Religion & Liberty Online Archives

Educational Choice

December 26, 2012

Life-Long Learners or Good Test-Takers? An Orthodox Christian Critique

The video below of a second grade teacher in Providence, RI reading his letter of resignation has recently gone semi-viral with over 200,000 views on YouTube. What I would like to offer here is an Orthodox Christian critique of the anthropological assumptions that separate this teacher from the “edu-crats,” as he terms them, who in his district so strongly championed standardized testing-oriented education at the exclusion of all other methods and aims. Continue Reading...
November 29, 2012

Textbook Bubble-Boys

According to AEI author Mark Perry, there is another education-related “bubble” to worry about: the textbook bubble. He writes that this textbook bubble “continues to inflate at rates that make the U.S. Continue Reading...
November 19, 2012

Why Can’t We Fire Bad Teachers?

Timothy Dalrymple wonders whether education reform should be one of the great objectives for American Christians in the twenty-first century. Taking up that cause will require overcoming the intransigence of the teachers’ unions: Try firing an ineffective teacher.   Continue Reading...
September 26, 2012

Societal Development and the Kalamazoo Promise

In a recent New York Times article (here), Ted C. Fishman offers and in-depth feature on the Kalamazoo Promise: Back in November 2005, when this year’s graduates were in sixth grade, the superintendent of Kalamazoo’s public schools, Janice M. Continue Reading...
August 07, 2012

Teacher’s Union: We Want to Help You By Suing You

For decades teachers’s unions have been giving teachers—and unions—a bad name. A prime example is the intimidation tactics used by Louisiana Association of Educators (LAE): A Louisiana teachers union is threatening private schools with legal action if they accept money from a new voucher program – and the threat has already forced at least one school to put its participation in the program on hold. Continue Reading...
June 21, 2012

The Demand Side of College Education

One of the most worrisome economic troubles coming down-the-pipe is the “student debt bubble” which many argue is caused by too many students seeking degrees in higher education as the costs of tuition increase. Continue Reading...