Education Issues at Center Stage at the National Political Conventions

As a country known in the past for it’s exceptional education system, America is now falling behind. Due to many factors, many regard the education system in United States as broken. This was voiced many times at the Democratic and Republican National Conventions.

On the last night of the Democratic Convention Presidential Nominee Barack Obama addressed the need to reform America’s education plan.

“Now is the time to finally meet our moral obligation to provide every child a world-class education, because it will take nothing less to compete in the global economy,” he said.

In his acceptance speech on the final night of the Republican Convention Presidential Nominee John McCain called education a civil rights issue.

“Education is the civil rights issue of this century. Equal access to public education has been gained. But what is the value of access to a failing school,” he asked? “We need to shake up failed school bureaucracies with competition, empower parents with choice, remove barriers to qualified instructors, attract and reward good teachers, and help bad teachers find another line of work.”

The Education Equality Project was at both conventions. This is a group of major city mayors, state and national education officials, educational reformers and many others concerned about the lack of equality in today’s educational system. Their goal is to help assure that everyone, regardless of race and income level, has the opportunity to succeed in life by providing them with a sound education. To help ensure their mission is a success, the group is trying to get leading Democrats and Republicans to sit down and formulate ways we can all work together at improving education.

While in Denver, we heard from James Mtume, who hosts the syndicated radio program “Open Line.” He is especially critical of many American’s disinterest in education.

“Any society that does not deal with problems with education is like a person sitting in the middle of the road. You get hit both ways by traffic,” he said.

Civil rights and social justice activist Rev. Al Sharpton was in Denver and St. Paul on behalf of the Education Equality Project. His message was that this is the time for education reform.

“We have the right to make new adjustments, readjustments, and be serious about this…Our conscience dictates it. This point in history mandates it,” he said. “Our children are not to be compromised. It’s time to close the gap. We’re the ones that can do it. Now is the time!”

One of the main concerns of the Education Equality Project is the increasing number of high school students who chose to drop out. For example, according to a recent study by the Schott Foundation for Public Education, Michigan graduates 33 percent of black males and 74 percent of white males. In the Detroit Schools that number drops down to only 20 percent of black males and 17 percent of white males. Statewide 20,000 students drop out each year, including about around 80 in the nine districts served by the Marquette-Alger Educational Service Agency.

Singularly, experts say preventing high school students from dropping out is the most effective way to reduce the number of impoverished people and to decrease the amount of unemployment in the future.

Stephanie Cosgrove, eighteen, of Cherokee, Iowa, was a delegate at the DNC. She is an advocate of early intervention as a way of improving the education of American students.

“For instance, when it comes to preschool, we could solve so many social issues if people had proper education early on and were developmentally up to par with where they should be,” she said. “The studies have shown that a child that has gone to preschool and had a good education from the start is less likely to be dependent (on society) or going through the system.”

Former Republican presidential candidate and Arkansas Governor Mike Huckabee had this take on the issue at the RNC.

“The biggest issue I think is making sure their education system works for the students, and that it’s built around them and not around the schools,” he said. “The education system ought to be about the students, not about the institutions.”

One target for reform on the educational front, especially at the Democratic National Convention, was the Bush Administration’s No Child Left Behind Act. Faylene Owen is a Michigan State University Trustee who was in Denver.

“I think education is best left to the states and localities. Federal government intervention in education has caused more problems than it has solved, like the No Child Left Behind Act, which continues to cause problems for our neighborhood schools,” she said. “The best role for the federal government is to provide financial assistance for students and research funding for our institutions.”

Democratic Congressman Dale Kildee of Flint was also at the DNC and he too feels the Act needs “redoing.”

“First of all, if a district misses (competence assessments) by an inch or a mile you get the same consequences. They restructure your school, sometimes close your school right down. I think we need to have some differentiating consequences,” he said.” “One of the big shortages or defects of No Child Left Behind are unfunded mandates. They put all these mandates upon the schools, but didn’t give them the money to carry them out. We have to fund it much better.”

Another issue discussed at length at both conventions that all agree is affecting our quest for a well-educated nation is the rising cost of college tuition. If students have not been hindered by the cost of school before, they will be in the near future if current trends continue. Owen, as a university trustee, is in the front line of setting tuition rates.

“As a country we are making a huge mistake by failing to invest more in higher education,” she said. “Our higher education system is one of our major competitive advantages over other countries…and we need to continue to invest in it to keep our advantage. It will pay off for the country if we invest now.”

Kildee said he believes that one good way to assist students with the cost of going to college is to better fund Pell Grants. Pell Grants are financial aid grants that do not have to be paid back by the student.

“The cost of textbooks and the cost of tuition has really gone up, yet the help we give to students has been frozen,” he said. “We really have to get down to ways of making education very, very quality but efficient in cost. I know individual young people who were forced to drop out of college because of their debt.”

Former NFL star Chris Carter, who was at the RNC as a representative of the NFL and VISA, was promoting financial literacy among young people. He said the cost of higher education is putting young people far behind right from the start.

“Education is so expensive. They already start their adult life so far behind and trying to catch up is very difficult,” he said. “They all work through college, get a job, and they’re hustling for years and years to try to pay it off and stay ahead.”

Republican delegate Mike Knopf, seventeen, of Dubuque, Iowa agrees that college costs are, perhaps, the biggest issue facing young people today.

“The biggest issue for my age group is probably college funding because you and I both know that the four year college degree is now turning into the five year college degree and student loans are getting harder to pay off,” he said. “So, (in this election) whatever the candidates can offer up for post-secondary schools is probably going to be a big sway issue.”

John Moen, sixteen, Eden Prairie, Minnesota was at the RNC and he too is concerned about college funding.

“I’m not in college yet but when I do go I know it’s going to cost a lot of money,” he said. “I know that my parents can afford college for me but I know a lot of people cannot. I think the government should spend more time putting some of the money into funding education and not things that won’t be as helpful to America’s youth.”

Avery Platter, fifteen, of Apple Valley, Minnesota had a different take on the issue while visiting the RNC.

“I think that it’s not the government’s place to regulate how much colleges charge because that’s ‘big Government’ and I do not agree with ‘big government,’” he said. “I think since the cost of everything is rising we shouldn’t be too surprised that tuition costs are rising.”

Adam Kiihr, nineteen, of Charlotte, North Carolina, who was at the RNC with the Junior Statesman Program, agreed with that viewpoint.

“If you put forth the effort and do well enough in school you can get a scholarship and that can get you in to college for little or no cost,” he said. “So, I don’t feel it’s the government’s responsibility to cover that.”

So in the end, education has become a major issue in this upcoming election. Both parties agree our country cannot thrive without a solid education for everyone, no matter how young or old, or of what race.

U.S. Secretary of Education Margaret Spellings was at the RNC and was asked what young people can do for education reform.

“Don’t take the easy way out. I know that’s often easy to do, and often supported by grownups,” she said. “Put academics before sports. Put academics before part-time work. Those sorts of things…hold yourself to high standards.”

Editor’s note: This story was written by the 8-18 Media team that traveled to the Democratic National Convention, including Emily Stulz, 16, Erin Bozek-Jarvis, 14, Eric Wagner, 14 and Ben Harris, 13, with contributions by the 8-18 Media team that traveled to the Republican National Convention made up of Andrew LaCombe, 18, Chelsea Parrish, 17, Hayley Maskus, 15, Connor Stulz, 14 and Maggie Guter, 11.