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America's Growing Educational and Job Nightmare |
| By
Frosty Wooldridge
Most Americans
over 40 witnessed the dumbing down of our schools in the 70s, 80s, 90s
and into this century. As a teacher, I was' encouraged’ to pass
minority students who did not work for excellence nor did they study
toward academic success. Students quickly learned they didn’t
have to study for learning or passing grades. Thus, they coasted
from grade school without effort and finished high school with spurious
diplomas. Recently, Lou Dobbs of CNN, presented Americans with
some disturbing facts on our schools. Fifty percent of black and Hispanic teenagers do not
graduate from high school. The United States does not stand in the
top ten industrialized nations of high school graduation rates. Robert
Reich, former labor secretary, said, “Our children are not going to do
as well as we are doing because they won’t be able to command decent
paying jobs. And that’s the first time in many years since the
Depression.” The facts show American students rank 28th in math
while trailing China, Finland and Korea. America is no longer the most
college educated nation in the world. Eric Hanushek, Hoover
Institution, Stanford said, “I think it tells us something about
the long-run prospects if we don’t in fact take a new tact (sic) and
improve our schools. Other countries are pushing very hard at developing
their human resources and skills of their populations.” According to the Dobbs’ report, 37 million people
live in poverty. Functional illiteracy affects over 35 million
Americans. One in five American children lives below the poverty
level. Each year, 1.5 million unwed women give birth. What are the inevitable results? The American
Dream degrades to lower and lower expectations. Wages stagnant, mortgage
defaults rise, 47 million Americans lack health insurance. Frustration
and crime accelerate. What’s causing the demise of our educational
systems? Four aspects of our Constitution erode every single day
of the year because of massive, unrelenting legal and illegal
immigration. What does it take to run a successful American
society? First, it takes a highly educated populace. Second,
everyone must buy into and adhere to a similar moral code. Third, each
citizen must appreciate and abide by the same ethical system and
finally, a single language is imperative to discuss, debate and evolve
solutions for the common good. We continue losing all aspects with
massive immigration from Third World countries. America is a constitutional republic invented by very
intelligent men such as Hamilton, Madison, Adams and Jefferson! However, it takes a highly educated public to advance that brilliant
piece of governance. We’re losing that ability on all fronts. A prime example stems from a report by the Rocky
Mountain News, May 16, 2005, ‘What Happened?’
www.rockymountainnews.com: “In 1999, 5,663 students enrolled in Denver
Public Schools. In 2005, only 1,884 graduated from high school. That
studied (sic) showed more than 65 percent flunked out or dropped out. What caused such a massive failure rate?
The report showed that
30,000 illegal alien kids attended school with little to no ability to
speak English. Their parents suffered functional illiteracy in
English and Spanish. Additionally, the classroom experience
suffered such degradation that one in five teachers quit or transferred
out of DPS system every nine month cycle.’ With 1.3 million illegal alien children in schools
across America and hundreds of thousands of ‘anchor babies’
born to illegal mothers who cannot and do not speak English, it’s
little wonder America's classrooms suffer similar problems across the
country. Writer Vicky Davis brings this national educational
and job nightmare to a burning focal point when she said, “Assume the
following are true: America has a population of about 300 million people.
Minimum wage is between $5.00 and $7.00 per hour. A computer programmer
makes an average salary of about $60,000 per year. Davis declares facts about overpopulated countries
like India and China. She knocks you upside the head with the following
realities facing American workers: “China has about 1.3 billion people,” she said.
“A common wage for a manufacturing job is about 50 cents per hour.
India has over 1.1 billion people. A computer programmer makes
between $7,000 and $10,000 per year.” Question 1: If you were a corporation, where would
you locate to ensure the highest profits assuming that there are no
barriers to re-importation of your products and services back into the
U.S.? Answer: China or India. Question 2: Will more education for America’s
children solve the problem of the wage differential between China, India
and the United States? If so, explain how. Answer: Frightening! Question 3: Consider the following as one option for
solving the problem of the wage differential: Encourage massive
immigration of foreign workers - labor and professional into America so
that the cost of labor decreases by simple supply and demand rules. How many people would the United States have to import to equalize wages
between China, India and the United States? Answer: You
don’t want to know because you’ll get sick to your stomach. Question 4: Assuming that more education won’t
solve the problem and the selected remedy is to lower wages in the
United States to match those of India and China, consider the following
and answer the questions... Question 5: One argument used to justify free trade
with China is that American consumers reap the benefits of being able to
buy cheaper products produced by the Chinese. Considering that
American workers are also American consumers, explain how cheaper
products are a benefit to the consumer if the consumer must work for
wages that are competitive with the Chinese and Indians and they must
pay for the increased infrastructure costs and loss of natural resources
to accommodate the increased population. Question 6: Who benefits most from ‘Free Trade’
and the global economy? Question 7: Define the vision you have for the future
of America and for America’s children. Is this vision possible
if the U.S. policy is ‘Free Trade’ and competition in the global
economy?” With Davis’ sobering pop quiz, how do you think
America’s Middle Class will survive the free trade onslaught with the
continuing development of a highly uneducated population? Short answer: It won’t. It will no longer remain
the Middle Class. It will become the lower class. Why? We don’t have enough educated people willing
to take action to stop insourcing, offshoring, outsourcing and
downgrading of American jobs. Who did this? Look to the president of the United
States and Congress. Last week, senators Teddy Kennedy and Specter
promoted Senate Bill 1932 bringing another 350,000 H-1B visas foreign
workers into the USA with green cards to work American jobs. That’s on top of the already 1.1 million
legal immigrants they approve annually. And, that’s on top of the 1.0
million H-1B, H-2B and L-1 visas ALREADY HERE! Bush did not raise
a finger to stop last week’s addition of another 350,000 of that
insanity. He must get a kick out of seeing Americans lose their
jobs to foreigners! In the meantime, even Democratic Senator Byrd of West
Virginia got so sick of the 350,000 H-1B visas that he offered an
amendment to strip the bill of the visas. Your Senate voted to delete
Byrd’s amendment and passed the 350,000 H-1B visas by 84 to 14 votes.
Your own senators voted to screw 350,000 American workers out of a job. It leads me to the following quote by Mark Twain,
“Sometimes I wonder whether the world is being run by smart people who
are putting us on or by imbeciles who really mean it.” |
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