Hawaii Dept. of Education refuses to provide sex-ed curriculum content to legislature !
Seems the public schools in Hawaii have a sex education program for kids as young as 11 years old. Okay, nothing terribly unusual there.
Then two state legislators asked the state's department of education to provide them with the curriculum.
The state's Department of Education refused.
My first reaction was "That's gotta be either a misprint or a misunderstanding." Under what theory could a state-funded agency that used taxpayer funds to develop a curriculum for mandatory instruction refuse to disclose the contents to any member of the public--much less a state legislator?
But there it was.
Seems a few dozen state employees need to learn who pays their salaries. As in, fire them, immediately. No negotiating, no terms, no deals. Fire them. If you tolerate this kind of refusal by public employees to be held accountable to the public then there will BE no more accountability from bureaucrats. Lord knows there's little enough as it is.
And just so we're clear, the problem I have with this has nothing to do with the fact that the subject being taught is sex education. I'd be just as concerned if it was civics or history.
True story: My dad served a brief period in our state senate. At that time there were a number of professors at the state's universities who only taught one or two classes a week. The legislature didn't feel the people were getting much for the salaries taxpayers were paying, and instructed the presidents of the universities that henceforth no one could draw a professor's salary unless they taught at least four class periods a week.
As you can guess, the professors drew themselves up and proceeded to lecture the lawmakers--for the most part rural folk with modest educations--about "academic freedom." According to the professors the legislators had no right at all to set terms like how many hours a state professor must teach, and the professors would do whatever they wanted.
The lawmakers--normally consumed by partisan fighting--raised a few eyebrows and proceeded to draft and introduce a bill cutting the funds appropriated to the universities by 25% or so.
This being flyover country, that solved the problem immediately: the PhDs knew they had a sweet deal and had no desire to take a pay cut or try to find work elsewhere. It was a classic demonstration that the ultimate power to set policy should rest with the people who are paying for the operation.
Of course that was back before liberal judges decided they were the ones who should set policy, not legislatures. Years ago that would be solved by just a couple of judicial impeachments. Unfortunately there's no such resolve today.
Then two state legislators asked the state's department of education to provide them with the curriculum.
The state's Department of Education refused.
My first reaction was "That's gotta be either a misprint or a misunderstanding." Under what theory could a state-funded agency that used taxpayer funds to develop a curriculum for mandatory instruction refuse to disclose the contents to any member of the public--much less a state legislator?
But there it was.
Seems a few dozen state employees need to learn who pays their salaries. As in, fire them, immediately. No negotiating, no terms, no deals. Fire them. If you tolerate this kind of refusal by public employees to be held accountable to the public then there will BE no more accountability from bureaucrats. Lord knows there's little enough as it is.
And just so we're clear, the problem I have with this has nothing to do with the fact that the subject being taught is sex education. I'd be just as concerned if it was civics or history.
True story: My dad served a brief period in our state senate. At that time there were a number of professors at the state's universities who only taught one or two classes a week. The legislature didn't feel the people were getting much for the salaries taxpayers were paying, and instructed the presidents of the universities that henceforth no one could draw a professor's salary unless they taught at least four class periods a week.
As you can guess, the professors drew themselves up and proceeded to lecture the lawmakers--for the most part rural folk with modest educations--about "academic freedom." According to the professors the legislators had no right at all to set terms like how many hours a state professor must teach, and the professors would do whatever they wanted.
The lawmakers--normally consumed by partisan fighting--raised a few eyebrows and proceeded to draft and introduce a bill cutting the funds appropriated to the universities by 25% or so.
This being flyover country, that solved the problem immediately: the PhDs knew they had a sweet deal and had no desire to take a pay cut or try to find work elsewhere. It was a classic demonstration that the ultimate power to set policy should rest with the people who are paying for the operation.
Of course that was back before liberal judges decided they were the ones who should set policy, not legislatures. Years ago that would be solved by just a couple of judicial impeachments. Unfortunately there's no such resolve today.
posted by SF at
2:22 AM
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