My Dad Couldn’t Read: The Plain Case For School Choice In Tennessee
By Brandon Lewis, Founder of The Tennessee Conservative –
I moved in with my father when I was in 7th grade.
Dad was born the youngest of 13 kids in 1937 on a hard-scratch Alabama farm near the Mississippi line.
He had club foot and facial oddities caused at birth.
We lived in an old, sawmill-slat house that had partially burned. Dad “fixed it up” so it was livable.
There was one sink in the house – in the kitchen. Unpainted waferboard ceilings, paneling and threadbare carpets were the finishes.
We burned wood in the basement for heat.
No Air-conditioning.
However, Dad knew this: It was important for me to get an education.
Even though he took me to the wrong school the first day, he knew I needed to be there.
He asked about my school work constantly, though he could not read the notes the teacher sent home.
He got up in the morning to make me breakfast, got me dressed and out the door for the school bus.
In 1998, he saw me graduate high school.
In 1999, during my first semester of college, he died.
Tommy, my Dad’s best friend, called me and told me I needed to come home.
Denson, another friend, met me at the house. He was cleaning up the kitchen where my father had an aneurysm. I thought someone had spilled coffee all over the floor – but that wasn’t it.
God how I miss him. Tears well up in my eyes as I write this.
He was a fine man. Kind, affable, well-liked, funny and an irascible rascal to his friends.
And he loved me. I wish I had appreciated it more.
As I mentioned, Dad could not read. It was a fact that embarrassed him – and he did his best to hide it.
His illiteracy hurt his prospects. It was tough making end meets without this skill as a single Dad.
So, why do I tell you all this?
Two reasons…
First, right now, only 3.3% of Tennessee kids are mastering reading. Only 1 in 4 are on track.
In high schools all across Tennessee, we are graduating functionally illiterate children.
This moral failing of the public education system will have a lifetime of terrible consequences for our children who then become adults.
I know. I lived it.
Second, teachers’ unions and RINO’s will say that parents aren’t “smart enough” or “educated enough” to send their kids to the right schools if TN adopts universal school choice.
This is, in my opinion, a lie from the Devil.
If he didn’t write it, he has his hands in it…
If my father, who never attended school more than a handful of days, worked hard to make good educational choices for me, I know Tennessee Parents can be trusted.
They certainly cannot do any worse than our failing government schools.
It angers me that we take 13 years of a child’s life and in many cases harm them more than we help them.
This is institutional child abuse.
It may not be as obvious as the kinds we’ve outlawed, but the consequences are in a way just as negative.
That’s why I have been and will remain a strident advocate for real school choice.
We’ve tried government education for 40 years. It has failed in our state.
It is time to give parents and kids back their tax dollars.
It’s time for school choice.
The Tennessee Conservative is the ONLY publication proactively fighting for this.
We are, in my opinion, the most hard-driving advocate for school choice in the state.
I have taken Republicans to task on their failings in this arena – even though it has been difficult.
If you feel, as I do, that parents and children need a way out, please consider supporting our publication financially.
We need your support to get the word out on this important issue.
Donate Now to Fight for School Choice.
I promise, I will not bow or buckle until Tennessee’s Kids have the education they deserve.
P.S. I know, compared to the corporate media pros, I’m not always as polished or as politically correct. Occasionally, I may be a little harder on the GOP than I should.
However, we are where we are because Conservatives have not held our party accountable for results. Please know that on School Choice I believe my heart is in the right place.
Our kids deserve better.
Help me do better by them. We can do it together.
Click here to support our School Choice efforts.
Brandon Lewis, Founder of the Tennessee Conservative.
My personal opinion is that a large majority of Tn. educators should be removed. They’ve gone from teaching to sermonizing and protecting their collective butts. It’s always the parents fault if the kid can’t read, it’s always the parents fault the kid is a problem child and it’s always the parents fault if they object to the fact the teachers have the kids for more hours than the parents. I realize there is good and bad on both sides but school choice would weed out a lot of problems along with dumbing down to the lowest denominator the curriculum. If the parents had more control over what school their child attended, teachers would start paying attention and parents would be forced to participate. Just my opinion.
My granddad was the only one who could read or write, Depression poor, Black Lung, grandma never learned but worked in the Shirt factory. The 6 girls went to some level of school, a learning disability like Dyslexia was unheard of so my uncle never learned, granddad managed to teach him to sign his name, he could do anything you showed him how to do. 30 yrs in 1 factory. All the girls made sure their offspring had as much education as they could afford.
I’m the first born of 4, the only 1 to graduate HS. This is not simply a Tennessee issue, it is a systematic dumbing down of education to accomplish the goal of domination of the lower class, bring everyone down to the lowest level, to create easily led Sheep. Many of us fooled them and never stopped learning, even if we didn’t have a college education, which for many has become useless, as useless as my HS education was as we were entering the computer age, that school didn’t prepare us for. We need to move to a Vo-Tech system, where everyone can take both a Tech/College path, mix it up too, simple sewing, cooking, simple repairs have become obsolete. How to balance a budget or read a ruler is still important. Gender doesn’t count in learning. Knowing how your government works, what are your Constitutional rights besides pleading the 5th. Or I want a lawyer. Federalist papers are as much a necessity to read as the Constitution is. And I GOT is improper English! It’s I have.
I don’t blame the teachers, they are confronted with large classes, minimal resources and working through the Pandemic.
Children should be tested in 3rd grade for reading and writing skills, given special classes and not move to 4 grade until they are proficient.
I think trade school education should start in High School and be a path available: plumbers, carpenters, auto repair, HVAC,