Ben Carson - An Extraordinary Life

Ben Carson overcame all odds to become a neurosurgeon and, by age 33, director of pediatric neurosurgery at the Johns Hopkins Childrens Center. Hear Carson discuss his work and philanthropy, his thoughts on health care reform, and about whats still on his to-do list.

Interview length 57:39 (March 2010)

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Prager University - Professor Terry Moe - How Teachers Unions Hurt Schools

We talk endlessly about improving public schools. So what's standing in the way? Stanford Professor Terry Moe identifies the biggest obstacle -- teachers unions.

Professor of Political, Science, Senior Fellow at the Hoover Institution, Ph.D., University of Minnesota

February 2013

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Star Parker - Ben Carson on America's Education Challenge

In the midst of the third presidential debate in Florida, which was supposedly about foreign policy, President Barack Obama interjected a few words about American education.

The rationale was not unreasonable. A better-educated America will be a better-performing and more internationally competitive America.

"Let's talk about what we need to compete. ... Let's take an example that we know is going to make a difference in the 21st century and that's our education policy," he said.

Unfortunately, as is so often the case with politicians, what we hear sounds so logical, so compelling. If only it had anything to do with reality.

According to the fractured political logic on education, which is not much different from what we hear regarding most areas of public policy, the reason we have failure is we're not doing enough of what already isn't working.

In the case of education, we're spending a lot of money and not getting results. So the problem must be, in the brilliant political take on matters, we're just not spending enough money.

"I now want to hire more teachers, especially in math and science, because we know that we've fallen behind when it comes to math and science," Obama said. "And those teachers can make a difference."

But, Mr. President, what information do you have that leads you to conclude that more teachers can make a difference?

According to information recently published by Face the Facts USA, a nonpartisan project of the George Washington University School of Media and Public Affairs, over the last decade the federal government spent $293 billion and states spent a combined $5.5 trillion -- money targeted to improving academic performance -- with no discernable change in reading and math scores. "A quarter of high school seniors don't meet basic reading standards and a third fall below basic math proficiency," Face the Facts USA reports.

Throwing money at education may make those who get the money better off, but there is little, if any, evidence that it makes any difference at all in improving academic performance.

Recently, I sat down and interviewed one of my heroes: Dr. Ben Carson, director of pediatric neurosurgery at Johns Hopkins Hospital.

Outside of his work, Carson's passion is education. As someone who grew up in a Detroit ghetto, whose mother was a domestic who could not read, he has some idea what it means to start with nothing and achieve the American dream.

But listening to Carson -- whose latest book is titled "America the Beautiful: Rediscovering What Made This Nation Great" -- you get a much different take on what is wrong with education and our nation today than what we hear from politicians.

Carson says, "We were a 'can do' nation and now we're a 'what can you do for me' nation."

He talks about the two biggest influences when he was a boy: a demanding and caring mother and his church.

According to Carson, "we're being crucified by political correctness -- that any lifestyle is equivalent to any other lifestyle."

Through the Carson Scholars Fund, he provides $1,000 college scholarships to kids "who excel academically and are dedicated to serving their communities." He also builds reading rooms -- there are now 77 at schools in 11 states -- designed to provoke kids to want to read.

After a half-hour interview with Carson, here's my takeaway: Education is about family, meaning, personal responsibility, standards of right and wrong, and appreciating the uniqueness of every child.

Without these fundamentals, truckloads of taxpayer money will accomplish nothing. Which is why the trillions being spent are poured into a black hole.

I would add that, given the realities of today's public schools -- defined by the political correctness that Carson says is crucifying us -- there is no hope of meeting his standards for education without giving parents freedom to choose where to send their kid to school.

Star Parker

Star Parker is founder and president of CURE, the Center for Urban Renewal and Education, a 501c3 think tank which explores and promotes market based public policy to fight poverty, as well as author of the newly revised Uncle Sam's Plantation: How Big Government Enslaves America's Poor and What We Can do About It.

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Star Parker - Chicago Strike Shows Why we Need School Choice

It says something about today’s public education reality that the two sides in the teachers’ union dispute in Chicago are the union and the mayor.

Allegedly the point of schools is to educate children. But which side in this dispute has sole interest in children and their parents?

The answer, of course, is neither side.

Unions are about the economic interests of the teachers. The mayor is about his budget and the economic interests of the city.

No one solely represents the interests of the kids.

It’s not to say that the union or the mayor has no interest in the quality of education being delivered. But this is just part of their agenda.

Do union members have to worry that their jobs will be gone if children don’t get the best possible education? No. Does the mayor have to worry that his job will be gone or his career over if children don’t get the best possible education? No.

In private sector labor disputes, sitting across from the union representative is the representative of a private company. The survival of that firm depends on its ability to serve its customers. Its labor cost is one line item in the cost structure of the products it sells.

The firm negotiating with the union does have to be concerned that union demands will drive it out of business – that it won’t be able to deliver the best, most competitively priced products.

This helps explains why private sector union membership has dropped dramatically. In the mid-1950’s, 36 percent of the private sector labor force belonged to unions. Today it is less than 7 percent.

Union demands that cause uncompetitive pricing or poorer quality products threaten the survival of the firm because it cannot serve its customers. The customer is king.

If the customer doesn’t like what he’s getting, that customer will go somewhere else.

But what about parents and kids? They have no where else to go. In Chicago, they are stuck with whatever outcome the confrontation between the mayor and the union produces because there is no competition.

Beyond this, even the best public school teachers have their hands tied because they cannot provide what so many of these kids need. A structure of values, discipline, and a clear sense of meaning and right and wrong.

The New York Times’ Nicholas Kristof writes, “In fairness, it’s true that the main reason inner city schools do poorly isn’t teachers’ unions, but poverty.”

But now we have a chicken and egg problem. Are kids not getting educated because they are poor or are they poor because the public schools, generation after generation, provide such poor education in these communities?

Poverty is preponderant among single parent households, and single parent households have grown dramatically in black communities over the last half century. In 1970, 38 percent of black births were to unmarried women. Today it’s over 70 percent.

Should we consider it an accident that over this same period a cultural transformation took place in this country? Court decisions removed prayer and traditional religious values from our public schools. Is it worth considering that the purge of traditional values from public schools and widespread family breakdown were two sides of the same cultural coin?

I think so. But whether you agree with me or not, parents who want their children in a school teaching traditional values, rather than the moral relativism endemic in K-12 public schools today, should have this choice in an allegedly free country.

Eighty six percent of the kids in Chicago’s public schools are minority kids from low income families. Meaning and teaching of right and wrong is what these kids need. Whatever compromise the unions and the mayor reach won’t matter to them.

What they need is school choice.

Star Parker

Star Parker is founder and president of CURE, the Center for Urban Renewal and Education, a 501c3 think tank which explores and promotes market based public policy to fight poverty, as well as author of the newly revised Uncle Sam's Plantation: How Big Government Enslaves America's Poor and What We Can do About It.

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