I scoured the websites of all the Massachusetts gubernatorial candidates and could not find one that matched my agenda. So I wrote one. Enjoy!
Quality Education for Massachusetts.
Massacusetts deserves educational equality. For too long some of our citizens have enjoyed the best education has to offer, while others languish in educational programs mired in 20th-Century thinking. It’s time to change that.
Tests for all!
It is clear from Massachusetts’ experience that standardized testing is a boon to all students. And yet many students in the Commonwealth remain untested.
While public school students enjoy testing for at least two weeks a year, private school students in the Commonwealth are denied this best practice of twenty-first century education. Why? Given what we know about the benefits of standardized testing, why do the crooks in charge of private schools continue to deny this benefit to their students? This is not just educational malpractice; it’s consumer fraud. Private school parents pay many thousands of dollars expecting a high-quality education for their students, and yet private school administrators continue to deny these parents the state-of-the-art educational practice that public school students enjoy for free.
Private school parents do not deserve this discrimination! Testing for all!
Lift the cap!
Urban students–well, those who speak English as a first language and do not have any special needs, anyway–have been enjoying the benefits of charter school education for twenty years. These academies of innovation represent what is best for students, and yet far too many of our suburban students are stuck in hidebound old-model schools staffed by union hacks. Why, these suburban failure academies not only serve special needs students, they also frequently have administrators who have never served their country as part of Teach for America! This educational malpractice must end. It’s high time that our wealthiest students got the same opportunity for charter school excellence that their lower-income peers enjoy for free. Therefore, we must lift the cap, and allow unlimited new charter schools in the Massachusetts communities with the highest per-capita income.
Fear not, oppressed residents of Weston, Wayland, and Manchester-By-The-Sea! Help is on the way! Soon you too can enjoy the nimble, responsive, free-from-union-constraints charter schools! Gone will be your “school committees!” Say hello to self-appointing governing boards accountable to no one!
The future of our Commonwealth depends on excellent education for all of our citizens. We must stop the educational oppression of our highest-earning citizens and level the playing field!
But it’s not so hypothetical. A bunch of parents in Marblehead already have set up a charter school for their darlings.