By Ashleigh Costello
EAGnews.org

WASHINGTON, D.C. – Thousands of educators gathered last week at the National Education Association’s annual Representative Assembly.

And they used that time to discuss the challenges facing public education, right?

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Not even close.

While our nation’s public schools continued to suffer from huge budget deficits, large scale layoffs and plummeting graduation rates, our nation’s largest teachers union avoided those subjects.

Instead they adopted a crucial business item formally recognizing the United Nation’s “International Day of Peace,” which occurs every Sept. 21.

“If humans can figure out how to stop killing each other, we won’t have a problem funding quality public education for each child,” said Justin Hughey, a member of the Hawaii delegation that introduced the item.

“As educators, we have the potential to make this world a better place by teaching the next generation the values of peace, compassion and awareness of interdependence of life,” said Miles Okumura, recipient of the United Nations Association of Hawaii “Peacemaker of the Year” award.

“100,000 teachers can reach 15 million future citizens every year with just one lesson plan a year.  Over the course of our careers, we can raise and educate hundreds of millions of citizens.”

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One can only presume that the NEA is talking about scaling back the national defense budget and redirecting those funds towards education.  Who needs an army or a navy, anyway?

One problem.  There is no evidence that increased spending and student achievement are connected in any way.  The only thing we know for sure is that the more we spend on public schools, the more teachers make every year.

Perhaps at next year’s meeting, the NEA will address failing urban school districts or the lack of innovation in classrooms. Or maybe not. This union has never been terribly interested in education in the first place.

Would someone please show these hippies the door, so we can attract some real educators into our classrooms?