Are Public Schools The Last Domino to Fall?

I had the opportunity to speak at the Colorado Association of School Boards Annual Convention upon assuming the Presidency of that Board and organization. Here are my remarks from that day:

Confidence in our government and confidence in our public institutions are at historic lows. One by one our public institutions and our leaders have seen their influence and their role diminished in our society--we no longer trust our public institutions to be forces of good in our lives--and that, sadly, includes our public schools.

The questions we must ask, as school board members, are, “Are public schools the last dominos to fall? And if so, will it spell the end of the great American experiment of democracy?” “Are we, in 2017, engaged in a struggle to preserve public school education in America and, by extension, our democracy?” I believe we are. And today, I want to talk about how, as board members, we must connect, educate and lead our communities, our state and our nation to preserve that institution.

While some might speak of the failures of public schools, I want to speak about the promise and the hope that public schools represent in America, and remember the voices in America’s past that have spoken about the important role of public school education in our democracy.

While some might speak about the imagined glory days of public schools and bemoan how far we have fallen, I want us to recognize what our public schools are doing remarkably well, acknowledge those areas where we may be falling short, while charting a path toward a better future.

While some might speak about competition in K-12 education as though it were a business in the free market and subject to the forces of the marketplace, I want to speak about the important role our schools play in not only preparing our students for college and career, but in preparing them to be citizens of this great democracy.

For it is an almost constant refrain—our schools are failing, we’re not meeting the needs of our students, we’re spending too much, or spending too much on the wrong things, our teachers are not doing their jobs and we’re not preparing our students.

I reject the idea that our schools are failing. I will continue to reject it as long as there are individuals in the Telluride classrooms who work hard every day on behalf of every student. I will continue to reject it as long as the 50,000 teachers, administrators, and board members in your districts, in our almost 1,900 public schools across our state, are working so hard every day for our over 900,000 public school students.

When some of our elected leaders speak only of failures, when our state leaders consistently underfund our educational system from preschool to higher education year after year, is it any wonder that seeds of doubt have been sown in our communities about the successes we have achieved in public school education?

With so many players in the K-12 sphere, on both sides of the ideological divide, is it any wonder that we have a fragmented landscape that divides us more than unites us? One that divides us into pro-charter and anti-charter camps, pro-voucher and anti-voucher, private versus public, rural versus urban, big versus small, rich versus poor.

Our communities too often do not hear the reality of public schools today and we must educate them about the work we accomplish every day: we educate more students than ever before; we educate a more diverse set of students than ever before; and despite ever increasing challenges facing our students, families, and schools, we continue to care, nurture and educate every student, every day, in every classroom across our state.

But be assured that I do not see the world through rose colored glasses. While our schools are not failing, we must acknowledge that they are challenged as never before. Some of the challenges are of our own making—others reflect our choices as a society and the priorities we set as a nation.

We graduate a record percentage of students, yet leave too many behind.

We struggle to attract new teachers, while designing accountability systems that discourage them, pay salaries that do not allow them to live in the communities in which they teach, and limit their independence to teach.

We ask schools to do more, while paying for less. We perpetuate a school funding system that accentuates the economic divide between the haves and the have nots, while consistently underfunding education overall.

It seems that we have forgotten our obligation to provide for the common good, as John Adams, one of our founding fathers said, “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.” His words are as true today as they were in the 18th century.

We have allowed others to tell our story. We have failed to recognize our obligations to each other. We have forgotten how important our public schools are for our democracy.

I would ask us to remember the words of Franklin Delano Roosevelt, who said, “Democracy cannot succeed unless those who express their choice are prepared to choose wisely. The real safeguard of democracy, therefore, is education.” Roosevelt recognized the role that public school education plays in a robust democracy, “It has been well said that no system of government gives so much to the individual or exacts so much as a democracy. Upon our educational system must largely depend the perpetuity of those institutions upon which our freedom and our security rest. To prepare each citizen to choose wisely and to enable him to choose freely are paramount functions of the schools in a democracy.”

For it is in our public schools that we gather together the disparate threads of individuals and weave the fabric of a democracy.

I ask you again: are public schools the last dominoes to fall among our public institutions? Or will they be the solid foundation on which we rebuild and renew our democracy? What will be the legacy for which our generation is remembered?

It is for us, those of us who lead and govern our local schools, to decide the answer to those questions.

We have the opportunity and the obligation to lead the effort in pushing back against these divisive voices that label our schools as failures, our teachers as inadequate, and that would strip our public schools of resources.

We must lead in uniting Colorado behind a common goal and put an end to the divisive conversations that, ultimately, do not solve our most pressing problems, nor elevate our students, their teachers, and their schools.

We must lead in addressing our shortcomings honestly and creatively, compromising with our ideological adversaries for the benefit of our children, and work to create a well-funded and equitable school finance program.

We must lead to create the highest achieving and most equitable public schools in the world right here in Colorado. Schools that graduate all students fully prepared to participate in our democracy, that create opportunities for all children not based on the color of their skin, their zip code, the language they speak, or their country of birth. I share Representative Rankin’s vision: in five years we want people to compare Finland to Colorado--and recognize where Finland comes up short.

Does this seem impossible? Sometimes it does. Between the BS factor, the random acts of intervention by our friends in the legislature, the impacts of TABOR and Gallagher, I would not blame us if we shrink from the challenge.

But I want to take you back to Rice University in 1962 when a young president, filled with optimism, challenged the country to place a man on the moon by the end of the decade. Kennedy said, “We choose to go to the Moon in this decade and do the other things, not because they are easy, but because they are hard; because that goal will serve to organize and measure the best of our energies and skills, because that challenge is one that we are willing to accept, one we are unwilling to postpone, and one we intend to win.”

I would ask you if the challenge of creating great public schools, schools that lift all students regardless of where they live, where they have come from, or where they are going, is not a challenge that measures the best of our skills and energies and one that we are unwilling to postpone, and one that we intend to win? I think so.

We rose to the task in 1962 and we put hearts, minds, our souls, and yes, our tax dollars into that effort.

We must do that again today for public school education and be equally as bold as our forebears in the 1960’s. Those of us gathered here this morning must be the leaders to unite our state behind the best, most equitable, and highest achieving public schools in the world. We must be the leaders in public schools that occupy the center of our communities and our democracy. We must be the leaders for public schools in Colorado in 2018 and beyond for the sake of our democracy, and our children.

As President Kennedy said, "If not us, who? If not now, when?" Colleagues, it is our time to lead. Thank you for this opportunity to join with you in this great effort.

Paul Reich

12.4.17

CASB 2017 Annual Conference Speech