Bold Thinking for Public Education

Education Reform is often treated with kid gloves, tiptoed around, especially in states like Maine. Why? The collapse of public education is so complete that marginal steps seem to be all people can imagine. Think bigger. Do it all. Here is how.

First, in Maine and elsewhere, indoctrination, accommodation, “appease and please” culture is alive and well. It has replaced time-honored truths with untruths, replaced teaching mental strength, discipline, self-reliance, and creativity with coddling, weakness, dependence, conformity, and a cycle of discouragement.

Everywhere it pushes children to the back of the bus, replacing parental priorities – character and prosperity – with other ideas, normalizing cultural disharmony, grooming young people to reject faith and family for Marxism, even depravity.

In place of traditional priorities, love of faith, family, freedom, and a personalized American Dream, they teach the opposite until trust is uprooted, fear seeded. So, we start by boldly stating the utterly obvious: Good values matter, crap is crap.

Second, to cure the disease, one has to acknowledge its infectious nature, the extent of the damage, and then prescribe and operationalize the remedy. Two questions then: Why has all this happened? How do we rebuild a credible public school system?

No one will say it, but teachers’ unions do not exist for teachers or kids. They exist for themselves. They are a grossly out-of-touch ideological machine, focused on power, money, and fundamentally transforming children into dependent activists.

Let me be specific. The National Education Association (NEA) and the American Federation of Teachers (AFT) – both in Maine – are not for kids or parents, but politics. Assuring a child’s safety and prosperity is second to accumulating power.

Maine’s largest cities – in order – are Portland, Lewiston, Bangor, South Portland, Auburn, Scarborough, Brunswick, Sanford, Biddeford, Westbrook, Saco, and Windham, where teachers are. But the unions? In Augusta, a Democrat power hub.

As Maine parents and kids reel, the lowest scores in 30 years, 50^th of 50 in education, 75 percent of  4^th graders unable to read, 74 percent of 8^th graders unable to do basic math, teachers’ unions whistle by the graveyard, do not care.

Maine’s collapsing public school system has parents pulling kids, those who can moving out of state, a 30 percent increase in homeschooling, private (Christian) schools growing (while being harassed by the State), and parents no longer trusting.

Where are the Maine teachers’ unions? Siding with the politicians who created the mess to get union money. Not defenders of kids or teachers, they are political animals. They are in Augusta at the troth, giving money to get money and power.

How it works: Teachers’ unions “collect dues” from Maine’s 14,000 teachers, 8,000 “ed techs,” up to $460 a year, taken from teachers. On the raw numbers, they get eight million dollars from teachers annually.

Where does it go? Taken from low-paid teachers, it feeds union staff at $200,000 each – and Democrat politicians. Unions buy Democrat votes to push more money to them and to cover their leftist ideology. See how it works?

Former AFT president Shanker said: Unions will represent kids only “when they start paying union dues.” The NEA president said she is all about “political action.”

Bluntly, teachers’ unions steal from teachers, try to make “opt out” without retaliation impossible, since administrators know opt-out means no representation.

Where does all that money go? To ideological activities and unions. One study noted, teacher dues “fuel not just bargaining tables but a sprawling political machine…from school board elections to presidential campaigns,” with 98 percent going to Democrats.

Contributions by NEA affiliates in 2024 topped $45 million – political groups, candidates, and parties, says “Open Secrets.” Today, the most powerful lobbyists, political contributors, and distorters of public education are the teachers’ unions.

So, what can be done? Lots. Yes, stop teaching leftism, deprogram kids and teachers, restore focus on outcomes in reading, math, science, and history, incentivize mental strength and critical thinking, raise pay for good teachers, set new expectations, teach independence, not dependence.

But we need far more. We need “shop” back in schools, interschool competition, teacher creativity rewards, inspired students, restored moral grounding, and teaching character. We also need to support private Christian schools and homeschooling.

But we need still more. We need to totally remake education in Maine, make it a top priority, put kids back on track for success, not drugs and dead-end lives. We need to incentivize good outcomes, tie kids to jobs, and cause teachers to stay longer.

We need to ask hard questions: How deep must we cut to get the cancer of waste, ideology, and abuse out of the system? How swiftly can we restore objectivity, replacing ideology, incompetence, and corruption with prosperity thinking?

Can we leverage the Governor’s powers to force reform, using the 55 percent of education paid by the state? Why not executive orders striking hundreds of senseless, counter-productive mandates on schools – free them to teach truth.

On teachers’ unions, why not spur competition, alternatives for teachers, make unions “opt-in” not “opt-out,” free teachers to teach at higher incomes?

How do we stop the misuse of dues and reduce union power? Maine teachers’ unions are fighting against the “Voter ID” referendum – with teacher dues. That is how far removed from reality and focusing on kids they have become. We need bold thinking to save Maine’s schools, nothing less. We need to start over.

Robert Charles is a former Assistant Secretary of State under Colin Powell, former Reagan and Bush 41 White House staffer, Maine attorney, ten-year naval intelligence officer (USNR), and 25-year businessman. He wrote “Narcotics and Terrorism” (2003), “Eagles and Evergreens” (North Country Press, 2018), and “Cherish America: Stories of Courage, Character, and Kindness” (Tower Publishing, 2024). He is the National Spokesman for AMAC. Today, he is running to be Maine’s next Governor (please visit BobbyforMaine.com to learn more)!