As Shane Voss appropriately noted in The Durango Herald and The Journal on June 28, state politicians continue to propose legislation that threatens public education. Even high-performing charter schools, such as those in Durango, are facing threats.
As a result of the work of teachers and staff members, motivated leadership, highly qualified district administration and our elected board, Durango has avoided the disasters faced by other districts. The never-ending struggle for adequate funding from the Legislature continues and retaining our talented teachers will need constant attention.
In the summer of 1998, as part of the Durango Education Association leadership team, I attended the CEA/NEA workshop in Steamboat Springs, where one of the speakers presented a dire warning about the Republican candidate for governor of Colorado. The concern was that he represented the tip of the spear in a nationwide effort aimed at killing public education.
This effort was couched in the creation of charter schools and voucher systems, allowing taxpayer dollars to be spent on sending children to private and parochial schools. The ultimate, hidden agenda was the privatization of education.
At first blush, charter schools seemed acceptable enough, but they served as a gateway to “privatization” and “academies.” Colorado was the third state to enact a charter school statute in 1993. At the time, several progressive educators felt that some choice was healthy. But as we see throughout the U.S., the end result has been an effort to gut our public school system and create academies that cater to the privileged few, and to privatize education to make a profit.
The advent of consumerism in education seems self-contradictory.
One of the four pillars of our democracy is free, K-12 secular education in public schools, as well as a free press, the rule of law and citizen politicians. Education is a multi-billion dollar endeavor and capitalists, by pushing the idea of school choice, are eager to get their hands on some of those dollars. The “great American experiment” aimed at equality for all would be severely challenged, if not ultimately destroyed, at the expense of children.
A major part of the problem with the enactment of privatization and academies is that many states do not require teachers at these schools to be licensed. Another glaring weakness is that if a school is privatized, and funded privately, those schools could avoid federal guidelines in reference to discrimination, ADA and equality laws.
As we see in several states, the funding for public schools has been radically slashed over the past couple of decades to direct taxpayer dollars to private schools and academies. In Durango, we have been lucky to successfully deal with various pushes for charter schools and resist some of the more dangerous threats, such as the one posed by Hillsdale College’s “Classical Academies” approach, which is not a secular one.
We have also been able to avoid the harmful incursions of the Moms for Liberty movement, a blatant attempt to ban books. Such attempts would eliminate diversity, equity and inclusion in our public schools. In essence, they are part of the formula to whitewash the history of our nation, deny science, push Creationism, praise misogyny and, basically, eliminate entire groups of citizens.
Durango should be proud to have a school district that is so astute in reflecting our community and its needs and is forward thinking. It is not by accident that we are here.
The hard work, dedication and talent within our public schools has crafted a school system that meets the needs of our children, our community and a just nation. We must remain vigilant and work hard to maintain not only appropriate funding, but also resist the long-term scheme to remove one of the pillars of our democracy, public education.
Gene Orr is a retired educator with 43 years of experience teaching social studies and history in middle school, high school and college in Durango. He has a master’s degree in education and lives in Kline.
