"The whole people must take upon themselves the education of the whole people and be willing to bear the expenses of it. There should not be a district of one mile square, without a school in it, not founded by a charitable individual, but maintained at the public expense of the people themselves." -- John Adams

"No money shall be drawn from the treasury, for the benefit of any religious or theological institution." -- Indiana Constitution Article 1, Section 6.

"...no man shall be compelled to frequent or support any religious worship, place, or ministry whatsoever, nor shall be enforced, restrained, molested, or burthened in his body or goods, nor shall otherwise suffer on account of his religious opinions or belief; but that all men shall be free to profess, and by argument to maintain, their opinion in matters of religion, and that the same shall in no wise diminish enlarge, or affect their civil capacities." – Thomas Jefferson

Monday, May 6, 2013

Thank a Teacher

This week is National Teacher Appreciation Week. Tomorrow, Tuesday, May 7, 2013 is Teacher Appreciation Day.


From the Northeast Indiana Friends of Public Education
For all of our friends who are teachers, thank you for all that you have done and are doing to help your students learn and grow. Despite all of the teacher bashing and crazy education "reform" policies, every morning you put on your professional face and keep doing what you know is best for kids.

Please remember that those of us here at NEIFPE have your backs and are doing our best to push back against the policies that are harmful to public education.

While only one week per year is designated as Teacher Appreciation week where teachers are honored and given an extra donut, we want you to know that we value you every day.

It's about helping children...
"Somewhere along the line we've forgotten that education is not about getting this or that score on a test, but it is about enlarging hearts, minds, and spirits. It's about fulfilling human potential and unleashing human creativity. It's about helping children understand that the world is a place full of wonder, truly wonder-full. It's about giving children the tools they will need to participate in a complex global world where we can't imagine today what the next twenty years, let alone century, will bring" -- Susan Zimmerman in Comprehension Going Forward

Public Schools Take All Students.
"Bail out the bankers and bankrupt the school teachers -- we will still teach...I will never follow the lead of those who exclude the kids who need education the most so that my precious scores will rise. I will never line up with those whose idea of reform is the subtle segregation of the poor and desperate. I want no part of the American caste system." -- John Kuhn, Superintendent of superintendent of Perrin-Whitt Consolidated Independent School District, Perrin, Texas

"Accumulation of material should not stifle the students' independence. A society's competitive advantage will come, not from how well schools teach the multiplication and periodic tables, but from how well they stimulate the imagination and creativity...Imagination is more important than knowledge." -- Albert Einstein




Found in Susan Ohanian's Notable Quotes...
"The conditions that cause children to fail in school cannot be found in schools.
They can be found in the 91 percent of each childhood spent outside of school.
They cannot be fixed by schools and they cannot be fixed by preschools.
Children who fail in school don't need better schools. they need better childhoods."
—Rob Bligh, Feb. 23, 2013

A Feudal System
"A nation that destroys its systems of education, degrades its public information, guts its public libraries and turns its airwaves into vehicles for cheap, mindless amusement becomes deaf, dumb and blind. It prizes test scores above critical thinking and literacy. It celebrates rote vocational training and the singular, amoral skill of making money. It churns out stunted human products, lacking the capacity and vocabulary to challenge the assumptions and structures of the corporate state. It funnels them into a caste system of drones and systems managers. It transforms a democratic state into a feudal system of corporate masters and serfs." -- Chris Hedges, in Why the United States Is Destroying Its Education System, Common Dreams, 4/11/11





Also see...

National Teacher Day, May 7, 2013

PTA Teacher Appreciation Week

Teacher Appreciation

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Stop the Testing Insanity!


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