Explanation

There are two components of today’s practice. The first is a Bob Dylan poem. It is one of my favorite poems. Read it to warm-up.

The second component is a dynamic highlighting drill. Read the highlighting that corresponds with the highlighting color of the short cite for each card. If the short cite is highlighted in yellow, read the yellow. If it is highlighted in green, read the green. One card switches in the middle — watch for a tag-formatted instruction in the middle of a card.

1. “Last Thoughts On Woody Guthrie” — Bob Dylan

When yer head gets twisted and yer mind grows numbWhen you think you're too old, too young, too smart or too dumbWhen yer laggin' behind an' losin' yer paceIn a slow-motion crawl of life's busy raceNo matter what yer doing if you start givin' upIf the wine don't come to the top of yer cupIf the wind's got you sideways with with one hand holdin' onAnd the other starts slipping and the feeling is goneAnd yer train engine fire needs a new spark to catch itAnd the wood's easy findin' but yer lazy to fetch itAnd yer sidewalk starts curlin' and the street gets too longAnd you start walkin' backwards though you know its wrongAnd lonesome comes up as down goes the dayAnd tomorrow's mornin' seems so far awayAnd you feel the reins from yer pony are slippin'And yer rope is a-slidin' 'cause yer hands are a-drippin'And yer sun-decked desert and evergreen valleysTurn to broken down slums and trash-can alleysAnd yer sky cries water and yer drain pipe's a-pourin'And the lightnin's a-flashing and the thunder's a-crashin'And the windows are rattlin' and breakin' and the roof tops a-shakin'And yer whole world's a-slammin' and bangin'And yer minutes of sun turn to hours of stormAnd to yourself you sometimes say"I never knew it was gonna be this wayWhy didn't they tell me the day I was born"And you start gettin' chills and yer jumping from sweatAnd you're lookin' for somethin' you ain't quite found yetAnd yer knee-deep in the dark water with yer hands in the airAnd the whole world's a-watchin' with a window peek stareAnd yer good gal leaves and she's long gone a-flyingAnd yer heart feels sick like fish when they're fryin'And yer jackhammer falls from yer hand to yer feetAnd you need it badly but it lays on the streetAnd yer bell's bangin' loudly but you can't hear its beatAnd you think yer ears might a been hurtOr yer eyes've turned filthy from the sight-blindin' dirtAnd you figured you failed in yesterdays rush

When you were faked out an' fooled white facing a four flushAnd all the time you were holdin' three queensAnd it's makin you mad, it's makin' you meanLike in the middle of Life magazineBouncin' around a pinball machineAnd there's something on yer mind you wanna be sayingThat somebody someplace oughta be hearin'But it's trapped on yer tongue and sealed in yer headAnd it bothers you badly when your layin' in bedAnd no matter how you try you just can't say itAnd yer scared to yer soul you just might forget itAnd yer eyes get swimmy from the tears in yer headAnd yer pillows of feathers turn to blankets of leadAnd the lion's mouth opens and yer staring at his teethAnd his jaws start closin with you underneathAnd yer flat on your belly with yer hands tied behindAnd you wish you'd never taken that last detour signAnd you say to yourself just what am I doin'On this road I'm walkin', on this trail I'm turnin'On this curve I'm hangingOn this pathway I'm strolling, in the space I'm takingIn this air I'm inhalingAm I mixed up too much, am I mixed up too hardWhy am I walking, where am I runningWhat am I saying, what am I knowingOn this guitar I'm playing, on this banjo I'm frailin'On this mandolin I'm strummin', in the song I'm singin'In the tune I'm hummin', in the words I'm writin'In the words that I'm thinkin'In this ocean of hours I'm all the time drinkin'Who am I helping, what am I breakingWhat am I giving, what am I takingBut you try with your whole soul bestNever to think these thoughts and never to letThem kind of thoughts gain groundOr make yer heart poundBut then again you know why they're aroundJust waiting for a chance to slip and drop down"Cause sometimes you hear'em when the night times comes creepingAnd you fear that they might catch you a-sleepingAnd you jump from yer bed, from yer last chapter of dreamin'

And you can't remember for the best of yer thinkingIf that was you in the dream that was screamingAnd you know that it's something special you're needin'And you know that there's no drug that'll do for the healin'And no liquor in the land to stop yer brain from bleedingAnd you need something specialYeah, you need something special all rightYou need a fast flyin' train on a tornado trackTo shoot you someplace and shoot you backYou need a cyclone wind on a stream engine howlerThat's been banging and booming and blowing foreverThat knows yer troubles a hundred times overYou need a Greyhound bus that don't bar no raceThat won't laugh at yer looksYour voice or your faceAnd by any number of bets in the bookWill be rollin' long after the bubblegum crazeYou need something to open up a new doorTo show you something you seen beforeBut overlooked a hundred times or moreYou need something to open your eyesYou need something to make it knownThat it's you and no one else that ownsThat spot that yer standing, that space that you're sittingThat the world ain't got you beatThat it ain't got you lickedIt can't get you crazy no matter how manyTimes you might get kickedYou need something special all rightYou need something special to give you hopeBut hope's just a wordThat maybe you said or maybe you heardOn some windy corner 'round a wide-angled curveBut that's what you need man, and you need it badAnd yer trouble is you know it too good"Cause you look an' you start getting the chills"Cause you can't find it on a dollar billAnd it ain't on Macy's window sillAnd it ain't on no rich kid's road mapAnd it ain't in no fat kid's fraternity houseAnd it ain't made in no Hollywood wheat germAnd it ain't on that dimlit stage

With that half-wit comedian on itRanting and raving and taking yer moneyAnd you thinks it's funnyNo you can't find it in no night club or no yacht clubAnd it ain't in the seats of a supper clubAnd sure as hell you're bound to tellThat no matter how hard you rubYou just ain't a-gonna find it on yer ticket stubNo, and it ain't in the rumors people're tellin' youAnd it ain't in the pimple-lotion people are sellin' youAnd it ain't in no cardboard-box houseOr down any movie star's blouseAnd you can't find it on the golf courseAnd Uncle Remus can't tell you and neither can Santa ClausAnd it ain't in the cream puff hair-do or cotton candy clothesAnd it ain't in the dime store dummies or bubblegum goonsAnd it ain't in the marshmallow noises of the chocolate cake voicesThat come knockin' and tappin' in Christmas wrappin'Sayin' ain't I pretty and ain't I cute and look at my skinLook at my skin shine, look at my skin glowLook at my skin laugh, look at my skin cryWhen you can't even sense if they got any insidesThese people so pretty in their ribbons and bowsNo you'll not now or no other dayFind it on the doorsteps made out-a paper mâchéAnd inside it the people made of molassesThat every other day buy a new pair of sunglassesAnd it ain't in the fifty-star generals and flipped-out phoniesWho'd turn yuh in for a tenth of a pennyWho breathe and burp and bend and crackAnd before you can count from one to tenDo it all over again but this time behind yer backMy friendThe ones that wheel and deal and whirl and twirlAnd play games with each other in their sand-box worldAnd you can't find it either in the no-talent foolsThat run around gallantAnd make all rules for the ones that got talentAnd it ain't in the ones that ain't got any talent but think they doAnd think they're foolin' youThe ones who jump on the wagon

Just for a while 'cause they know it's in styleTo get their kicks, get out of it quickAnd make all kinds of money and chicksAnd you yell to yourself and you throw down yer hatSayin', "Christ do I gotta be like thatAin't there no one here that knows where I'm atAin't there no one here that knows how I feelGood God AlmightyTHAT STUFF AIN'T REAL"No but that ain't yer game, it ain't even yer raceYou can't hear yer name, you can't see yer faceYou gotta look some other placeAnd where do you look for this hope that yer seekin'Where do you look for this lamp that's a-burnin'Where do you look for this oil well gushin'Where do you look for this candle that's glowin'Where do you look for this hope that you know is thereAnd out there somewhereAnd your feet can only walk down two kinds of roadsYour eyes can only look through two kinds of windowsYour nose can only smell two kinds of hallwaysYou can touch and twistAnd turn two kinds of doorknobsYou can either go to the church of your choiceOr you can go to Brooklyn State HospitalYou'll find God in the church of your choiceYou'll find Woody Guthrie in Brooklyn State HospitalAnd though it's only my opinionI may be right or wrongYou'll find them bothIn the Grand CanyonAt sundown

2. Dynamic Highlight SwitchingEducational inequality cements political inequality that deprives students of the right to life, the right to vote, and the right to free expression. Wesche 16 — Breanne N. Wesche, Attorney at the Rizio Law Firm—a personal injury law firm in California, former Special Education Teacher in the Houston Independent School District, holds a J.D. from the Thurgood Marshall School of Law at Texas Southern University, 2016 (“Putting The American Education System To The Test: Recognizing Education As A Fundamental Right And Abolishing Unequal School Funding,” Thurgood Marshall Law Review (41 T. Marshall L. Rev. 5), Available Online to Subscribing Institutions via Lexis-Nexis)[*5] I. Introduction In the United States of America, a child's zip code often determines the quality of the child's education . A myriad of social, economic, and political factors contributes to this tragic truth. This article,

however, focuses on the staggering, discriminatory effect that Unequal School Funding has on our nation's youth.Consider the experience of Daniel Lopez, a fifth-grade student in Houston, Texas. n1 Daniel and his family live on the south side of Houston, near William P. Hobby Airport. The public school nearest Daniel is an old, dilapidated building. When Daniel arrives at school each morning, he sees broken computers, leaky air conditioners, and chipping turquoise paint. He sees a small athletic field, occupied by ten-year-old "temporary" trailers. He sees a physical education teacher, doing her best to teach a mathematics class.Compare Daniel's experience to that of Thomas Smith, a fifth-grade student living near Houston, Texas. n2 Thomas and his family live in a neighborhood filled with multi-million dollar homes, located just miles away from Daniel's neighborhood. The public school nearest Thomas is a new, state-of-the art building. When Thomas arrives at school each morning, he sees new tablets for every student, interactive white boards in every classroom, and extra teacher assistants for individualized help. He sees the new soccer field, next to the tennis courts. He sees art and music teachers with specialized training. [*6] Which student do you expect is more likely to feel valued when he arrives at school each day? Which student is more likely to reach his potential? Which student do you think has more opportunities to succeed?Such disparate realities exist between students in different zip codes in large part because of Unequal School Funding: the discriminatory practice in which school funding is based on unequal property taxes within the district. Discriminatory practices such as Unequal School Funding exist in our country because ed ucation is not protected as a fundamental right . The United States Supreme Court has only once considered

whether education is a fundamental right. The Court's failure to recognize education as a fundamental right resulted in both the nation's pervasive practice of Unequal School Funding and the wildly varying protection of educational rights throughout the states. In light of these horrible repercussions, the Court should now readdress whether education is a fundamental right. Furthermore, the proper analysis of ed ucation as a fundamental right would undoubtedly abolish unequal and discriminatory practices such as Unequal School Funding .I. Education Is A Fundamental Right Ed ucation is a fundamental right because it is inextricably linked to the constitutional guarantees of liberty , voting , and freedom of expression . The quality and level of a United States

citizen's ed ucation has a direct impact on that citizen's ability

to exercise such constitutional rights. As compared to a citizen with a low-quality and low-level education, a person with a high- quality and high-level ed ucation is less likely to be incarcerated, more likely to vote, and more equipped to exercise his freedom of expression .A. The Right to Liberty"[An incarcerated man] has, as a consequence of his crime, not only forfeited his liberty, but all his personal rights except those which the law in its humanity accords to him. He is for the time being the slave of the State. He is civiliter mortuus; and his estate, if he has any, is administered like that of a dead man." -- Ruffin v. Commonwealth n3A United States citizen's right to liberty is forfeited upon incarceration. Thomas Jefferson once described liberty as the [*7] "unobstructed action according to our own will within limits drawn around us by the equal right of others." n4 A prisoner is stripped of the right to take unobstructed actions. For example, a prisoner cannot take the unobstructed actions of voting, traveling, starting a business, or having children. n5 A prisoner's every allowable action -- what to eat, when to sleep, when to bathe, who to see, what to wear -- is obstructed and confined by rules created by others. n6 A person's inalienable right to liberty, then, becomes alienable upon his incarceration.A citizen with a low-level education is significantly more likely to be incarcerated than his well-educated counterpart. In 2004, the Bureau of Justice Statistics concluded that 36.3% of incarcerated men over the age of 18 have less than a high school diploma, and only 11.5% of incarcerated men over the age of 18 have some college education. n7 Likewise, a survey conducted by the American Community Survey in 2009 revealed that Black and White men who are "high school dropouts are about 5 times more likely to go to prison . . . than men who have completed high school." n8 Moreover, the amount of male high school dropouts who become incarcerated continues to rise every year, while the amount of high-school-educated men who become incarcerated remains virtually stagnant. n9The statistics for female prisoners are equally as staggering. A 2009 survey found that 37% of incarcerated women had less than a high school education, while only 14% of non-incarcerated women had less than a high school education. n10 The survey also found that only 31% of incarcerated women had some postsecondary education, while 58% of non-incarcerated women had some postsecondary education. n11 In short, education levels are inversely related with the likelihood of incarceration: the increased quantity of a person's education decreases the likelihood of incarceration and resulting forfeiture of liberties.[*8] B. The Right to Vote"A share in the sovereignty of the state, which is exercised by the citizens at large in voting at elections, is one of the most important rights of the subject, and in a republic ought to stand foremost in the estimation of the law." -- Alexander Hamilton n12The right to vote and access to state and federal franchise is a revered and zealously protected right of all citizens. n13 The right to vote in federal elections is explicitly conferred by the United States Constitution, in Article I, Section 2, and in the Seventeenth Amendment. The right to vote in state elections, while not explicitly listed in the Constitution, has been provided special judiciary protection, as "it is the 'preservative of other basic civil and political rights.'" n14A citizen with a low-level education is significantly less likely to vote than his well-educated counterpart . n15 The U.S. Census Bureau's Current Population Survey in 2012 showed that only 7.9 million citizens without a high school diploma were registered to vote, compared to over 41.6 million citizens with a high school diploma who were registered to vote. n16 The same survey showed that only 6 million citizens without a high school diploma reported voting, compared to over 34.4 million with a high school diploma who reported voting. n17 Further, a study in 2009 showed that 50.4% of those with less than a high school education were registered to vote, while 84.8% of those with bachelor's degrees or more were registered to vote.

n18 Ed ucation , thus, significantly contributes to the likelihood of a citizen's effective participation in a democratic society . n19C. The Right to Freedom of Expression

[*9] "[Education] is required in the performance of our most basic public responsibilities . . . It is the very foundation of good citizenship." -- Brown v. Board of Education n20The First Amendment of the United States Constitution guarantees freedom of speech and of assembly, collectively known as "freedom of expression." n21 Justice

Benjamin Cardozo defined freedom of expression as "the matrix, the indispensable condition, of nearly every other form of freedom."

n22 Exercise of freedom of expression continuously protects all other fundamental rights . n23

A poor ed ucation significantly limits a citizen's ability to exercise freedom of expression . "Education directly affects the ability of a child to exercise his First Amendment rights, both as a source and as a receiver of information and ideas, whatever interests he may pursue in life." n24 The classroom – the "marketplace of ideas" n25 – holds a pivotal role of opening up an individual to key experiences in our culture and society. n26 Schools should instill in our young an interest in political discourse, the tools for political debate, and knowledge of government al processes . n27 Indeed, Americans revere public schools as the "most vital civic institution" for encouraging political consciousness and protecting our democratic system of government. n28 A substandard ed ucation ,

however, strips a child of his ability to fully participate in our democratic society, thereby losing his voice and the ability to fight for his rights .Ii. The Problem: The Supreme Court Has Failed To Recognize Education As A Fundamental Right [*10] The Supreme Court's failure to recognize ed ucation as a fundamental right has allowed discriminatory and inconsistent treatment of educational rights throughout the states . For example,

the trend of allotting unequal funding to school districts is a pervasive practice across the country . Moreover, without guidance from the Supreme Court, each state government 's protection of educational rights is , at best , haphazard and wavering . Thus, the state where a citizen resides determines both whether education is considered to be a fundamental right and the level of educational equality the state government requires.

Only the plan can remedy this political inequality — education is key. Newman 13 — Anne Newman, Researcher at the University of California Center for Collaborative Research for an Equitable California—a multi-campus research program and initiative, holds a Ph.D. in the Philosophy of Education from Stanford University, 2013 (“Education Policy Making in the Shadow of an Enduring Democratic Dilemma,” Realizing Educational Rights: Advancing School Reform through Courts and Communities, Published by the University of Chicago Press, ISBN 9780226071749, p. 17-19)The Relationship Between Education and Political Equality

Making informed decisions about representation and public policy requires a host of abilities, including analytic reasoning skills and the ability to distinguish sophistry from sound argument. This is even more true in a deliberative democracy that expects citizens to contribute to agenda setting, in contrast to a vote-centric democracy that simply asks citizens to cast ballots for representatives. The crux of the relationship between education and political equality centers on the types of advantages that education affords citizens in public discourse. People who have comfortable housing, lucrative employment, and good health care may participate in deliberation more easily than those who are less well-off in these respects. Moreover, severe deprivation in any of these welfare domains may impede political participation altogether. Yet inequalities with respect to housing, income, or health care do not result in deliberative inequality per se . Having a bigger house, a more lucrative job, or better health care does not directly confer superior deliberative skills upon citizens.

By contrast , education is directly tied to deliberative influence , and it is not possible to neutralize ed ucational inadequacies to restore political equality without addressing educational deficits head on . The political disadvantage that follows from having poor reasoning skills or limited literacy , for

example, is hard to remedy without addressing these problems directly. Moreover, educational inequalities cannot be readily contained for the sake of achieving political equality in public forums. How could well-educated citizens refrain from using their skills in deliberations? Basic income , on the other hand, is largely instrumental to deliberative influence , and the wellbeing it provides can be achieved through various means, such as public assistance for food and housing. By contrast , the quality of citizens’ ed ucation directly affects their effectiveness in public deliberation , and nothing short of giving citizens the requisite skills can compensate for their lack thereof . A few caveats are necessary here. Some citizens may secure the skills that constitute an adequate education outside formal schooling because these skills are not the sole province of formal education. And not all schools successfully teach students the requisite deliberative skills. Even many well-funded schools may fail on this front. Moreover, a charismatic personality may more than compensate for educational disadvantage in some deliberative settings. Yet the possibility of autodidacts and compelling personalities cannot vindicate miserly provisions for public education. Nor do the deficiencies of civic curricula today diminish the importance of the state’s responsibility to do better on this front. After all, for the vast majority of citizens, educational opportunity is limited to the

offerings of the public system. When public schools fail them, a significant portion of the population is likely to be severely disadvantaged in the political sphere.

The tight link between education and political equality is poignantly expressed in Supreme Court Justice Thurgood Marshall’s dissenting

opinion in San Antonio Independent School District v. Rodriguez, in which the majority opinion refused to recognize a federal right to education.29 In addition to finding no legal ground for such a right, the majority expressed concern that recognizing a right to education would open the floodgates to myriad other welfare rights. Marshall refuted the Court’s slippery-slope argument by contending that ed ucation is distinctively tied to individuals’ ability to exercise constitutional liberties, including free speech and the right to vote , and to participate in politics

more generally: “Education may instill the interest and provide the tools necessary for political discourse and debate. Indeed, it has frequently

been suggested that ed ucation is the dominant factor affecting political consciousness and participation.”30 His dissent highlights how the meaningful exercise of political liberties is inextricably tied to ed ucational opportunity —a connection that is even tighter in a deliberative democracy, where one’s reasoning skills and ability to communicate determine one’s opportunity to have political influence.

Utilitarian balancing can’t justify educational inequality. Any solvency deficit to a counterplan should be rejected as a preventable injustice. Gross 1 — James A. Gross, Professor of Industrial and Labor Relations at Cornell University, holds a Ph.D. from the University of Wisconsin-Madison, 2001 (“A Human Rights Perspective on U.S. Education: Only Some Children Matter,” The Catholic University Law Review (50 Cath. U.L. Rev. 919), Summer, Available Online to Subscribing Institutions via Lexis-Nexis)VI. Concluding ObservationsTo understand that education is a human right is to understand that the problems of ed ucation in this country and the proposed solutions are inextricably interconnected with issues of morality, justice and values . Fundamental issues of human rights, justice and morality must be addressed and resolved before any reconstruction of the educational system is attempted. What is excused as misfortune must be recognized as injustice and what has been dismissed as the status quo must be traced to the action or inaction of the unjust.

A just society, particularly one with the economic resources of the United States, would not choose to reject any of its children . A just society would treat each of its children as an "unprecedented wonder" n243 and would be committed to enabling them to realize their potential for living a full human life. n244 Each child would be recognized for the person he is; his presence on this earth would be treated as an "unconditional blessing." n245

This recognition and celebration of life is the core principle of human rights. It was recognized by a Freedmen's Bureau commissioner who urged that the freed people in the Bureau's schools be "treated as men with immortal souls rather than as beasts of burden or machines for pulling cotton." n246 More than 100 years later, Thomas Sowell similarly noted that the "only common denominator among the successful schools [in the black community/ghetto] was that the students were treated like human beings and everything was geared to the expectation that they would succeed." n247 The children understood that they were important in and of themselves. n248 [*952] Conscious choices violate the human rights of certain children . Yet human rights constitute the most essential moral claims that all human beings can assert . n249 They confirm the sacredness of human beings and their intrinsic dignity . Human rights are entitlements. The great disparity in the amount of money spent for some compared to that spent on the education of other people's children is a measure of how little certain children are valued as human beings . As a result, a message is sent that those children "deserve to be neglected [and] to be surrounded by a blatant lack of respect." n250

A solution to this problem will require the problem solvers to know what it is like for children to grow up rejected and shunned by the dominant society, what it means and does to them, and whether they think they deserve to be treated that way. As Kozol asks, "what is it that enables some of them to pray? When they pray, what do they say to God?" n251 Other previously ignored questions must also be answered:

how certain people hold up under terrible ordeal, how many more do not, how human beings devalue other people's lives, how numbness and destructiveness are universalized, how human pity is at length extinguished and the shunning of the vulnerable can come in time to be perceived as natural behavior ... . How does a nation deal with those whom it has cursed? n252

Others wonder about the impact of long-standing devaluation on both the children devalued and on those responsible for that devaluation: "after all that has happened, in history and in our own time, can black people still be seen with empathy and without sentimentality as human beings with aspirations and potential that deserve fulfillment?" n253 Andrew Hacker maintains that persuading Americans to care about children other than their own is imperative because indigent children are looked upon as a burden. n254Where is the public indignation at the abuse of innocent children who have done nothing wrong? Despite a "reverence for fair play" and a "genuine distaste for loaded dice" in the United States, Kozol maintains [*953] that in the realms of education, health care and inheritance of wealth, fairness is not evident. n255 In those areas, Kozol says, "we want the game to be unfair and we have made it so; and it will likely so remain." n256 If our motives can be judged most accurately by our actions or inaction, Hacker and Kozol's perceptions are on the mark. Many in our country, including children, are isolated in helplessness while others choose to isolate themselves by their own selfishness. It is a selfishness that consists not only of an unwillingness to redistribute resources to others in need, but also of a deliberate perpetuation of an unfair distribution of the benefits of the ed ucational system which secures advantages in society .Americans pride themselves on their morality. The "American Creed" is the ideological foundation of the nation, encompassing the ideals of the inherent dignity of the individual human being, and of the fundamental equality of all, as well as "inalienable" rights to freedom, justice and fair opportunity. All of these ideals are reconciled within the framework of the common good. These are the elements of a democratic creed that, although pre-dating the United States, represents the "national conscience." n257 The creed is the basis for the realization of the "American Dream," which in addition to being a dream of wealth has also "been a dream of being able to grow to fullest development as a man and woman" to benefit "the simple human being of any and every class." n258In 1944, Swedish economist Gunnar Myrdal characterized U.S. race relations as an "American Dilemma": the moral dilemma of the disparity between ideals and actual behavior. n259 It is tragic that any such gap remains after all of these years. Yet, it is not unrealistic to believe in and work for change unless

those with economic and political influence are completely hypocritical. The civil rights and women's rights movements in this country are among the precedents that justify some optimism and hope.No matter how discouraging the prospects for fundamental change in the educational system, it would be even more irresponsible to fail to act. n260 If human rights violations are to end, then the moral choices that [*954] underlie those violations and the values that influence those moral choices must be changed. n261 Without that change, we will continue merely to remodel on a faulty foundation. Despite commentaries about the futility of trying to reverse these choices, fundamental change is possible and one of the many reasons for that change is the ability of challengers to redefine a policy issue.

Acceptance of ed ucation as a human right changes our understanding of the essential purpose of education and requires a fundamental and thorough redefinition of education policy. The primary objective of education policy would become compliance with the rights of all children to the type and quality of ed ucation needed to live full human lives rather than , as now,

conceiving of education as merely a utilitarian instrument for maximizing payoff for those who invest in it - or for those who can afford the type of education most likely to provide the greatest return on investment. It puts into sharp historical and cultural perspective the fact that since the Universal Declaration of Human Rights in 1945, nations from all over the world have recognized education as a human right while our own Supreme Court does not consider education to be even a constitutional right.It may be that domestic human rights issues go unacknowledged by the public because of the myth that the United States is a paragon of human rights observance. As human rights become more important in international relations, this country is vulnerable to charges of hypocrisy for attempting to maintain a "facade of championing human rights when it does not protect the rights of its own citizens." n262 Despite the rhetoric about the sanctity of human rights, hypocritical or not, it is likely that most people in this country comprehend human rights only in the context of such egregious human evils as genocide or systematic torture. Beyond that there is little understanding of the meaning, significance and implications of human rights.All education systems want to produce a certain kind of human being, and values have always been an essential and unavoidable part of education. Ironically, therefore, the redefinition of education policy [*955] issue requires education. From the time they start school, children need to learn about human rights and to respect the human rights and dignity of all people regardless of race, color, language, gender, or faith. Human rights education needs to occur at all levels from elementary school through college or university.Promotion of internationally recognized human rights principles emerging in international law, moreover, would educate our judiciary as well as the public. These international human rights principles pose a growing challenge to what some experts consider the isolation and provincialism of U.S. courts. n263 Given the influence of values on judicial decision-making, these human rights principles provide an important source of law for U.S. courts to use in the interpretation of the Constitution, including filling in the gaps in constitutional protections. To ignore those principles is to express indifference to them and expresses a willingness to put the United States in direct conflict with international law. n264No attempt is made here to spell out the details of a curriculum or the content of specific course subjects needed to enable people to live full human lives. However, a quality education is about reading, writing, computing, communicating, imagining, thinking, reasoning, creating, participating, questioning, analyzing, challenging, judging, and changing. It is about the unprecedented wonder of each and every human being, the rights and duties of each other. It is about history and heritage as well as partaking in cultural stories and heritage. It is about

sharing all the intellectual adventures at the heart of civilization. It is about morals and ethics and the content of character. It is also about participating in decisions that affect one's life.A quality education must not be indoctrination in an "Aren't-We-Americans-Just-Dandy curriculum" as Theodore and Nancy Sizer called it. n265 Education needs to have a global perspective with an understanding of all peoples, their cultural heritage, values, problems and ways of life. Ed ucation needs to be about human solidarity, respect for human dignity, the equal rights of all human beings, and justice and equality for all people.

There is no reason that can justify the perpetuation of human rights violations to education: not transparent appeals to the democratic principle of local control of education (it would be a perverted [*956] democracy that commits or tolerates violations of the human rights of children); not a state's use of local control as an excuse rather than as a justification for interdistrict inequality; n266 and not the federal government's evasion of the duty by hiding behind the myth that education is exclusively a state and local matter in this country . n267

A just society would not tolerate anything less than the end of these violations of our children's human right to education. Of course, our willingness to end these violations depends on the type of a society we desire and what kind of people we want to be.

American democracy will collapse without excellent and equitable K-12 education. Political inequality results in fascism. Brown 10 — Wendy Brown, Heller Professor of Political Science at the University of California-Berkeley, Co-Chair of the University of California-Berkeley Faculty Association, holds a Ph.D. in Political Philosophy from Princeton University, 2010 (“Without Quality Public Education, There Is No Future for Democracy,” The California Journal of Politics & Policy, Volume 2, Issue 1, Available Online at http://escholarship.org/uc/item/72s6p9ph, Accessed 07-09-2017, p. 2-3)Without quality public education, we the people cannot know, handle, let alone check the power s that govern us . Without quality public education, there can be no substance to the promise of equality and freedom, no possibility of developing and realizing individual capacities, no possibility of children overcoming disadvantage or of teens reaching for the stars, no possibility of being a people guiding their own destiny or of individuals choosing their own course. Above all, there is no possibility of being a self-governing people, a democracy .

As the world grows more complex and integrated and the media grows ever more sophisticated and powerful in shaping events and ideas, what maintains democracy is not the technical

instruction into which resource-starved schools are rapidly retreating. It is not the reduction of high school to two years, college to three and only

vocational training for the many, but the kind of ed ucation through which future citizens learn to understand and engage the complexities of this world.

For democracy to survive, let alone thrive, the people must be able to know and analyze the power s organizing our lives . The people must be able to reflect on the perils and possibilities of our time and develop considered views about how to navigate them. The people must be able to analyze written and oral arguments, journalistic accounts, images and sound bites—distinguishing the reasonable from the sensational, the serious from the simplistic, the well-founded from the fatuous.

This card continues… switch to green.If such capacities have always been important to democratic citizenship, our increasingly complex world demands them all the more , and quality public education is the key to their acquisition. Without quality public ed ucation in our future, there is no future for democracy . Without quality public ed ucation in our future, we face a huge divide between the educated and uneducated , corresponding to a divide between the rich and the poor and [end page 2] magnifying the power of the former and the powerlessness of the latter. This is plutocracy, not democracy.

Without quality public ed ucation in our future, we face a populace taught only the skills needed for work, ill-equipped to understand or participate in civic and political life. This is corporate oligarchy, not democracy.

Without quality public education in our future, we face a people manipulable through their frustrations, mobilizable through false enemies and false promises . This is the dangerous material of democracy’s opposite— despotism if not fascism .

So California’s disinvestment in ed ucation not only entrenches and deepens inequalities , not only breaks the promise of opportunity for every able student, not

only chokes the engine of invention and achievement that built California’s 20th century glory. It destroys the fundament of democracy itself — an educated citizenry capable of thoughtful analysis and informed judgment .

California must recommit to first-class K-12 education and the California Master Plan for higher education. We must come to our senses, quickly, about preserving the most esteemed public university system in the world. And we must do so not only because education is what lifts people from poverty , equalizes opportunities , reduces

crime and violence , builds bright individual and collective futures, but because ed ucation makes democracy real .Educate the state. Sí se puede.

This is an existential risk — concentrated private power causes global warming and nuclear war. Chomsky 14 — Noam Chomsky, Professor Emeritus at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Member of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences, the National Academy of Sciences, and the American Philosophical Society, holds a Ph.D. in Linguistics from the University of Pennsylvania 2014 (“America’s corporate doctrine of power a grave threat to humanity,” Salon — originally published on TomDispatch, July 1st, Available Online at http://www.salon.com/2014/07/01/noam_chomsky_americas_corporate_doctrine_of_power_a_grave_threat_to_humanity/, Accessed 07-09-2015)The Final Century of Human Civilization?There are other examples too numerous to mention, facts that are well-established and would be taught in elementary schools in free societies.There is, in other words, ample evidence that securing state power from the domestic population and securing concentrated private power are driving forces in policy formation . Of course, it is not quite that simple. There are interesting cases, some quite current, where these commitments conflict, but consider this a good first approximation and radically opposed to the received standard doctrine.Let us turn to another question: What about the security of the population? It is easy to demonstrate that this is a marginal concern of policy planners. Take two prominent current examples, global warming and nuclear weapons . As any literate person is doubtless aware, these

are dire threats to the security of the population . Turning to state policy, we find that it is committed to accelerating each of those threat s — in the interests of the primary concerns, protection of state power and of the concentrated private power that largely determines state policy.

Consider global warming. There is now much exuberance in the U nited

States about “100 years of energy independence ” as we become “the Saudi Arabia of the next century ” — perhaps the final century of human civilization if current policies persist.

That illustrates very clearly the nature of the concern for security, certainly not for the

population. It also illustrates the moral calculus of contemporary Anglo- American state capitalism: the fate of our grandchildren counts as nothing when compared with the imperative of higher profits tomorrow.These conclusions are fortified by a closer look at the propaganda system. There is a huge public relations campaign in the U.S., organized quite openly by Big Energy and the business world, to try to convince the public that global warming is either unreal or not a result of human activity. And it has had some impact. The U.S. ranks lower than other countries in public concern about global warming and the results are stratified: among Republicans, the party more fully dedicated to the interests of wealth and corporate power, it ranks far lower than the global norm.The current issue of the premier journal of media criticism, the Columbia Journalism Review, has an interesting article on this subject, attributing this outcome to the media doctrine of “fair and balanced.” In other words, if a journal publishes an opinion piece reflecting the conclusions of 97% of scientists, it must also run a counter-piece expressing the viewpoint of the energy corporations.That indeed is what happens, but there certainly is no “fair and balanced” doctrine. Thus, if a journal runs an opinion piece denouncing Russian President Vladimir Putin for the criminal act of taking over the Crimea, it surely does not have to run a piece pointing out that, while the act is indeed criminal, Russia has a far stronger case today than the U.S. did more than a century ago in taking over southeastern Cuba, including the country’s major port — and rejecting the Cuban demand since independence to have

it returned. And the same is true of many other cases. The actual media doctrine is “fair and balanced” when the concerns of concentrated private power are involved, but surely not elsewhere.On the issue of nuclear weapons, the record is similarly interesting —

and frightening. It reveals very clearly that, from the earliest days, the security of the population was a non-issue, and remains so. There is no time here to run through the shocking record, but there is little doubt that it strongly supports the lament of General Lee Butler, the last commander of the Strategic Air Command, which was armed with nuclear weapons. In his words, we have so far survived the nuclear age “by some combination of skill, luck , and divine intervention, and I suspect the latter in greatest proportion.” And we can hardly count on continued divine intervention as policymakers play roulette with the fate of the species in pursuit of the driving factors in policy formation.

As we are all surely aware, we now face the most ominous decisions in human history . There are many problems that must be addressed, but two are overwhelming in their significance: environmental destruction and nuclear war . For the first time in history, we face the possibility of destroying the prospects for decent existence — and not in the distant future. For this reason alone, it is imperative to sweep away the ideological clouds and face honestly and realistically the question of how policy decisions are made , and what we can do to alter them before it is too late .

Any solvency deficit should be framed as an unacceptable injustice. Gross 1 — James A. Gross, Professor of Industrial and Labor Relations at Cornell University, holds a Ph.D. from the University of Wisconsin-Madison, 2001 (“A Human Rights Perspective on U.S. Education: Only Some Children Matter,” The Catholic University Law Review (50 Cath. U.L. Rev. 919), Summer, Available Online to Subscribing Institutions via Lexis-Nexis)I. IntroductionThe quality and the availability of public education have continuously been debated in this country. The most recent debate is rooted in the report of the National Commission on Excellence in Education of 1983 which found education in the United States inadequate and in need of fundamental reform. n1 Since then, problems in the educational system have been the subject of numerous publicly funded reports and programs, federal legislation, judicial review and executive action through the creation of the Department of Education. Despite the blizzard of studies, papers, programs, and statistics about the overall problem, a major difference in the quality of education provided to the "advantaged and disadvantaged" remains. n2 The school-age children most affected by these

educational "inadequacies" continue to be those most vulnerable to discrimination and the consequences of poverty .How a problem is framed can seriously affect how it is addressed, and the dialogue on education has generally been framed in terms of a loss of national resources and loss of productivity. Those individuals who assess the problems of education in this country appear unable to understand or unwilling to acknowledge that fundamental issues of human rights , moral choice , and value judgments are at the core of any ed ucational policy formulation . In short, the concept of human rights is widely

ignored in the United States education policy. Policy-makers fail to recognize that when issues of rights and justice are ignored, educational policy decisions become a choice among alternatives representing only conflicting [*920] interests and varying degrees of power among interest groups who would gain or lose as a consequence of policy changes.

Policy-makers do not speak about children as children. n3

They do not deplore that "beautiful lives are [being] wasted," n4

nor affirm that "every child among us has a precious life and holds a precious dream." n5 They do not proclaim the most deadly sin to be the "mutilation of a child's spirit." n6 Policy-makers ignore that poor, minority children in this country are still denied their human right to ed ucation as well as their right to realize their full humanity.

This essay explains why education, particularly elementary and secondary ed ucation , is a human right . It explores how the United States historically ignored children's right to education. This essay identifies and discusses largely ignored moral choices and value judgments and conceptions of rights and justice underlying the distribution of educational benefits and burdens in this country. The essay also demonstrates how the application of human rights standards would require a fundamental redefinition of the issues of U.S. educational policy as well as a fundamental change in our understanding of the purpose of education.Internationally, particularly beginning with the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, n7 education is already considered a human right. Education commissions in this country prefer to focus on inefficiencies rather than injustices. However, the existence of failing ed ucation for many children and excellent ed ucation for other children is the consequence of human decisions . These benefits for some and burdens for others are not the result of accidental or impersonal forces beyond our control. Consequently, the values and conceptions of rights and justice underlying those decisions must be identified and assessed .The educational injustices of today are not new. In 1953, a research project entitled The Uneducated n8 expressed the same concerns about the lack of quality education in the United States. The authors of The Uneducated, in carefully chosen words, found that although this country's [*921] efforts to provide "an ever-higher level of education for the mass of the population" are "unique and largely successful," certain parts of the country and particularly "certain groups" did not share in those educational efforts. n9The authors of The Uneducated cited the "wastage of manpower" during World War II as irrefutable evidence that inadequate education in certain areas had serious consequences and that the country as a whole no longer could disregard these regional deficiencies as only local community or state responsibilities. n10 The report identified the southern states and specifically the Southeast as the most educationally deficient areas. n11 In an alarmingly frank statement, the authors attributed the "general disinterest" in the "educational problem" of the Southeast to "the fact that in that area so many of those affected by poor educational facilities were Negroes." n12Although today's jargon is different, the themes of The Uneducated have remained unchanged over the years. The inadequately educated are "handicapped persons" who cannot function effectively as citizens, workers or soldiers. The solution requires improving the quality of education, and the federal government plays a major role in that improvement. n13

The school choice counterplan can’t solve because it undermines democracy. Stokes 12 — Elizabeth Stokes, Campus Network Summer Academy Fellow at the Roosevelt Institute, holds a B.A. in Philosophy, Politics, and Economics from the University of Pennsylvania, 2012 (“How Turning the Public School System into a Market Undermines Democracy,” Roosevelt Institute, July 25th, Available Online at http://rooseveltinstitute.org/how-turning-public-school-system-into-market-undermines-democracy/, Accessed 07-10-2017)Efficiency considerations aside, the real problem with championing marketized models in education and other areas is the damage it does to democracy. We should not be upholding a model based on turning citizens into consumers. Democratic citizenship does not simply involve an individual’s choice from a platter of options.

Rather, it requires active participation in collective decisionmaking.

The problem with marketized models is that in the process of providing individuals with private “choice,” citizens are necessarily deprived of public choice – that is, the opportunity to discuss, deliberate, and act in concert with others . While advocates of

marketization claim that it eliminates many of the protracted disputes that

currently impede the effectiveness of schools, disputes aren’t always such a bad thing from the standpoint of democracy – especially when they deal with matters of genuine common concern like the ed ucation of future generations. Even if conflicts do arise, the opportunity to debate and engage in a democratic give-and- take with neighbors is a vital aspect of political education and empowerment. As Alexis de Tocqueville observed in the 1830s, it is only through participation in the exercise of power over collective outcomes , and the practice of thinking about and acting on public issues in public arenas, that people can develop the skills and commitments necessary to be citizens. Removing public ed ucation as a site for political ed ucation simultaneously removes yet a nother stake citizens have in our democracy .Of course, this is not to say that there is no place for anything that is not a “traditional” public school. On the contrary, a variety of independent alternatives can certainly complement a healthy public school system and contribute to diversity and innovation. That’s particularly true when they represent initiatives led by local community members rather than corporate franchises. But that is very different than using public money to undermine and dismantle public education itself as a genuinely public enterprise.The trend toward increasing privatization and marketization means the increasing disempowerment of citizens. The reconfigured version of “public” advanced by marketized models of education is severely truncated and distorts our understanding of why public education is important. Public ed ucation is not simply service delivery. It is also an expression of community and shared responsibility that helps shape the character of a society. We should value public schools not only for educating our children, but also for their role as local

institutions where citizens can congregate and practice democracy.