Despite the fact that religion is a major feature of American life, it is the subject of only 1% of news stories on the four major networks and the national print press, and those are typically hostile. Journalist Fred Barnes, for example, reports a
dinner with then Gov. Cuomo and a dozen journalists during which Cuomo said he sent his children to Catholic schools because "The public schools inculcate a disbelief in God." Barnes wrote, "From the reaction of my colleagues, one might have though Cuomo
had advocated mandating snake-handling as a test of faith for the state's students." They peppered the Governor with dozens of hostile questions. There is, Barnes says, a "peculiar bias in mainstream American journalism against traditional religions.
Whenever religion comes in contact with politics, the news media reacts in three distinct ways, all negative. Reporters treat religion as beneath mention, as personally distasteful, or as a clear and present threat to the American way of life."
Smaller classes, more teachers & class time & resources
The kind of commitment our public schools need requires that we work toward four goals:
Smaller classes. Compared to their counterparts at private institutions, teachers in our public schools are asked to handle up to twice as many students at a
time.
The best possible teachers. [We need] intelligent ideas that would make it less cumbersome for new teachers to get certified and would expose existing staff to rigorous ongoing training and evaluation.
A longer school day and school year.
While the US breezes along with a 19th-century 180-day school calendar designed to free up the kids in the summer to work on the family farm, the Germans send their children to school for 220 days, the Japanese for 240.
Decent school facilities.
American public education is really composed of two systems-an excellent one that serves the children of the already comfortable and a wretched one that barely serves the rest. [We need especially to repair] our schools’ physical facilities.
