This was my last press release, just before the teacher's strike was called off, by the same old method. Although it is a bit outdated, it is still necessary nonetheless.

Teachers' Strike Should Be Permanent

Callum McPetrie, SOLO Youth Coordinator

As many of you are already aware, the PPTA (Post-Primary Teachers' Association) are going out on strike on September 12th, for the usual reason (wages). Apart from a day off for me and most other Secondary School students throughout New Zealand, a strike is a good example of merely one of the problems of the disastrous public school system.

The teaching profession isn't the most rewarding career around, and it sends shivers down my spine thinking of mature adults "coming back to school" and having to deal with all the "cuzzie bros" and "homie gees" that plague the system, and everyday life in general.

Schools certainly aren't the nicest working environments. Many schools resemble landfills more than places where people send their children to be educated. Although many respectable parents do indeed want the best learning environments for their children, parents, unless they're well-to-do and live in some fancy area of town, get little choice, in the form of school zones. Poor parents are confined to poor schools, and continuously declining standards. Many good parents are left out.

Under a private school system, more students attending the school are a great thing for the owners, but that's another story. Under the public school system, more students are a waste, and not wanted. That's the whole idea behind school zones.

Teachers also get little say in the day-to-day running of the school. It's big government socialists who formulate the PC crap that is learnt at schools. Teachers have to abide.

Most teachers themselves are big government socialists, and don't like the notion of schools being privately owned and operated, despite great successes with private schooling elsewhere, during history. A private school system is exactly not that. Schools operate independently, depending on what forms of education are in demand.

Another reason why the public education system is such a failure is the market (or lack thereof within it) for skills. There's no incentive to work harder or to teach smarter than anyone else, thanks to union regulations on teacher payment and benefits. If any school attempted to pay its teachers on a basis of their teaching ability and methods, a big uproar would be heard from the union and the school would be punished. The classic case of the lazy workers bringing down the good ones.

Last but not least, the effect of Political Correctness on schools and a student's ability to learn, think critically and rationalize is a no-brainer.

The big-government socialists should be pointing to their policies and their preferred economic system as the source of all this failure. The lack of personal responsibilty that keeps society together under the present socialist system is the cause of the teachers' frustation, of the poor quality of schools, the lack of choice as to what is learnt by all parties involved (minus the big-government bigots), and the hopeless mentality of students, teachers and parents in regards to present-day schooling.

Something to think about on September 12, PPTA.

SOLO- www.solopassion.com

Callum McPetrie - callummcpetrie@yahoo.co.nz

Lindsay Perigo - 021 255 8715