By James W. Clark
Anderson resident
Once upon a time, American children were educated in neighborhood schools, that had stood the test of time and created the genius that made American the envy of the world. Children walked and/or rode bikes to school and the community and school were the center of their universe. The community controlled the schools and parents controlled their children, as they received a good education in a protected and loving environment.
In the 1960s, the liberal conformists convinced courts and weak-minded politicians with no vision that forced integration would salvage the schools in inner cities, attended mostly by disadvantaged minorities. Laws were passed establishing quotas to ensure racial balance and diversity in all American school systems. The worst political blunder in our history. These laws resulted in the destruction of the school system, by removing parents and communities from the educational process and replacing them with an ineffective system controlled by bureaucrats and federal courts. By the time those responsible recognized their gross errors in judgment, the genie was out of the bottle and took on a life of its own, and they made every effort to distance themselves from the stigma of these tragic laws and a failing educational system. The real tragedy is — most educators and politicians know this to be true and do not have the courage to initiate change.
Busing, to integrate schools, has resulted in a massive build-up of a fleet of buses in America that cost billions of dollars to maintain and operate. Over 25 years, cost has run into trillions of taxpayers dollars that will never pay any dividends. I ask courts, bureaucrats and pundits: What have taxpayers received for 25 years of forced busing and its related expenditures? Are schools totally diverse and integrated? Do we have adequate and well maintained schools with improved test scores and graduates? Has the quality of education, in Indiana nationwide, improved? Are you aware of the coming changes and that busing may become a relic of the past? And, how much longer will citizens tolerate the high cost to maintain a failed system?
Most people realize they have paid a very high price, with little in return. I’d like someone from the school board or the budget office to tell the people of Indiana just how much it costs to operate and maintain 14,000 buses for one year. This might give them a reason why they are burdened with ever higher taxes; why schools are not properly maintained; and why teachers’ salaries cannot be increased. Most people believe busing should have been phased out long ago and, if schools are not fully integrated after 25 years, they never will be. Many are working to alter their school’s focus from diversity to excellence in education for all students. In order to accomplish this, they want to direct their money to build new neighborhood schools that will encourage diversity and result in excellent education at a reasonable price.
The winds of change are blowing across the land. The Supreme Court decisions, in several cases, are returning schools to local control, as a constitutional priority. Communities will no longer be willing to spend their money on a system that very few want and they can no longer afford.
