Candidates Need Educating on ‘Goals 2000’

Channel surfing at the height of the primary season made me wish for interactive TV and a chance to debate candidates.

Pat Buchanan hated “Goals 2000.” Which one did he hate most? “Every school will be free of drugs and violence and offer a disciplined environment conducive to learning”?

Steve Forbes wanted to abolish “Goals 2000.” Does he bristle at “The high school graduation rate will increase to at least 90%”?

Bob Dole despises “Goals 2000.” Does he think it an outrageous idea that “Students will demonstrate in the fourth, eighth and 12th grades that they can handle such subject matter as English, mathematics, science, history and geography”?

Or is each offended by all the “Goals 2000”? If so, what do they favor? Ignorance?

“Goals 2000” did not originate in Washington. It was hammered out by state executives. The National Governors Assn. at its midwinter meeting on Feb. 25, 1990, announced, “America’s educational performance must be second to none in the 21st century. . . . A new standard for an educated citizenry is required. . . .”

In agreement with the Republican administration of President George Bush, they set six goals to be accomplished in a decade.

The last 10 years of the present century were widely designated a “Decade of Education.” The official action for California was taken by both Assembly Concurrent Resolution 70 (1989) of the Democrat-controlled Legislature and proclamation by Republican Gov. George Deukmejian.

I had a premonition about “Goals 2000.” Yes, I hoped a commitment had finally been made, but I had already lived long and I wondered.

Everyone focused on the 1992 elections, then the 1994 elections, now the 1996 elections. Waves of America’s living future keep lapping onward through grades while governors and presidents come and go.

A third of a decade disappeared before Congress got around to what to do with “Goals 2000.” On March 31, 1994, President Bill Clinton finally signed enabling legislation. Eighteen months and a week later, the National Educational Goals Panel headed by Indiana Gov. Evan Bayh reported only modest progress at the half-way point in the ‘90s. Slow to act and quick to judge.

We hear a lot about family values and parenting. Some of those saying the most seem to understand least. We, grandfathers, need to sit demagogues down for a good talking to. Bringing along the next generation and the ones after that will cost us, our families, our communities, our state and our nation all the time and money we can invest.