PARENTS: Not school culprits

Marty Peterson, Director of McClure Public Policy Research Center and former UI lobbyist, recently slammed parents as “the party that actually deserves most of the blame for failing schools” and suggested “using test scores to determine whether parents are allowed a tax deduction for their child.”

Hogwash!

Parents should be praised for boot-strapping school tax burdens and for fighting faulty education reform. They get out the YES vote in 85 of 114 districts needing supplemental levies.

Yet Peterson used ink, oxygen and his prestigious position to abuse the bedrock of Idaho education. He asked, “Students spend less than 15 percent of their time in school. How about the remaining 85 percent?”

The 15 percent is stupid math, Marty, calculated on a 24/7, yearlong basis. During prime learning hours, schools control our kids 65 percent of the time in the mandated “education” year.

Put the blame where it belongs, Marty.

The Idaho legislature sets the K-12 appropriation, a number woefully behind a promised “replacement for shifting property taxes” of about $500 million.

As a result, districts charge unconstitutional fees to register and take classes and run supplemental levies.

The legislature establishes curriculum and length of year, not parents. Districts cut days for “staff- training” and “weather,” not parents. Educators continually change testing, teacher standards and questionable technology, not parents. Parents are not failures, Marty. They are Idaho’s public education heroes.

Peterson accomplished one thing: He informed readers about the quality of thinking in UI executive offices and the McClure Center.

RUSSELL JOKI

Meridian