Comments about ‘Education is key to easing poverty’

Education is the foundation of democracy and political stability. It is far cheaper to educate them than to fight them.

The Taliban hate public schools, as does North Korea and a host of other dictators around the world. China controls the internet very closely.

and we need to look at our own country in this regard. There are too many sub-standard schools in our cities and in rural poor areas. Now, with state budgets underwater, education funding is being cut, teachers are being laid off, classroom sizes are growing and tuition help for college is getting scaled back. Without a manufacturing base our best hope for the future is a highly educated populace. We're going the wrong direction.

So, if education is the key, lets admit defeat and end the war on poverty. Then we can put the time, effort, and money from that war into education-beginning with our own. It would be money much better spent.

I whole-heartedly agree.

However,

I'm conflicted about sending tax money abroad.

We have so many needs here at home.

Think globally, act locally.

Suggested Reading:

3 Cups of Tea.

Yet, if we were to believe scripture, the key to prosperity is righteousness.

If everybody had a college degree, how much would they earn working at McDonalds? We will always need less skilled jobs and low wages for them.

Who can argue that the Developing World wouldn't be better served by better education?

It would improve people and institutions. It would almost certainly lower the birth rate and the crime rate in the Developing World.

But if ending poverty there is the goal, getting there via improved education is a 20-year plan.

To which I ask, what about poverty in the here and now? What are the 1 and 5-year plans to alleviate poverty in the Developing World?

My answer: Improve civil society in the poorest countries. Develop the rule of law and the institutions to protect it. Allow private ownership of property.

Other possible answers: Follow the Korean and Chinese models.

Remember, 55 years ago Korea was basically an African country in terms of poverty. Only, Korea was divided by the most active DMZ in the world and was emerging from a horrific civil war fueled by the Cold War powers.

Now Korea is developed to the point where it has greater broadband Internet penetration than the USA.

Their way out wasn't education per se, but investment in oligarchical chaebols. The Chinese took a similar approach.

It's really a circle isn't it. How many educated people are living in poverty? How many impoverished students are truly able to focus enough on education to make a real difference in their lives? A vicious circle, I think. Look up Maslow's hierarchy.

Better still, look up the Book of Proverbs. There are clear directions there on how to be rich and how to be poor.

Give a man a fish and you feed him for a day. Teach a man to fish and you feed him for a lifetime.

An educated populace in poverty can actually be more dangerous. Right now we have plenty of educated computer tech guys and financial planners without jobs. College grads now looking for jobs only to get work at fast food places if they are lucky. An educated underclass gets restless but with that education they have the tools to revolt or transform society, perhaps for the worse. An educated underclass is what we have to fear. We have to have something out there for those that get the education that is beyond minimum wage work. For those less educated or inclined not to educate themselves in "book smarts" we need to reestablish our manufacturing non-skilled job base. There was a time when a person with an 8th grade education could find decent work or a trade where they could support their families. This is the transformation that needs to take place.

A few posters keep talking about "five year plans". If I recall my history correctly it was Stalin who approached problems in that way. He really succeeded in making his people happy didn't he?

Well, if you don't know, he didn't.

What is needed is an atmosphere of freedom and personal enterprise within that free context. That is how Britain and the United States became wealthy. There was plenty of education in the Soviet Union but neither the freedom nor the motivation to put it to use.

"We pretend to work and the government pretends to pay us" factory workers in the USSR used to say.

Then there are different subjects to learn. Some are very practical, while others are a waste of time, resources and energy.

Define "Education"... We have many definitions yet we have conflicting results. Please define "Education" so we can all be on the same page.

Public education is democracy. "Democracy" is too close to "Democrat" in Utah. So, public education is the worst kind. Home schooling is the best. Ask Howard Stephenson.

Public education is NOT democracy. it is just something that is publically funded because education is beneficial,

MOST polical systems and ideologies, even primative ones, have a from of public education.

AND the TONS money spent on inner city schools has PROVEN thar money si NOT the biggest answer, but cultural or environmental ot attitudinal are the biggest answers.


Funny how THE LIBERAL ELITE love to talk about public education,

but send THEIR children to private schools.

what does that tell you?

"TONS of money spent on inner city schools????"

Have you ever lived outside of Utah?

Just how does one get ATTITUDINAL change?
(EDUCATION)
My father-in-law was an education professor at a Univ. When my husband and I moved out of state, we asked him "what should we look for as we are house shopping to make sure we buy in a high quality school district?" He said, "it is very simple. Buy in the most affluent area you can afford." We did and he was right. Inner city schools are ALWAYS underfunded.

(from a liberal whose children attended public school)

IT is a well KNOWN fact that, per pupil,m inner schools some of most HIGHEST SPENDING.

Living in affluent areas,

you WILL notice a different ATTITUDE toward education, and educational ecpectations,

YOU WILL notice a difference in cultural valuation of education.

YOu WILL notice you are in environment that values education , that has HIGHER aspirations and expectations, has stronger family unit.

Who would NOT want their children in such an environment and culture.

In the September 2009 issue of Popular Science, they profile 8 teens who are science whiz kids. Among the qualifications, patents held or pending.

Of the eight, 3 were home-schooled.

You are right on the money with this editorial. We spend billions of dollars on obsolete F-22 fighters and other weapons, when the most effective weapon for peace would cost much less--put kids on school. How can we think that nations with so many out of school will ever get over the development hump without first giving every child an education? Thanks for this.

Example:
In New York there is a huge disparity between the spending on education between the poorest children to the richest children. In the inner city schools the per student expenditure is $5590, while in a suburban school the per student expenditure reaches close to $11,000 The students in both school systems have the same educational needs, but the student of an inner city school receives only half of the amount of the student in a suburban school.
Additonally, inner city schools actually need MORE funding than suburban schools because the needs of the children are greater. Equal funding for unequal needs is not equality.