influence education. The ideas have been around for a long time. Putting them in place in public (government) schools has only been possible in the last twenty years. The initiative from the federal government began anew in the 1980’s with the writing of A Nation At Risk and was followed in 1989 with the National Governor’s Conference which was controlled by Bill Clinton, then governor of Arkansas. Additionally these ideas are being pushed by such groups as the Carnegie Foundation, the Annenberg Foundation, the Texas Sid Richardson Foundation, the American Association of School Administrators, the Association of Secondary School Principals, the Parent Teacher Association, the National School Boards Association, and the Texas Business and Education Council. Their boards are populated by liberal thinkers who embrace in varying degrees, among other ideas, one-worldism or globalism, environmental extremism, multiculturalism, population control, radical feminism, acceptance of lifestyles that most people believe are immoral, and the development of a socialized workforce and health care system.
In addition to these foundations a group calling itself the Business Roundtable is also supporting these ideas. Among the members of this elitist group are most of the major oil companies and most major corporations in the US. The group operates at the CEO level, and so most employees do not realize their company’s efforts or the effects of those efforts. These companies selectively indoctrinate certain employees at the manager level or above, and utilize them to further the Business Roundtable’s agenda. The Katy ISD has had a Business Roundtable employee on its Board for over ten years, and candidates who work for Business Roundtable companies are always trying to get elected to the Board. It is difficult for the one who is there to retire until someone is elected to take his place. Business Roundtable employees also populate most Board committees in sufficient numbers to direct activities.
Perhaps the reader has noted the increased influence of businesses in public schools. While I was a member of the Katy ISD board, business members were placed on Campus Action Teams, and by law (when counting the business and community members) there are as many of them as there are parents. (Remember that school “law” in Texas is pretty much generated by the vested interest lobbyists representing school administrators.) The business members of the CAT also do not even have to reside in the school district. In Katy ISD there has also been created the Partners in Education Group which includes business members who are solicited to become very involved in our schools. KISD has also created the Katy Business Promise with funding from Shell Oil. Corporate business people also are encouraged to become “mentors” for students. The mentoring program was begun when I was on the School Board. I objected to the program because the superintendent at the time refused to allow the names of the corporate mentors to be released to the parents of the students who were being mentored. I personally would not have wanted someone spending time with one of my children if I couldn’t know his/her name.
These groups are generally perceived as something worthwhile, but if one reads the fine print, understands who is involved and what their agenda is, one might not be so excited about their initiatives. In my opinion they are not in our schools to help with academic learning, but instead are there to manipulate belief systems.
Parents need to step back and think about this influx of businesses in public schools. What businesses were involved in YOUR public school when you were a child? Schools have always been the purview of a principal, the teachers and the parents of the students. Why should that situation have changed? What benefit is there for school children to have “businesses” directing their traffic? How did we let these people into our schools? Their interests are not altruistic. They have placed themselves in our midst because financially they have a vested interest, and that interest is self-serving and not wholesome in my view.
In addition to these well-funded private groups, the National Education Association (NEA) as well as state teacher’s colleges have been instrumental in bringing this initiative together. The NEA and the teacher’s colleges have the motivating force of job protection at their core. It is always wise to follow the money when this type of movement appears. Textbook and software publishers also have a vested interest in this movement.
These groups have been able to initiate the idea of OBE through the federal Department of Education. Certain states were targeted initially to begin this process. Among these states were California, Illinois, Colorado, Oregon, Washington, North Carolina, Kentucky, Minnesota, Oklahoma, Pennsylvania, and Arkansas. Some of these states, like Kentucky, were very unwise and bought into this agenda wholesale. In no state were parents and others, who understood the initiative, able to permanently stop it. (Please read Educating for the New World Order by Bev Eakman, or The Deliberate Dumbing Down of America by Charlotte Iserbyt, or Brave New Schools by Berit Kjos for more information about federal involvement and the federal government’s influence on the curriculum in individual states.)
Texas Democrat Governor Mark White and his Select Committee on Education (SCOPE) (chaired by none other than Ross Perot) began this movement in Texas. The essential elements called for in 1984 were the beginning of the effort to dumb down Texas public education and ultimately our children.
This initiative was able to grow under a Republican governor who apparently did not understand the movement. Democrat Governor Ann Richards gave it new impetus by bringing in Skip Meno ( a New Yorker schooled in the process) as the Texas Commissioner of Education. In March 1991 the State Board of Education developed the “Long-Range Plan for Public Education.” Our elected State Board of Education member and a Republican, Jack Christie, helped develop the plan. It is chock full of OBE ideas. The long range plan that was approved in 1996 for the next five years is simply a continuation of this same bunch of junk. There is most certainly another one that has taken the place of the 1996 plan. Don Mercer, the curriculum director in KISD under Superintendent Hugh Hayes, admitted to a KISD board member that he and the superintendent, Hugh Hayes, were told to implement OBE in Katy schools by the Texas Education Agency. Does anyone have any reason to believe that the TEA did not keep issuing the same orders, even though we now have a different superintendent and a different head of curriculum? Even though the School Board in 1995 was very clear when they hired Leonard Merrell that they wanted to get rid of OBE and all that it entails, Dr. Merrell and his administrators that he has brought in from the outside at every opportunity, have totally implemented the OBE agenda in all Katy ISD schools.
Outcome Based Education is the means by which the School To Work agenda has been implemented in our public schools. The School to Work Act was passed, implemented and sunseted so that it’s purposes and intent would become obscure. It is difficult now to even find a copy of this Federal legislation! If you wish to see the STW legislation go to this website: http://members.aol.com/eddocweekly/4U.html The School to Work Act along with others that are part of this process are listed on the left of the site. If you have further interest in this subject, there are more articles there. STW attempts to provide some form of vocational training for all students while they are still in public school. Various excuses are given for the impetus, but mostly when children are not academically educated, vocational training is their last resort for obtaining a lifetime job skill.
Make no mistake; the agenda is to dumb down 80 to 85% of all children. As our State Board of Education member, Jack Christie, said, “We don’t need Shakespearean educated students any more. They can’t get a job. We need vocationally trained people.”
He’s talking about YOUR children!
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Mary McGarr, Katy Citizen Watchdog$ |
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Date: 11/15/2006 |
