Recently I heard an expert say about education, “The system is broken.” My first thought was the system may be broken, but if we throw money at it, it will still be broken.
The problem is that the people who run the system are broken. The people who use the system are broken. The politicians and experts who want changes to the system are broken.
James Madison mentioned in Federalist 51 why all this is true. He wrote, “What is government itself, but the greatest of all reflections on human nature.”
Human beings are flawed, so government and education are necessary. But also, the quality of government and education is dependent upon the quality of the people.
As a rule, Americans are sodden with greed, ignorance, irresponsibility, apathy and violence. The system is broken because it is full of people like us.
Kimball Shinkoskey
Formerly of Lewis County
