.2 A National Curriculum

In a place like this where we have the military the socioeconomic levels are much more predictable. It becomes lower-middle class for the young enlisted people to senior professionals in terms of the senior officers’ corp. So the mobility cuts across all sorts of socioeconomic levels. In the private sector you have senior corporate executives moving around at the high end of the spectrum and you have sales people and people who just get bored with living some place. Unfortunately some of the mobility historically has come from deadbeat dads who know that if they cross the state line they would not have to pay child support although that loophole is being closed more effectively now. There are all sorts of reasons why the problem of mobility exists, but the problem is growing, and it cuts across all socioeconomic levels. Now, the bottom line of this is that bad education in any state or community will affect the entire nation. That is the bottom line of mobility. If you have bad education in Mississippi and then the kids move to Virginia. Virginia then must deal with the bad education of Mississippi. Or Virginians move to New York and New York has to deal with the bad education of Virginia. So you see there is this tremendous interdependence of places and locations and not only geography, but also socioeconomic influence, I mean mobility just cuts across everything and really throws a joker in the deck. Does any community have the right to a bad education? Think of the consequences. If someone's education is bad then someone else has the right to come in. The answer to the problem is a national curriculum. We already have a hidden national curriculum with all of the disadvantages of a national curriculum and none of the advantages. The bottom line is that we have a curriculum that is out of control. Nobody can change the curriculum and that is the real problem. As a theoretical idea proposing a national curriculum is popular, but when it comes time when we say who is going to decide what goes in and what goes out, then you have disagreement. It goes back to trust and who do you trust to make these decisions. I was a strong proponent of having the national goals that came out of the Charlottesville conference that President Bush had in 1989 and I really thought it was a great thing that for, the first time in history, we had people talking about national goals, and that was really a big step forward and to have all the governor's coming in and ratifying the idea that we should have national goals. The goals that they came up with were horrible. I will hold my nose and vote for those national goals simply because those are not going to be the last national goals, those are a way of starting the conversation. If we can get into place national goals and a way of modifying the national goals, then we are ahead.

	What is the answer to the problem of mobility in education?	Answer Here
	Monique is a student in Mr. Adam's third grade class and has not yet learned cursive writing. Her family moves from VA to CA and she enters a class that has already begun cursive writing. How might a national curriculum have prevented this problem?	Answer Here