Al Gore: We can change the conversation

american schools are horrible...

i went to a highschool where teachers told me not to take the sat's. WTF the school needing more funding and they need to be fixed.

how about we fire the high-paid "bad" teachers and hire fresh "good" teachers. you will save on costs and have a better school system. in all my years going to school in america i can honestly say ive only had 1 teacher who was simply amazing and 2 possibly 3 that were good

colleges are accepting fewer and fewer students.
so it's increasingly more difficult to attend college.
not attending college results in well, a lower chance of having a job that pays well and what not...

what am i going to do? i have to apply to schools next year, my dad just lost his job, the economy isnt that great (okay it sucks), and california insists on slashing education funds.

thank you california.

it is all about cultural vocabulary,eficency,integrety and comunity strengthening, a conversation about the above words is the only way to swing culture in line with the global changes that need to ocure," a core vocabulary''
will help define direction ,not one of opinion, one of direction and momentum.

lol our children need education or they'll turn up like bush

Mr. Gore, with the Financial Meltdown during the last month, your words are resounding more than ever now!

I believe we CAN grow ourselves out of this mess!

The Bush Philopsophy of keep them scared and stupid has reduced our standard of living over the last 8 years, but I firmly believe we can OVERCOME it!

Bless you Al Gore!

I BELIVE TO CHANGE THE WORLD WE NEED TO LOOK AT THE TIES THAT BIND CULTURE TOGETHER THE THINGS THAT STRENGTHEN
CULTURE.

I BELIVE I HAVE A COMPREHENSIVE PLAN TO DO JUST THAT, CREATING COMUNITY, JOBS ,INDUSTRY WHILE CREATING A CLEAR WORLD DIRECTION ,INDEPENDENT OR TOGETHER,

IT WILL WORK,

I AM LOOKING FOR THE RIGHT VOICE NOW,

STOP BY ANY TIME,

GENT JIM

• Stop Immigration--Destroy the Public School Incentive Program

The decimation of California's public schools is really a step toward immigration reform and will ultimately stop our "immigration crisis." As public schools deteriorate, there is less incentive for families to risk illegal immigration just to have their children educated here.

• Why should you pay to educate those other people's children?

Let's face it: Saving public education will require people to pay more taxes, or to redesignate a larger percentage of current taxes. You cannot have a system of public education in a state (or nation) unwilling to pay for it. Any discussion of improving public education must begin with re-educating all citizens about the necessity of paying taxes. Right now, Californians do not want to pay taxes to educated "other people's kids."

• Spend and Don't Tax versus Tax and Spend
(or Spending money you don't have versus Spending money you actually have...)
It is a privilege to live in a democracy, but democracies are not free. In fact, they are expensive. The single most significant test of a citizen's loyalty to his or her government is not a loyalty oath, it is each citizen's willingness to pay taxes. It is clear California's citizens lost faith in state government long ago.

• Can't "Separate but Equal" be Equal Again?

Would we be facing this crisis in public education if it weren't for integration? Since the move toward racial integration of public schools, the California middle class of all races and ethnicities have largely removed their children to private schools. Those that have not moved their children, live in low-diversity, expensive neighborhoods and pay out-of-pocket to boost the budgets of their low-diversity, local (semi)public schools. Their children are immune to public education funding cuts.

The parents of children in public schools in California, whose children are endangered by funding cuts, are less likely to vote or contribute to political campaigns. This is one of the vicious cycles we are fighting.

• Instability is Good, Right?

Another is the way in which public schools are funded, a relic from the 19th century. In many ways, the globalization of the economy has rendered locally funded public education obsolete. The California State Budget Crisis proves that state and local funding of public education is too unstable to support the level of public education we need in order to compete in the global economy.

We need a stable source of income with which to fund public schools. We need citizens willing to pay taxes to that end. Clearly, at this point, Californians are not willing to pay those taxes.

• The "Hanging" Chad in the U.S.

California is a state with the size and resources of a nation. There are many nations in the world without free public primary education available to all school age children, for example, Chad, Myanmar, Nicaragua. So what if California is gradually becoming one of these.

Proposals for a Substantive Dialogue on Quantifiable Educational Reform
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-Ten Ideas for Creating a Superior Education System in Los Angeles and Elsewhere in the United States-

9. The budget of the Los Angeles Unified School District is larger than the budget of the City of Los Angeles. One of the only justifiable reasons to allow such behemoth innercity school districts to exist is to take advantage of the economics of scale in purchasing educational materials and the construction and maintenance of schools. The reality of LAUSD is quite different. There is a list of agreed upon vendors from which LAUSD buys, even though any individual could walk into a local store and get a better price than the school district. When we tried to purchase computers at our school for $300 less per computer, we were told that we could only buy from the higher priced district approved vendors.

Rather than “manhattanize” the construction of future schools on existing school sites that are presumptively more likely to be clear of toxic waste as was suggested by then LAUSD CEO Howard Miller almost 10 years ago, LAUSD has chosen the far more expensive alternative of using eminent domain to build new schools on often contaminated sites without examining far less expensive alternatives. It is also worth noting that something as simple as staggering the starting and ending times of school to ensure greater utilization of the existing schools might obviate the necessity of building more schools while accommodating many students who have to work nights to help support their families. These students would be much more likely to be engaged and stay in school, if they were allowed to get adequate sleep before coming to school later on during the day.

10. The exclusive source of school administrators in LAUSD, with the exception of the last two superintendents who have no formal public education experience, is school teachers who have a totally different skill set than what is necessary to effectively run a multi-billion dollar business. The reason that this system exists is that becoming an administrator is the exclusive form of upward mobility for teachers that are burned out by the intolerable present conditions in our schools. Furthermore, as the cost of home ownership continues to rise in Los Angeles, we cannot hope to attract less transient teachers unless we adequately compensate them, so that they will stay with the teaching profession. Administration of schools should become a totally separate educational track that prospective administrators should commit to and be educated for during college, rather than the sole source of upward mobility for the teaching profession.

Colleges and universities could assume a much more fundamental role in the aforementioned issues if they were not compromised by taking money from the same school districts they are supposed to oversee through the promulgation and implementation of effective pedagogy and practices.

Sincerely,

Leonard Isenberg

Leonard.Isenberg@gmail.com

Proposals for a Substantive Dialogue on Quantifiable Educational Reform
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-Ten Ideas for Creating a Superior Education System in Los Angeles and Elsewhere in the United States-

7. All testing should be limited to one assessment to determine appropriate class placement- irrespective of age- and a secondary assessment at the end of every grade level to determine if the student has achieved the minimum mastery of subjects necessary to allow promotion to the next grade- if this was instituted, you might actually have a chance of meaningfully teaching to standards. Supplemental expenditure for early identification and tutoring of students that are having trouble should receive a top prior and the best teachers. Presently, the newest teachers are given the most difficult classes, while the older more seasoned teachers teach the easier or more intellectually stimulating classes- this has lead to an average 50% turnover of teachers in LAUSD within 5 years.

Although the District says it wants highly qualified teachers, the reality is that they are not unhappy to see a higher priced teacher quit for a less expensive first year teacher. The sophistication necessary to calculate the exorbitant cost of this constant turnover of teaching staff, which dwarfs the savings derived by paying lower salaried new teachers, is beyond the understanding of most administrators whose own education was to teach school and not to run a multi-billion dollar public corporation.

The present over-testing regiment is degrading and disheartening to both students and teachers and wastes precious teaching time.

8. Bilingual education is a must in the global village. The only unequivocal way to tell a Latino student that his culture has value is to also teach his language. It is not going to hurt the rest of us and besides, they are the majority of the population in this state. Furthermore, all research shows that students who are literate in any language have a much easier time in transitioning to English.
One of the greatest lies being perpetrated in education is that it would require more money to solve the education crisis. On the contrary, it would actually cost significantly less than the price of incarcerating over 2 million people in a country that, in reality, is in dire need of an educated workforce to build the infrastructure that would make Los Angeles a better place to live for all of us.

Sincerely,

Leonard Isenberg

Leonard.Isenberg@gmail.com

TO BE CONTINUED

Proposals for a Substantive Dialogue on Quantifiable Educational Reform

-Ten Ideas for Creating a Superior Education System in Los Angeles and Elsewhere in the United States-
CONTINUED

6. LAUSD and the state make a lot of noise about teaching to state standards. However, there is a fundamental flaw to their reasoning- it assumes that the student in a certain grade has already mastered the underlying standards for their previous years of education. This is clearly not the case. The vast majority of students not only are unable to achieve the standards for their age-determined grade level, but they are also deficient in the standards for many of the prior years. A more rational approach to initial placement would be to access the students’ actual ability and then place them according to that ability, rather then place them by age into classes that frustrate and cause them to turn off at an early age and disrupt the educational process for other students. In France at the Lycée International, no attempt is made to teach substantive courses to foreign language speakers until they have had at least one year and sometimes two years of intensive language instruction. Students who have language mastery then have little difficulty catching up with their peer group. But an educational system that continues to socially promote students through grade after grade of standards that they have not mastered should not be surprised when these students either drop out of school or fail to achieve even a minimum level of the education they need to be successful citizens.

The vast majority of LAUSD students only have basic interpersonal language skills (BICS), which can be acquired in as little as six month in the United States. The more rigorous cognitive academic language production (CALP), which is necessary for higher education, is nowhere to be found in the majority of LAUSD schools, where students truly believe that a high school diploma is attained by copying a certain number of answers out of a book without understanding what they are writing. This phenomenon has gone on so long that a motivated and conscientious high school teacher is often greeted by hostility, if he dares to try and illicit CALP from students who have been “educated” to be antipathetic to education. This is a result of a misguided effort not to frustrate students. Many teachers teach a curriculum that has no rigor, because they realize that the majority of their students have been pushed through the system without the basic skills necessary to do the every more rigorous work demanded by subsequent grade levels. As the disparity between learned ability and grade level demand becomes greater- usually in middle school- the behavior issues become more pronounced.

Politicians and school administrators shouldn’t be surprised that these students fail the California High School Exit Exam (CAHSEE). The State of California cannot come in with a “red team” audit of a failing school that is leading to a state takeover of that school and then allow the principal of the same school to intimidate the teachers for failing the students and not giving them a “passing” grade.

Sincerely,

Leonard Isenberg

Leonard.Isenberg@gmail.com

TO BE CONTINUED

Proposals for a Substantive Dialogue on Quantifiable Educational Reform
CONTINUED
-Ten Ideas for Creating a Superior Education System in Los Angeles and Elsewhere in the United States-

5. Schools are traditionally underutilized. One factor leading to the academic failure of predominantly minority children and the related rise in gangs is the inability of lower socio-economic parents to parent their children because they are too busy working two or three low paying jobs in order to make enough money to support their families. Thus, their children are being raised by the streets and the gangs that vie with our society for the hearts and minds of these kids. If night school programs were offered at these schools, it would have several advantages: It would educate these parents into a skilled labor force that would allow them to meet the financial needs of their families, while still being the necessary and irreplaceable presence in their children’s socialization and accountability. Adolescents by their nature push for limits and absentee parents cannot supply these necessary limits. Furthermore, parents who are being educated would have the ability to help their language learning children, something they are presently unable to do in the vast majority of cases. If a kid on the Westside of Los Angeles doesn’t get it, the parents get the child a tutor or tutor the kid themselves, but what happens when the parents don’t have these options because their own educational level is so low?

Sincerely,

Leonard Isenberg

Leonard.Isenberg@gmail.com

TO BE CONTINUED

Proposals for a Substantive Dialogue on Quantifiable Educational Reform
CONTINUED

-Ten Ideas for Creating a Superior Education System in Los Angeles and Elsewhere in the United States-

3. The total capacity of all colleges and universities in the United States is 40% of high school graduates. End the disingenuous ed speak rhetoric that talks about all students going to college- college is not the only way to attain the skills necessary to become a productive and successful member of this society.

The industrial arts program in LAUSD has been systematically closed down over that last 30 years based on the false assumption that the cost of retrofitting these shops to the exigencies of modern technology would be prohibitively expensive. In countries like Germany and France, these costs of retrofitting and supplying educational materials were borne by the private sector, which was happy to do so in exchange for a constant supply of well qualified graduates from the high schools. This has allowed these corporations to avoid the necessity of taking mechanics off the shop floor to be retrained at even greater expense to these companies. In Europe and elsewhere, this has been a win/win scenario for both education and business.

Furthermore, students who subsequently decide that they want a higher academic education can more easily achieve this goal when they already have a skilled profession to pay for the presently daunting costs of increased tuition and other costs related to attaining such an education.

Companies like Home Depot are unable to keep many young employees beyond their 90 day trial period because they have not been educated by the schools to have the requisite basic skill level and social responsibility necessary to show up and work to even a minimal level of competency. What is the cost to American business in competitive terms to be unable to find adequately educated employees?

It takes approximately six months training to pass the state certification examination to be a welder. There is a critical shortage of welders in this country, where the starting average salary for this trade is $40,000 a year. Are people gainfully employed as likely to join gangs or join the 2 million inmates that presently occupy our jails?

4. The vast majority of our student population is condemned to failure before they even arrive at the school because they come from families that do not have the ability to physically and intellectually nurture their children in a manner that would lead to their ultimate success in school. We clearly know that things as mundane as diet, being read to, and having parents that have the time to talk to and parent their children create the stimulation and structure necessary to create the preconditions for ultimate success in school.

If the schools in Los Angeles and elsewhere became the Zocolo or cultural town square of the community, many of these disadvantages that presently plague our students and lead to their ultimate failure in school and attraction to gangs could be easily avoided. At the turn of the last century, the settlement house provided the early acculturation necessary to assure success in school of a whole generation of European immigrants.

Not only should local schools have a preschool program, but there should be an outreach into the community to identify women who are pregnant and assure that they are educated and aided in matters such as healthy diet, which would allow their children to reach their genetic potential- a prerequisite for ultimate academic success. Community markets run at the school on a weekly basis could significantly bring down the cost of these healthy foods to the community. Every successful industry has to be concerned about the quality of the raw materials used to produce its products, why should education be any different if it wants to be successful?

Sincerely,

Leonard Isenberg

Leonard.Isenberg@gmail.com

(TO BE CONTINUED)

Proposals for a Substantive Dialogue on Quantifiable Educational Reform

-Ten Ideas for Creating a Superior Education System in Los Angeles and Elsewhere in the United States-

1. The failure of discipline is a major factor in schools inability to educate students. Since schools are financed by the state based on Average Daily Attendance, school administrators are loath to suspend students who not only disrupt their own education, but also the education of other students who want an education. In an article published January 14, 2007 in the Los Angeles Times, a Title I school in Compton, California, that was half Black and half Latino and had only recently been taken over by the state for malfeasance, was able to achieved 868 API scores- comparable to Beverly Hills and San Marino- because the principal did not hesitate to suspend 100 from the 467 student body until they could comport themselves in a manner that would allow them to be educated. It is amazing how quickly parents can get their children to behave when they can no longer dump them on the schools.

2. The major difference between the successful private schools that now accommodate 92% of the Whites that have abandon public education in Los Angeles and the Los Angeles Unified School District is the teacher to student ratio. Private schools have 15 to 20 students per class, while LAUSD permits 43 to 1. If a teacher has five classes with 43 students in each, it is unrealistic to think that rigorous writing assignments will be given by teachers who cannot reasonably be expected to grade 215 essays a week- 75 is doable, especially if it is done in the context of a school without the aforementioned behavior issues.

It is highly suspicious that money for the improvement of public schools goes everywhere except to lessening teacher to student ratios.
(to be continued)

Sincerely,

Leonard Isenberg

Leonard.Isenberg@gmail.com

The purpose of education in a democracy is to prepare the citizens for their fundamentally important function of being the arbiters of power according to our constitution and the ideas propounded by Thomas Jefferson.

After the Vietnam War, the corporate dominated government no longer wanted to be hindered by an educated electorate that could hold it accountable- no more Berkeleys, Pentagon Papers, or Kent States- so it started to dumb down the educational process so necessary for continuing a viable and, therefore, accountable democratic government.

Using good orwellian newspeak/edspeak, where everything means the exact opposite, programs like NAFTA and No Child Left Behind were promulgated to supposedly make trade and education more equitable- what they actual did was further bankrupt the trade and education systems by destroying Mexican farms that were put in direct competition with highly mechanized U.S. farms and where inner city schools were held to high standards without being given the structure or assets to accomplish this legal mandate- money goes to everything in education but lessening teacher to student ratios and social promotion is still alive and well.

The real purpose of both of these and other government programs was to maximize the profits of large corporations and ensure that they would not be questioned by an educated electorate.

Today our schools are more segregated than they were before Brown v. Board of Education in 1954. According to Jonathan Kozel, there are presently only three Whites students going to school in all of the Bronx in New York. Jay Leno's Jaywalking on the Tonight Show shows how little the average American understands. One must wonder how many young American soldiers have died in Iraq without the ability to find it on the map or to meaningfully question why they were there in the first place.

While Mr. Gore is right that we must increase public education in order to reestablish the power of the citizen over unfettered government/corporate power and to allow us to remain viable given the challenge of China, India, and the European Union, it will not take the expenditure of any greater amount of money to do this.

Our failed education system is very similar to our failed health system in which we spend more money than any other country in the world on health care but are 27th in the world in infant mortality and other indicators of how effective the system is. Like health care, it is not how much money we spend, but how we spend it. In health care one-third of every dollar spent goes to the profits of an insurance company and not to health care, even though countries like Canada pay only 4% for a one-pay state run system. In education, obscene amount of money go to everything other than the fundamental necessity of lessening teacher to student ratios- probably the biggest difference between public and private schools..

In California, where there is a projected $14 billion dollars budget shortfall and a $450 million dollar shortfall to the Los Angeles Unified School District, education could actually be improve even with these cuts if the following things were done. It is sad that neither the Democrats or the Republicans, who are both in the pocket of corporate interests, have done anything to institute what would actually be cheap and relatively easy fixes of public education, since to do so would threaten the continued stiffing of this democracy by corporate dominated government, media, and other well-heeled self-interest groups.

Leonard.Isenberg@gmail.com

Of course Mr. Gore is absolutely right; we need to invest a great deal more in public education than we currently do. And not just because our current education system is woefully underfunded, but also because our current system is structurally inadequate, as fearfully antiquated as our societal dependence on fossil fuels. If the children of today are to be adequately prepared for their future in the global community, our education system must integrate practical and technical skills, the arts, cultural and political studies, and more. Schools must teach children about where their food comes from, how to grow it and how to cook it. A strong network of vocational schools must grow alongside our university system, to provide a suitable education for every student and a suitable employee for every occupation. And the curriculum must be integrated, for in the rapidly innovating climate of a global information age, the most important thing we can teach our children is not calculus, nor physics, nor marketing, nor painting. It is how to draw connections between all these disciplines. The purpose of education, in short, is not to cram a legion of facts into a young mind. It is to help that mind learn to think for itself.

Al Gore is 100% right on. Think about it: Every successful person has started with an education. Your doctor had to go to school to learn the medical skills in order to save your life. Your lawyer learned the law by going to school. Even your vet received an education which made it possible to care for your pet. The bottom line is that it ALL starts with an education. As Americans, no one will deny that an education enhances a civilized society. We cannot afford NOT to educate our population. With this in mind, education funding ought to be our highest priority. It's like what Mark Twain says about reading the classics: "Everyone wants to have read the classics but nobody wants to read them." In this case, everyone wants to be educated, but no one wants to pay for it. Let's put our faith back in humanity and provide a quality education of the people, by the people, and for the people of the United States of America.

Hi Al Gore!
You can see the Google Earth updated UNEP pictures about the dried- , dring lakes, demaged environment:
1. Green River (USA, Wyoming)2. Everglades (USA, Florida)3. Las Vegas city (USA)
4. Lake Al Wahda (Marocco)5. Lake Manantali (Mali, Africa)
6. Walvis Bay (Namibia)7. Ijsselmeer (Amsterdam)8. Atatürk Dam (Turkey)
9. Lake Chad (Chad)10. Three Gorges Dam (China)11. Shenzhen city (China)
12. Aral Sea (Kazakhstan)13. Lake Chapala (Mexico)
14. Lake Chora Basa (Mozambique)
and more on Google Earth (Global awarness button on left side)
Some hungarian Google developers updating the map.Best Regards,Tamás Kádár

I have an idea for a product that could be introduced to children at a young age and would stimulate their developing brains in new ways. The product could be used by a toddler to a geriatric.
I believe the technology to make this product possible- is already in development.

celestialceiling@gmail.com

Thomas Jefferson said that the prerequisite for democracy is to have an educated citizenry. Without education, the citizens cannot fulfill their fundamental function in a democracy which is to be the arbiter of power as was anticipated by our constitution.

It is not an accident that this situation exists. Those in power do not want to be effectively checked by the citizens of this country as they were during the Vietnam War, where demonstrations helped to bring it to an end.

In good orwellian newspeak, No Child Left Behind means that all children are not educated to fulfill their primary function as the arbiters of power in a putative democracy.

To truly educate all of our people would mean that we would lose our cheap Latino labor source and finally have to come to grips with 400 years of racism against Blacks.

How many of the soldiers who have died in Iraq could not have found it on a map?

The failure to educate is the disease from which all other symptoms of failure of democracy emanate.

As a CA community college art teacher I am dismayed to find the persona of current students to be essentially that of consumers. Many have difficulty buying textbooks, but believe that their life will cease to have meaning without the newest cellphone. When I try to talk to them about the nature of art, they tell me they want to learn how to make a really good product. And they don't mean, by that, a meaningfull piece of art. Most come here never having made something, with their own hands and ideas, in their life. Our K-12 schools are shorting them not only on art, music, shop and the like, but I believe also on Civics and US and World History. Plagerism is rampant and offending students don't even understand the concept. They are being raised by our society to be consumers rather than citizens. A huge problem is that our schools are now being run on the business model. This is inappropriate and really needs to change. CA used to have the best schools in the nation. To think we can have that again without spending money on it is absurd. As our greatest treasure, our children deserve the respect that comes with providing them an education that prepares them for a fully participatory adulthood.

As a CA community college art teacher I am dismayed to find the persona of current students to be essentially that of consumers. Many have difficulty buying textbooks, but believe that their life will cease to have meaning without the newest cellphone. When I try to talk to them about the nature of art, they tell me they want to learn how to make a really good product. And they don't mean, by that, a meaningfull piece of art. Most come here never having made something, with their own hands and ideas, in their life. Our K-12 schools are shorting them not only on art, music, shop and the like, but I believe also on Civics and US and World History. Plagerism is rampant and offending students don't even understand the concept. They are being raised by our society to be consumers rather than citizens. A huge problem is that our schools are now being run on the business model. This is inappropriate and really needs to change. CA used to have the best schools in the nation. To think we can have that again without spending money on it is absurd. As our greatest treasure, our children deserve the respect that comes with providing them an education that prepares them for a fully participatory adulthood.

Mr. Gore's comments are so true! As a teacher, I've understood how important it is to educate our future citizens. As a concerned citizen, I've watched many times over the years as education gets budget cuts, because it seems to be an easy target. Children have no voice in politics, and so need us to stand up for them, and for their education.

If Americans do not have access to higher education, they cannot become critical thinkers. Our government wants cattle, NOT people who can think for themselves and see the real truth. I urge anyone reading this to open your eyes and discover what's really going on here. The late William Cooper once said, "Read everything, listen to everybody, don't trust anything unless you can prove it with your own research".

In the area of education, Americans need to ask themselves, "what do they want to do and where do they want to go"? Education is effected by the largest and most complex confluence of social and economic factors than any other social interaction in the country. At the intersection of this confluence lies not only the heart of the problem, but the solution to the problem. Providing a good education is the most important thing a society can do, but yet in terms of tax and private dollars it is the most expensive.

To have change in education, we need to first identify the components of the social and economic confluences that intersect in education. Here are the major ones that I see: Taxes collected, unions, families, ideologies, teachers, students, business, state & federal legislation and general social and cultural changes. The interactions that take place between all of these determine whether there are overall improvements or an overall decline in educational outcomes.

For More Details Go Here:

http://www.harleymeyer.com/iss/education.htm

It is really high time the wealthy decision-makers understand that great public education does not just effect people who go to public schools. Our whole society is effected by how we treat and educate the majority of our children. Where there is ignorance and a lack of opoportunity, there will be crime and violence. It will be perpetrated on the whole society without regard to social standing, race, socioeconomic status, etc. That being said, if we are going to involve everyone in reversing global warming, we are going to have to be able to "speak" to everyone here about it. To do that, we have to have "listeners" who can understand what is said and how important it is. Education is the easy way to accomplish this. It's a no-brainer.

Al...I think you should give me scholarship to finish school!

I am in total agreement with this point of view.

JanforGore: You rock, Girlfriend. You are so on the money.

Dear Al Gore,
I believe education is the answer to so many of our problems. Education is an investment in our future for a better world...
We need to redesign our educational system, based on the creative arts through film, musicals, and documentaries, using high technology to make learning an exciting adventure. Envision our educational system and curriculum teaching through advances in educational kinesiology and multimedia entertainment to inspire children to develop their full expression of creativity, and imagination in learning --
Physical geography, earth sciences including the meterorological, solar system, and environmental studies, ecological patterns of the earth (climate, sea currents and tides), human social relations, economic issues, cultural geography and its impact on the world in through reading, poetry, dance, music, acting, dramatic arts, fashion design, painting, illustration, sculpture, photography, and writing.
Let www.current.com know if you want to develop these ideas into a proposal for creating this new, interactive educational system to invest in a better world -- here and abroad.
Michael Reed Gach, Ph.D.
Author, Producer, Publisher
MrGach@att.net

I think if Al Gore was in office for the past eight years. Oh wait i don't have time to think I'm to busy working to pay for the Bushes war.

There is no question that we should NOT be cutting funds for schools, but in addition, we need to change the ways in which the subject matter is presented to the students. We are in an age where children, startiing at pre-school ages, are becoming familiar with electronics and will, on reaching adulthood, go out into a world where electronic devices will be integral to their lives. Yet we continue to use paper books as the basis for presenting materiail to the students. This needs to change.
I have been a volunteer for the past 12 years, tutoring math at the 6th grade level. The teacher in the classroom where I work, is very good and and works very hard at trying to get the materiial across to the students. Mostly she is successful, but those students who don't get the lesson, and do poorly on tests or homework, are sent to me, where I have an opportunity to work with them one-on-one.
The books provided are large, about 500 pages, colorful, and full of storiies, aimed at illustrating how the subject matter will be used in later life. The books are also expensive, heavy to carry in the student's backpacks, and must be rebound after each semester. They also contain errors that cannot be corrected and examples that are more confusing than instructive. They have been in use for at least 12 years and are about to be replaced, at great expense.
Working one-on-one with the students allow me to determine what aspect of the material they don't understand. Sometimes it is the vocabulary used in a word problem, sometimes it is the mechanics of solving the problem, sometimes they don't understand when to add or multiply or divide, etc. in order to come up with the correct answer. Often they guess, rather than go through the riggors of the problem solving process. each student is different.

It's obvious that the teacher, who has 25-30 students in each of her math classes can't work with each student to determine what the problem is and how to go about solving it. But a computer could.

The State should have, as a goal to be able to provide a small, but capable, computer for each student and the lessons, instead of being in a paper book, should be presented on the computer. Interactive testing, should be able to be perfomed on the computer, by each student, so that the computer could determine, from the way the work is being done, what the problems are and whether the information is being understood. (Computers similar to those that were recently offered on a buy one/give one basis, would suffice to begin with.) If the student is required to work out the problem on the computer screen, using it as a tablet, the computer could keep track of where in the problem solution process the error is being made, and then require that the student go back and, after a few words of explanation, repeat that part of the problem. The material itself could also be presented in a more dynamic and interactive fashion so that the material is more interesting, and at the same time more understandable for the student.
Another advantage of this interactive relationship between the computer and the student is that it provides instantanious feedback to the student on how well the work is being understood. This fosters instant corrective action, which is better retained than getting the feedback when homework papers are corrected a day or two later and the teacher or a tutor has a chance to review it at that time.

This same approach can be applied to almost any subject and will provide positive results. It doesn't do away with the need for teachers, but can enhance their work so that we can get a better bang for the bucks we do spend. If we are to return to adequate funding for our education system, and I hope we will, I think that it is also imperitive that we move forward in our use of technology so that we can prepare the next generation for the world they will face.

I always wished that when I was in school many years ago, we could have been taught foreign languages in elementary school. It needs to start when one is very young and their brain can soak it up like a sponge.

I also think that every school should have a mandatory dress code, like Catholic schools. Learning is easier this way.

I understand the homework has gotten to the point that that is all they do in the evening...hours of homework. This has to have a bad effect on how their view learning.

All public schools must have access to updated computers, etc. and access to the rest of the world's way of life. It IS a very small world.

There are so many things I could mention but these are a few that seem important to me. Learning should be done in such a way that the student not only has enjoyment but, is gaining valuable information at the same time. Good teachers bring learning to life.

Public schools have to be made a priority!

Cutting education is a step backwards in maintaining a thriving economic system, robust democracy, and cultural excellence. At some point, we won't have the money to import ingenuity and we'll fall to the back of the pack of industrialized nations (we're already well on our way).

It's important to note that the US places high importance on education in its Foreign Assistance Framework (State Dept web site) with an overall stated goal:
“To help build and sustain democratic, well-governed states that respond to the needs of their people, reduce widespread poverty and conduct themselves responsibly in the international system."
Listed as 1 of 3 "Investing in People" objectives is Education.

Thank you for this video Al Gore! I wish there were more people in our political system who thought this way and I wish you were still in our political system, although you seem to make a bigger impact out of the system.

And what I find amazing is that this wonderful and informative conversation never made it to the front page of this site or Current News. Instead, we get fluff about an Indiana Jones movie riling Russian Communists; a sketchy story from CNN about a woman who allegedly caged her son; porn in California; and a woman who supposedly woke up after rigor mortis set in, courtesy of Fox News. How does reporting the same news we can find on any other MSM cable station make this new? This should be what is on the front page. Kind of disappointing to me. Education is the key to Democracy, and I thought Current was that instrument, but not when the same stories we see on Fox News and other outlets that really aren't "news" wind up here as news.

This is the first intelligent perspective I've heard regarding education. It's 100% correct - as I understand the purpose of education. We are slipping behind in many ways - we should have an emphasis on education to lead in the process of globalization and climate change. New thinking has to evolve now. Please contact Sen. Obama and let him know we support this perspective and that he will need to take all measures possible to address it.
Thank you again, Al Gore for your insight and clear perspective. Please stay out in front as a voice of wisdom. Nancy Henderson

Al, I appreciate everything you are trying to do. But this video is not inspiring, even though the topic is extremely important.

As I see it, the problem isn't budget cuts to education, but what caused the States to even have to consider these cuts. It's all about money and why States don't have the funds to help their citizens in any number of areas; not just education. This happens every time there is an economic downturn.

Individual states must live within their budgets and available funds. Unlike the federal government, they cannot just create funds out of thin air by going into debt or creating money. The federal government can waste money on unfunded wars, bombs, and pork and pass the payment of that debt onto future generations. The states don't have that option.

So, here is a REALLY stupid idea! Make the federal government fund ALL public education (K thru 12) on an equal basis for all of the students in America. No strings attached. The moneys would be directly transfered to the states, who would in turn pass it on to their local school districts. With this program to relocalize education, the federal Department of Education should be eliminated. Clearly this department has not fostered critical thinking skills or the development of educated citizens with its unfunded mandates.

Oh, and another benefit would be that maybe individual schools could throw the military recruiters out of their schools without the threat of losing their education funds from the federal government. This way the teachers could actually hope that their students' education will be used on tomorrows solutions to the huge challenges we face, instead of just being used for cannon fodder for the war machine.

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My interest in public education for all of our children stems from 1) my appreciation of having had an excellent primary and secondary education 2) and having been able to afford my children a good education. I want the same for my grandchildren, of course. In addition, I strongly believe that our future as a society depends on our giving our growing popultion a sound education, with a dual emphasis on sciences and the "humanities". We need this foundation to inform and encourage our democracy and a peaceful leadership in the global body-politic. Budgetary cuts in education are an obscenity. Instead we should be investing in smaller schools with smaller classes and multi-service campuses tied to family serving parks. We should support our teachers (of smaller classes) with the salaries, supplies and benefits they need, and we should support our families with onsite health and counseling services they need. Our children and the health of our ecosystems are our future - how can we possibly "cut back" on investing in either?!

The logic of this and the relevancy of this topic is absolute. California teachers are all experiencing the trauma of this policy of reducing education every day. School boards are scrambling to give and then take away pink slips. Teachers are in a constant state of stress and can't focus on doing their best and building an efficient and happy classroom because they can't plan their resources and need to plan for their next paychecks. The amount of money already spent on dealing with this threat has already wasted precious resources and energy.California is already 46th in the nation for spending per student and in the second breath educators are being blamed for lower performance of students. Every parent and citizen needs to speak out about these scare tactics and the state of education. Thank you again Al Gore for being the primary truth-sayer in this country.

Thanks for this Al. A good, solid education system is essential to the long-term economic prosperity of our country. Unfortunately, politicians have found that it is much easier to sell American's on cutting taxes than on investing in our future. How do we change the conversation to make it more politically feasible to raise taxes in order to promote a bright future for the next generation of Americans?

I think your movie on the environment helped change the national dialog. Maybe it's time for a movie on education as well.

I am a teacher at a public charter school in Los Angeles, California and I think that cutting education has become a habit over the years, so much so that anyone sitting in the governor's seat or a state assembly seat automatically decides to cut the budget for education because it's been done for the last 30 years.

I spend an average of $500-600 per school year on school supplies for my students because we don't receive proper funding now. I and my colleagues at the school we work at, are not allowed a lunch break because there is no other supervision for our students. Yes we all know, including the director of the school, its against the law but there is no money for additional personnel to hire.

I work with the most needy people of society and unless we change our spending habits, we will continue to have children who cannot read, write, or solve problems despite my and my colleagues best efforts.

Those who already have a quality education are pulling the rug out from under the upcoming generation by cutting funding. Having a miseducated population will leave young people defenseless against lies, manipulation, confusion and despair. I agree with Al Gore - fund quality public education for California's students!

There is a crisis in education in California. It is precisely the wrong time to cut funds for public education. California used to have a high ratio of funding to students/teachers. Now we are near the bottom of the states' list.

California is the world's 7th largest economy. We can do better, and we must.

Education cuts must not happen. The kids are our future. There is another problem that you hear very little or nothing about and that is the cuts in health care for our senior citizens especially those with limited, low income. Must we make this group decide on which medication to take or whether it is a food day or medication day. The kids mothers and fathers speak loudly and often for their kids future and that is absolutely how it should be but where is the voice for this group of our too often silent elders.

How about a walker march on Sacramento.

This total conversation is kind of like building a new fire station while the town burns to the ground.

Mr. Gore, do you realize how bad it's getting out here?

At this point in time what does it matter how much money you throw at education, as long as corp. America is allowed to oursource jobs and thus our very exsistence to the lowest bidder?

I have never understood any cuts to education. The link between education and consciousness about our choices, our responsibility, and our respect is direct and close. But maybe that's why some people are threatened by having a highly educated population...

I am very certain that to live sustainably on the planet with a bustling economy, it can only occur with a well educated populace. I agree that there is more and more information required to make conscious choices, and the easiest way to disseminate that information is through public education starting at a young age. Excellent K-12 education is most important to achieve for everyone.

Thank you Mr. Gore. Exactly my thoughts.

The government constantly tries to find solutions to problems by providing quick fixes. Getting to the root of the problem of US jobs being lost to the other nations is by focusing on elementary and higher education now.

Yacht parties, soaring gas prices, lack of health care, lack of money for education. What happened to our country?

I think they are cutting education because its in their better interest to keep us ignorant and working several jobs at a time. When we are so busy trying to put 'food on our family', we don't have the time or energy to watch what the government is doing.

Can't tell you how very sad I am that you will not be leading the next administration. Very grateful for the work you doing now... just want my cake and eat it too.

I think this is part of a systemic move towards privatization of all public programs. We're seeing it now with prisons, where corporations can hire prisoners as cheap labor.

If we bankrupt (defund) public programs, for profit corporations can swoop in and "save the day". The link between politicians and corporate interests are all too evident and real. As long as we allow these relationships to dominate politics, these are the results we will face.

it is not the higher education,it is the quality higher education.education is reflection of ones perfection in all the aspects of qualification,thinking,behavior. It is not just how much you are trained to get the pay. This quality of education which desciplines mind is importantant.
Eduacation should incorporate basic human qualities of being truthful ,honest , compassion,respect for others and hard work.
i would quote the literature falun gong regarding this aspect.

It is true that historically, one of the first things cut when revenues are down and budget deficits rise is public education. It is also true that it is absolutely wrongheaded. I suppose it happens because it is too easy, far easier compared to cutting corporate subsidies given the vigilance of lobbyist watchdogs.

Perhaps the solution is to advocate for legislation that prioritizes public education so that by law, the budget makers cannot sacrifice education until all other options have been exhausted.

This interests me because attempts to "do-in" public education has been part of the Republican agenda for decades. Privatization of education and funding cuts for public education are part and parcel of this plan to eliminate opportunities for the poor and much of the middle class to advance in society. If these folks win their battle we will see the end of our republic as we know it. Further we will lose the contributions of a majority of our population -- and that will put the icing on the collapsed cake called the USA.

Over the last ten or so years, we've seen the "dumbing down" of information and education reflected in all parts of society. It's in the school system, the media, in politics, and in every day life. The lack of "critical thinking" is reflected in the choices we make and the values we adopt.

We need to reverse the trend of over-simplifying everything by placing a large emphasis on the value of knowledge and the beauty of complexity.

We must come to believe that citizens have a real responsibility other than in just going to the polls once in a while. It's what our Founding Fathers imparted to us - this vision of a functioning democracy in which everyone played a part.

The key is in accepting that education is first a concept, then a practice. Without true, objective, factual learning, our society will continue to limp along, and finally wither. Supporting all levels of education must be a top priority. An educated population is not easily manipulated or deceived......

UC berkeley new regent Yudof earns 500,000+
regents earn like the CSU regents 200,000+
teacher's earn 40-50K if they are lucky.
the imbalance is huge, therefore the cuts to the upper group must be made to maintain any semblance of a decent education for the average students, each one of which may be able through decent education to alleviate or solve further the global problems. Paying a provost or a regent or a head director is just utilizing capitalistic ceo nonsense with the publics money. Education is overpriced in this country, why is it that in the EU the systems are nowhere near this price but the education is just as thorough?

Meanwhile the SFUSD cant even maintain their schools. They currently had a proposal to sell off 8 public school sites, and already sold one off that was a public site within walking distance of the largest rental community in the city of san francisco, (700 Font) highly un-sustainable.

Only one SF Board of Education member voted against the sale. It shows the lack of foresight and vision in regards to creating an education system that works...

What gets cut and what doesn't all has to do with how much money you have to donate to the politicians. I guess that the teacher's union, schools, children, parents and concerned citizens were not wealthy enough to save education from being cut.

We currently have a nation of the rich, the poor and a rapidly disappearing middle class. The rich don't care if public school funding is cut because their children don't go to public schools. The poor and the middle class don't have enough money and influence to keep school funding at the needed level. They are also too busy just trying to make ends meet that they don't have the time to work to make a difference.

How did we get here? and what are we doing in this hand basket?

Bottom line: get the money out of politics so that our representatives can work for "We, the People" again.

I couldn't agree more with Mr. Gore's remarks on the lack of logic involved in cutting education funding (yet again) during difficult times in an attempt to reverse those difficult times.

It seems obvious to me that the reason for this is that education does not serve the financial interests of the corporate industrial complex. The ultra-rich cannot continue to amass obsene amounts of wealth by investing in a safe, just and healthy future for America.

We, the American people, have to reclaim this wonderful land. We must stand up and say, "We will no longer accept the corporate hijacking of our country. We are smarter than you think. We have had enough. We are paying attention and we take back ownership of our democracy."

I'm really getting involved. I understand that this is going to be work. I've pick a few of the issues I feel are the most pressing (climate crisis, education...), I'm educating myself and making some noise. If we all do it they can no longer ignore us.

Now that I have had some time to think about your question...what should we do to transform public education...I have a more specific answer. :)

One thing we should do is allow teachers to innovate a creative program that will excite students to want to learn and REQUIRE students to learn to think. Curriculum must integrate subjects into something students can connect to their lives and make sense of.(Currently NCLB has fragmented instruction and curriculum in a way that defies logic.)

The other thing that needs to happen is the students...at every age...need to be given responsibility for their education. They need (with teachers and parents) to set real goals for their lives...not just for the sake of 'practicing' goal-setting skills... but for the purpose of owning a goal that will require a change in their educational choices or path to learning. Owning the goal can help them (with their family) choose homework over Playstation 2 (or whatever the current number is).

I have spent a lot of time doing 'student-led conferences' where students are involved in setting goals for the year and they participate in their parent-teacher conferences. It has been enjoyable to do this as a teacher, and the families I work with value the process, but it has not been 'tied' to any real change in the child's education. I think...if it were...it could have a HUGE impact.

We teachers often bemoan 'cookie-cutter' education, because each child is unique...but our current system does not really allow for each child's uniqueness...their strengths and weaknessess. NCLB's programs to address this have been a horrendous mish-mash of scheduling minutes for interventions. It hurts one's brain! :)

We adults need to devise multiple paths to success for our children. We need to make all of them exciting, but have each path play to different unique strengths that children have. As adults...and I mean ALL adults... we need to support them and their goals along the way. We must insist that they may not 'opt out'...no dropouts! And somehow...like Barack Obama has said...we adults have to understand that these children are the responsibility of ALL of us. It's not okay to pass the buck, or blame someone else, or say "I already paid taxes for my kids." and not support schools.

That's what I think...Mr. President. :)

They are cutting education because the upper rich class has to have their tax cuts for yachts, no taxes, and loopholes that the poor and middle class do not get. I think that the rich should have to pay and then pay back all the free money they have received over the years and then the budget would balance. We should take the hummer away from the governer and put the proceeds towards the deficit and quit paying for all the extra perks he receives.

The current administration and republicans in general, as well as many moderate democrats have been de-funding many public institutions and privatizing as many public services as possible. For example the private military contractors carry on in Iraq unbounded by Geneva conventions. This is part of a continuing policy that shifts more of the wealth to the rich corporate ruling class and eliminate the middle class. Cutting taxes on corporations and on the wealthy is an integral part of the methodology. Limiting education is another tactic. In the new global economy corporate executives are rewarded with greater salaries regardless of performance. In many cases ailing corporations are bailed out by taxpayers as lower level workers struggle to survive as more of the undereducated compete in the workplace and are forced to accept lower wages.
College tuition is rising so fast that soon only the wealthiest will be able to afford it. The financial burden of student loans may hinder many grads who will have to fight for the lower paying positions as companies continue to cut cost to survive.

This is a vital topic for Californians. Education is one of the most effective ways to ensure that high paying jobs stay in California.
Our state Gov. responds to pressure. It is up to us to apply it until we get what we want!

Education is often the target of funding cuts because the more educated the masses are, the harder they become to control and subdue. We are wealthy enough to provide free or nearly-free education for all college students. Education should not be limited to those who can afford it, everyone should have the right to further their own knowledge regardless of financial status.

Okay ...

I gotta proposition for ya...
You find us a pot of money, say $100 million to start...

With this money we will seek to purchase nonperforming loans from the idiots who own them, banks usually, but not always... Anyway...

This is how it works, we offer the loan holder 70% of the loan, cash... He loves us, and gets to write off the loss and dumps the loan quick...

Then we go see the guy who "owns" the house and is now usually about 3 months into his new ARM, the teaser rate was good for 24 months, then the rate went from 2.5% to 8.25% and his payment doubled... Wow! Lets say he lives in Brentwood, CA... or Stockton or Tracy or even in Dallas... But the higher numbers California offers are more fun so lets just say that he bought the house for $600,000.00, and he has mortgage of say $540,000.00 (original teaser payment, $2,133.00) and since the payments were current until the rate changed he owes now owes about $516K, but the house won't refi for that and he is 3 months behind on the mortgage, he now owes just over $12K to make the loan current, plus the next months payment of $4.057.00... Man, time to walk...

But wait... We just bought that mortgage for $361,000.00... And this guy owes us $12K... So why don't we see if he would like to really own his house? I bet he would, and I bet he would like to keep his credit rating, too...

So what can we do for him? Can we, say, accept half of the money he was trying to give the original mortgage holder and forgive the rest...? Sure can! Most folks in that position are trying, they have at least half of what they owe, usually... So he's got $6K and we will take $3K of that for fees, someone has to pay me for instance..., and then we will go to a real bank with our friend and client and get a real loan... His house is worth no more than $450K, maybe even $425K, but it will legitamtely appraise for enough to finance our friend. Now our investors need to make a decent return on their money and since this exercise will probably take a month or so per transaction, I am sure that we could interest investors with a rate of return of only 5% per transaction. In other words we could discount the loan to say $385K with our investors getting a return of 5% ($18K) and another $5,500.00 going back to cover loan costs and other fees etc... Like the cost of the non profit that does the deals...

Anyway our friend in Brentwood now has a loan at 5.75%, with a payment of around $2,250.00... Which he can live with if we rescue him in time!

So tell me what did you have planned for that big green investment group, anyway?

RG Johnson
San Jose CA
SouthBayDraftGore08
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/bayarea4gore/

COURAGE Comments on Public Education By Kathleen Hughart, San Diego Community College Instructor
May 22, 2008 San Diego, California
:Teacher-Learner Autonomy and National service

In a country as diverse as the United States of America, federally mandated school programs stifle learning and create more harm than good.

Students, parents, teachers and school administrators from each individual community must have authority over their school’s public education.

The top-down NO CHILD LEFT BEHIND program, with its scripted teaching manuals and preconceived “correct answers,” poisons the learning environment.

Federal funding should not be linked to automated test score results. Teachers know how to teach according to the specific needs of the people in neighborhoods where they live and work.

Immediately after high school graduation, teens can repay the government’s investment in public education by fulfilling a mandatory two-year national work-service apprenticeship in the career of their choice.

Given the chance to learn unimpeded by federal interventions, publicly educated young people can create solutions and reconstruct U.S. society.

It goes beyond just competing in an information age. I think the gutting of our public education system is an out an out attempt to undermine the basic functioning of our democracy. You really can't have a democracy without a public education system available on equal terms to all. Now we have two public educational systems: one in wealthy suburbs where kids are prepared for college and to find opportunities in our economy and one in poor inner cities and rural areas where kids are warehoused. (Of course, we have a third system of private education where kids are given the tools and contacts of the ruling classes, but that is another story.)

COURAGE Comments on Public Education By Kathleen Hughart
May 22, 2008 San Diego, California
:Teacher-Learner Autonomy and National service

In a country as diverse as the United States of America, federally mandated school programs stifle learning and create more harm than good.

Students, parents, teachers and school administrators from each individual community must have authority over their school’s public education.

The top-down NO CHILD LEFT BEHIND program, with its scripted teaching manuals and preconceived “correct answers,” poisons the learning environment.

Federal funding should not be linked to automated test score results. Teachers know how to teach according to the specific needs of the people in neighborhoods where they live and work.

Immediately after high school graduation, teens can repay the government’s investment in public education by fulfilling a mandatory two-year national work-service apprenticeship in the career of their choice.

Given the chance to learn unimpeded by federal interventions, publicly educated young people can create solutions and reconstruct U.S. society.

I disagree with the notion that we have to raise taxes to properly fund education. Simply cut the bloated budget for military expenditures and redirect those funds towards education. Even cutting the bloated Pentagon budget by the smallest percentage could make such a difference in funding education, and the U.S. would still outspend the rest of the world on military spending by billions and billions of dollars.

I grew up in an underserved area of southern california and saw many good kids wth hopes and dreams fall victim to drugs and violence and gangs. I am now a nurse at a childrens hospital in a very poor area and have the opportunity to talk to these kids about how they feel about their future. The overwhelming consensus is that they have dreams and goals but feel they have no hope. I hear from them the schools are not safe, the schools do not offer the college prep classes they need, the teachers are babysitting more than teaching. If you want a real solution to high unemployment, high welfare rolls, increasing gang problems then give these kids a proper and fair/balanced education. Give kids a sense of hope for their futures and they will succeed. I am living proof. If my parents hadn't sent me to private school I might have been another statistic that people would be calling a purge on society.

Dude, you're preaching to the choir. I'm a school teacher. What people really don't want to talk about is that taxes will have to be raised to adequately fund education...

I would love to support the issue, however there currently is not enough checks and balances to the universities expenditures in the state of california. The UC system, and CSU systems overspend and duplicate projects phenomenally to the point of bankrupting the state. They engage in Memorandum's of Understanding with cities, that ignore the communities, and do nothing to solve the impacts of the universities "largess" in spending, salaries (see UC regent Yudof) or in utilizing "foundations" and other side made authorities to purchase land, and destroy neighborhoods. We face this currently by the SFSU CSU Masterplan, where the SFSU "foundation" purchased University Park North and University Park South, eliminating over 1,000 units of precious rental housing and proposing to demolish and develop on the recreation site of Parkmerced. This property itself is a possible "NATIONAL LANDMARK" due to its design, integrity, and landscape in full maturity by thomas dolliver church. (See www.tclf.org under "marvels of modernism") I am all for the proper and well thought out development of cities, and the urgency of improving the world for all who live here, and future generations. But the un-sustainablility of demolishing the entire development of Parkmerced by the current owners after "rennovating the units" and selling off portions to the SFSU Foundation which than sold it back to the CSU system. Shows a severe problem in the overall education systems growth and checks and balances. Until the proper review of the parcel is done through a Historic Resources Survey, and lands purchased through side-deals with developers is thorougly investigated. The SFSU growth and masterplan should be severly VALUE Engineered and the expenditures of the California University system and its negotiations with city agencies investigated by the federal government until a proper balance is achieved in expenditures, growth, access to education at an affordable level, and protection and sustainable measures of increase and growth that dont throw communities under the steam-roller of development, or eco-green "chic" developments like www.parkmercedvision.com that are highly unsustainable in nature.

Sincerely

Aaron Goodman @ PRO
www.parkmercedresidents.org

It's always politically easy, indeed safe, to cut funds from childrens' programs...education, foster care, healthcare, nutrition, whatever it is. Children can't vote. Children can't make political contributions. Children can't hold politicians' feet to the fire or politicians' minds to common sense thinking. I believe Mr. Gore is spot on. Education should be a top priority. It should be funded at the very least, if not more, with, the same zeal and commitment we have to building bombs and prisons. (How is it that increasing funding for public education is throwing good money after bad? Money, we are told, when it comes to human social programs, can't solve the problems. Yet it always seems to be the answer for solving the problems when it comes to building bombs or prisons.) Priorities...easy to figure out which ones are at the top of the list. Just look at the bottom line.

In The Audacity of Hope , Barack Obama notes on page 22,
“And yet our debate on education seems stuck ... between those who say money makes no difference in education and those who want more money without any demonstration that it will be put to good use.”

Money will not simply solve the serious problems in education today.

We can solve the problems by encouraging innovation and entrepreneurship in education. We have neither the money nor the time to implement traditional methods to improve education right now. We require new ideas and new approaches that will quickly and dramatically improve education.

The current funding atmosphere works against improvements in education. Funding organizations (angels, VCs, government, foundations, etc.) aren't funding education entrepreneurs. As web sites like this one and so many more indicate, new technologies have the capability to change the world, including education.

My colleagues and I have taken the step of innovating in science education. Online high schools in six states, Stanford, Johns Hopkins, Apex Learning, and many more have adopted our approach. It's patented and groundbreaking. Yet, we have never been able to get a dime of investment from anywhere. We are not rich and have had to provide all of the funding for this venture ourselves.

Our entire capitalist system is broken, and funding decisions are the worst part of it. The ROI decisions don't include long-term or societal returns and costs. Our education system is spiraling to its death, and, as things are, we are powerless to stop it.

We could be doing so much more for so much less cost with results much sooner. Recall that over the last few decades, billions of dollars have been spent on fixing science education with essentially no result. Only a fundamental change can fix education. Innovation will be a critical part of the fix.

My web site is www.smartscience.net.

In The Audacity of Hope , Barack Obama notes on page 22,
“And yet our debate on education seems stuck ... between those who say money makes no difference in education and those who want more money without any demonstration that it will be put to good use.”

Money will not simply solve the serious problems in education today.

We can solve the problems by encouraging innovation and entrepreneurship in education. We have neither the money nor the time to implement traditional methods to improve education right now. We require new ideas and new approaches that will quickly and dramatically improve education.

The current funding atmosphere works against improvements in education. Funding organizations (angels, VCs, government, foundations, etc.) aren't funding education entrepreneurs. As web sites like this one and so many more indicate, new technologies have the capability to change the world, including education.

My colleagues and I have taken the step of innovating in science education. Online high schools in six states, Stanford, Johns Hopkins, Apex Learning, and many more have adopted our approach. It's patented and groundbreaking. Yet, we have never been able to get a dime of investment from anywhere. We are not rich and have had to provide all of the funding for this venture ourselves.

Our entire capitalist system is broken, and funding decisions are the worst part of it. The ROI decisions don't include long-term or societal returns and costs. Our education system is spiraling to its death, and, as things are, we are powerless to stop it.

We could be doing so much more for so much less cost with results much sooner. Recall that over the last few decades, billions of dollars have been spent on fixing science education with essentially no result. Only a fundamental change can fix education. Innovation will be a critical part of the fix.

My web site is www.smartscience.net.

In The Audacity of Hope , Barack Obama notes on page 22,
“And yet our debate on education seems stuck ... between those who say money makes no difference in education and those who want more money without any demonstration that it will be put to good use.”

Money will not simply solve the serious problems in education today.

We can solve the problems by encouraging innovation and entrepreneurship in education. We have neither the money nor the time to implement traditional methods to improve education right now. We require new ideas and new approaches that will quickly and dramatically improve education.

The current funding atmosphere works against improvements in education. Funding organizations (angels, VCs, government, foundations, etc.) aren't funding education entrepreneurs. As web sites like this one and so many more indicate, new technologies have the capability to change the world, including education.

My colleagues and I have taken the step of innovating in science education. Online high schools in six states, Stanford, Johns Hopkins, Apex Learning, and many more have adopted our approach. It's patented and groundbreaking. Yet, we have never been able to get a dime of investment from anywhere. We are not rich and have had to provide all of the funding for this venture ourselves.

Our entire capitalist system is broken, and funding decisions are the worst part of it. The ROI decisions don't include long-term or societal returns and costs. Our education system is spiraling to its death, and, as things are, we are powerless to stop it.

We could be doing so much more for so much less cost with results much sooner. Recall that over the last few decades, billions of dollars have been spent on fixing science education with essentially no result. Only a fundamental change can fix education. Innovation will be a critical part of the fix.

My web site is www.smartscience.net.

Education should be a priority. It is sad to see how quickly the government is ready to take money and programs away from education. Recess and P.E. are being are stripped away. Art and music programs are marginalized. It seems that the government is trying to dictate what our children become. What happened to the American Dream?

the credit crunch was brought on by the current republican administration's deregulation or lack of regulation in mortgage lending industry. The budget deficits for all the individual states has resulted not only from a diminished local economy and lesser property taxes, due to record foreclosures but chiefly from the tax cuts for the wealthiest of americans as well as tax holidays like the yact tax loopole.

the trickle down theory has been disproven many times and has been given its best chance during the bush administration. wealth people just take their extra money and put in off shore bank accounts.

republicans want to privitize everything and consolidate the wealth in the country, cutting education is their wet dream. it is THE most effective way to disimpower the masses and further contribute to the dumbed down, well trained consumer who cares less about civil rights and more about B list stars. we have a great example of what the country will look like if we keep going in this direction and it's our neighbor Mexico. everything is privitized and it doesn't create better products and services due to competition, it breeds monopolies and extreme greed, leaving the bulk of the population to fend for themselves.

I believe we should pass legislation extendiing public school education to include 2 years of community college. this would be a step in the right direction and would greatly benefit our communities. Other countries such as in Europe provide their citizens with free college education. Why shouldn't we do the same for our own people when the U.S. is such a wealthy country?

What would education look like if it was play-based? http://www.redroom.com/audio/jane-perry-her-book-outdoor-play-teaching-strategie...

As a forty year educator I agree that education is the answer, BUT not the same old education that has been failing for the past 30 years.

We need a system that understands the children of today and can meet their educational needs where they are - rather than asking them to regress into a system designed to produce assembly line factory workers. More support and resources for a broken system is not the anser.

absolutely - in other developed cultures, a teacher is afforded the same status and respect as a doctor or a lawyer - and i would say a teacher has as much or MORE effect on our society. Many kids spend more time in a school than even with their parents - they need the kind of trained, quality person who can't even afford to be a teacher in this day and age.

Our young people are growing up in an increasingly information-laden age and need to learn how to use the power of their minds to find employment, navigate through our very flawed media system and even just to cope with all of our modern challenges.

*Cutting* our education is just about the worst thing this country could do for itself.

Cutting public education budgets is something I don't understand either. As the mother of 7 year old twins, I was outraged to learn that public education is one of the first places our government looks to redirect dollars.

The state of public education in our country is already unsatisfactory, at best. It seems to me it is one of the few things we should be able to count on as a society that is taxed to the extend that we are and who supposedly values education as we say we do.

Given what teachers are so meagerly paid and asked to do out of their own pockets; what parents do in order to help their schools just make ends meet; and what our government asks of us, it feels criminal to me that public school budget cuts are even an option.

By observing the more recent public/social service bashing moves of business-driven politicians, especially in regards to public education, it almost seems as though they purposely want public services, including education, to fail so people will have no other choice but to buy access to any services they receive in society - in terms of education, forcing parents to turn to for profit driven private and charter schools to educate their children.

Those who are unable to send their kids to private and or charter schools will have no other choice but to send their children to severely underfunded schools resembing day prison camps, and will remain at the poverty-unemployed-criminal sector of society.

Following the economic rules of capitalism, society needs a certain ratio of unemployed people (which is comprised of people in jail, the homeless, children, the disabled, and the elderly), a large enough low wage paying work sector to provide services for those in the upper class, and a proportionally small percentage in the corporate sector dictating the market and profiting from the disparities between the owner and working classes.

The no child left behind policy is a method of classifying kids from disadvantaged backgrounds at a young age as those who will comprise the working-service and military service sectors.

Measures to properly fund schools in poverty stricken areas and affirmative action threaten the ratio needed in society that would allow capitalism to thrive. When banks and business receive more public tax payer funding than the people, it is obvious where this government's priorities lie.

Given the circumstances, the fight for quality, accessible education, and even for good paying jobs (which are disappearing due to business outsourcing, down sizing, the elimination or underfunding of salaries for teachers and other social service/public services), has to be directed to these greedy politicians who either directly or indirectly feed into this system; which is already enslaving the working class with debt that they will have to struggle with and work off for the rest of their lives.

With the present miserable situation of the working class slipping into poverty, does it make you wonder why there always seems to be plenty of money to increase the number of police (to regulate the working class according the ruling class's liking), prisons (to contain the overwhelingly disadvantaged poverty and crime stricken masses), and fund imperialistic wars?

Education is extremely important for our country. Considering we live in a democracy, it is incumbent upon the public to be educated and informed, to make decisions concerning the future and our leaders. Al's comments goes to the heart of the matter. In my opinion public education today is not geared in the proper direction. Our public schools are set up to teach memorization not critical or creative thought. Much needs to be done to overhaul this system. Talking about it is a great way to get things started.

I can't imagine what is left to be cut from the public school system.

I had children in public schools in Los Angeles, California for the 21 years between 1980 and 2001. They barely had seats and textbooks, let alone art and music and sports. Cafeteria food, if it existed, made my son ill. My daughter developed torticollis when they took away school lockers. Neither child had any effective counseling whatsoever. My son, an honor student, was administered the GED test in the 11th grade and encouraged to leave school 18 months early.

Who in their right mind could possibly support budget cuts for education but support tax breaks for corporations and yachts and jets?

I now live in a small town with atrocious schools, where the bulk of the population cannot spell the days of the week, and the clerks in the stores don't know how to make change. This is insane. Are we just all waiting for that big wave to wash us away, or what?

Thank you for making this important statement, impeccably rational, cogent, well-articulated, and concise.

Setting aside critical "basic skills education" which are essential and unarguably important, the failure of public education can be measured by the public's vulnerability to the political strategems that established and sustained the last half dozen years of war. What better exemplifies such a failure than the substitution of slogans for thought in political rhetoric and then in public dialogue -- a mass failure of the faculty of critical thinking? What can explain the effective propagation of palpable lies and irrelevancies as bogus justifications for invading another soverign nation other than a failure to inculculate the most superficial sense of perspective about modern American society in relation to the richness, value, and uniqueness of multiple human societies cultures past and present?

Targets of a justifiable "war on terror" include terror of "new taxes" -- a principle that suffocates and cancels any reasonable consideration of investment made in relation to value received -- and terror of "terrorists" whose invocation undoes any sense of proportionality about the authentic risks and threats to our everyday lives.

We have schools ready now, and they should be used to educate our children and teenagers about our fast-changing world. China is maintaining their educational programs, even in Cheng Du province, where their schools were demolished. More taxes if necessary must be collected to maintain our school system.

I appreciate Mr. Gore's comments. When he speaks of changing consciousness, I recall when our governor said with pride, "I want to starve the public sector and feed the private sector."

I am a lecturer in the CSU system. Our students are the recipients of this consciousness of starving the public sector. Their inheritance is 27 years of starving the public good.

They have been clever in creating the consciousness that taxes are bad. Big Government is bad. Government has never been bigger and more in our business. My understanding is that Government is about the allocation of resources.

I would like to encourage all of us to use the 'T' word in response to these millionaires who have access to officials we elect to protect the public good. A progressive tax system is sane and just. In my humble opinion this is an action in changing consciousness toward a healthier local, state and national community.

The video is right on the mark but our problem is coming up with solid and real solutions. Many, including a large portion of my fellow Democrats in California, will not allow a change in allocation of financial resources in CA. An example is the deep support for large salaries for many state employees, especially, fire fighters and prison guards. A prison guard in CA makes around $150,000 or more with overtime and an inmate costs about $47,000 a year to the taxpayers. How about spending that amount of money on each student and lowering the spending on inmates to the level spent for each student, of something like $5,000-6,000. Then, we'll have money for education. I don't hear Democrates talking about that! Prison guards' union is too strong. CA can also increase teacher salaries but they need to cut back on STRS retirement benefits as well as many other retirement salaries. These funds can also be directed to current salaries (or keeping the teachers) or toward classrooms.
Many studies have been done in CA for improving education but education system model must be re-made: A large amount of funds can be released and utilized for classroom education if the model of existing school districts is eliminated. Small school districts basically doing the same administrative jobs (outside classroom level teaching) namely, paying salaries, hiring, ordering books, district finances, etc can all be done by an excellent central system utilizing a high quality electronic communication and technology system. Monies saved, which will be significant can be directed to the classrooms. Current school district model is broken and can not continue. These changes can be done at county level first before eventually moving to state level. Individual school districts could still be actively involved in delivering good education to their respective small communities but without the tremendous costs of district administration. Food for thought.

It is interesting to me that during a time when the U.S. economy is obviously in a recession, we would cut spending and thus jobs. By cutting jobs, we are increasing the number of unemployed and compounding the problem. The correct course of action in an economic recession is to Increase spending, thereby replacing the jobs, and thus tax revenues, being lost due to a declining market. Part of the problem with a lot of tax dollar spending is that it leaves the treasury and enters directly into the hands of large corporations and the effects of an increase in spending never gets seen by the average american. Instead of cutting spending, we should be increasing the deficit by highering more teachers and paying existing teachers higher wages to attract better teachers to our state. The increase in the number of teachers would decrease class size, and thus increase individual student's ability to learn.

Education is the most essential place for government spending.

People who expect quality public education should commit to paying teachers more than what prison guards earn.

Teachers need access to "best practices" mentoring and team building within the schools so that teachers are teaching their strongest subjects. It makes little sense to ask a science specialist to teach art or phys ed--yet that is often what happens, and vice-verse.

A vigorous program of vocational arts must be offered from 8th grade and up. Not all students are academic or college bound. Inspire each student to set goals, then give students access to the skills they need to attain those goals.

At the very least, a "life skills" course should be required in middle school and again in HS so students learn real-world skills of how to earn money, save money, budget, plan events, interview for jobs, start a business, do community service, take care of their bodies, communicate in effective ways in a variety of situations. Etiquette class should be mandatory.

Foreign languages should be mandatory, as they are in most European countries, Asian countries, and South American countries.

There is a contradiction inherent in requiring Calif. HS students to pass an "exit exam" which is offered Sophomore year. Why should the Sophomores who pass the exit exam remain in HS? Why should those students who cannot pass the exit exam (due to special needs) be forced to endure a curriculum that will not meet their actual needs nor build on their actual, trainable skill sets?

Would Mr. Gore entertain an invitation to serve as Secretary of Education and implement national-level reforms? If so, he should also increase the opportunities for students and teachers to engage in foreign-exchange programs.

Finally, it is important that each elected official, from the state level up through congress and senate, spend at least 20 hours in a public school working alongside students and staff. Only then will true reform happen. "You have to see it and experience it to believe it." This service--or fact-finding mission-- should be a requirement of any elected position, including President.

I think an Apollo-sized project is necessary to get us two goals:

1. Best public education system in the world.

2. Create economy/new jobs based on making solar, wind, and other renewable energy sources cheap enough for everyone to use. Power the US with it, then export it.

Fund schools, not prisons.

My son is a sophomore in high school, and I can say without a doubt that the system has failed him this year. They have spent so much time either studying to tests or getting wrapped up in frivolous paperwork that he has been forgotten. In the fourth grade he was classified as needing one on one special ed classes in reading and math. In school he could not get it...with me at home he had no problem... I asked him why and he told me because I make it fun to learn and because that one on one really helped his confidence level. And being a part of one on one classes in school helped his marks and motivation go up... Which is why I am so frustrated to see him struggling now because funds were dropped and his one on one special classes were dropped along with it. He was thrown into the deep end of the pool this year without warning, and his marks have fallen after being sustained for the last five years. And he is a very bright young man.

So I don't understand the rationale behind making the most precious resource we have suffer because politicians have to continue to play pandering games to those lobbies that bring them the most cash over the educational welfare of our children. Now my son will more than likely have to go to summer school and hopefully will do well. I do all I can as his mother as I have for the last ten years to keep his confidence high and to continue at home to make learning as fun a process as I can. But his motivation in some subjects is simply not there. He complains it is monotonous, boring, and the atmosphere at times borders on being more of a boot camp than a school.

What the The No Child Left Behind Act has done is just the opposite and it needs to be repealed all the way. I will continue to work with my son and do all I can to see him graduate high school because he already knows the career he wants and he should have every opportunity to reach that goal regardless of the petty red tape that our educational system has become which takes away the very resources our children need to be successful. It is time to start thinking of our children as people, not merely statistics on a government chart or our schools as recruitment grounds for the military.

Our potentially wonderful country has been hijacked by a handfull of people who would love to see the population become more ignorant (so they can get away with whatever misdeed they can). Ignorant people tend to be tricked easier, scared easier. They will believe whatever is spoon-fed to them in the media by the handfull. The American system is supposed to of the people and by the people (not the handfull of politicians). The People are the only ones who can change what is going on, and we all have to vote for the right things for this wonderful experiment called the United States of America. We should take into consideration the voting technique in Brasil. Everyone is required to vote come voting day. Everyone 100%. No excuses. Love to all (even the handfull, who need it most)

It's inspiring to see the issues of education taken seriously at this level. California is the nation's richest state, yet it ranks among the lowest nationwide for per pupil spending... Additionally, standardized test laden public education is a huge disservice to the matriculating population of California. We need an immense focus on ESL education, most of the new K-12 population are immigrants from all over the world (primarily mexico and southeast Asia) who are in dire need of learning english skills.

In addition, it is critical that education begin to focus on 'whole student development' and diverge from the rigid structure of memorizing facts, performing on tests, sitting down and shutting up. We need to cultivate our students' consciousness as well by encouraging mindfullness in education... Encouraging awareness, non-judgment, openness and free thinking... just my too sense...

This doesn't go far enough. Imagine how much better off this country would be if it spent far less on sustaining the military industrial complex and subsidizing BIG OIL and BIG PHARMA and BIG AGROBUSINESS and, instead, provided free public education through college for all qualified citizens. Lack of full support for public education will eventually doom this country to third-world status-- we are well on our way already.

Imagine how much better off the country would be if it weren't saddled with a 9 trillion dollar debt that requires the Federal Government to give the first $400-600 billion dollars of federal tax income to people and governments that own the federal debt obligations. Think what that tax money could perchase in terms of education, infrastructure building and maintenance, etc. etc.

Vice President Gore is kind in his words regarding California's 'up is down' budget priority on education.

The American education system is losing it's competitive edge globally and in less than 2 short decades risks falling behind emerging Asian economies like China, Singapore, India simply by sheer numbers of educated as well as quality given value disparity.

American myopia in the 21st century is apparent in it's poor decision making around the fundamental priorities that were responsible for it's rise in the 20th century -- education, investment in infrastructure at home, focus on science-based decision making processes, emphasis on international collaboration and alliance, fair labor practices -- in exchange for increasing emphasis on individual performance and profit taking.

It becomes a perpetual downward spiral that feeds the social ills of society as violence increases, prisons fill and depressed urban areas grow.

What's the answer? For starters, how about measures that help 'promote' greater corporate social responsibility and examining national budget priorities such as the reckless military budget and those who are perversely profiting from violence abroad.....

I agree that meeting education needs is important. But we need more than just an increased, or maintained budget. We need a qualitative education that expands on a child's individual skills and developmental needs, creates a sense of fun in learning and in support of their class community, incorporates environmental and social responsibility into the curriculum and promotes critical thinking.

This sounds difficult, and it will be. But today's direction of emphasized group standards and accountability, does not reflect, nor do justice to our children, parents, educators, or administration. In addition to maintaining or increasing the educational budget, we need to renovate the educational system to reflect today's many American cultures as well as the social, emotional, physical and cognitive development that must be supported and nurtured in children. By approaching education from a qualitative, not quantitative approach we will help instill in our children the tools and techniques they need to be successful critical thinking members of society. More than that, maybe the children will begin to enjoy school. And as we all know, we are more likely to continue doing something if we enjoy it.

Education is our most important resource, it drives our future leadership. If this nation can finally catch on to the importance of protecting our environment, why is it so hard to understand that we need a nation of educated youth that will insure and protect our future.

Thank you! This is great!
I would add that people who want to cut public education funding are those who sent their kids to private school.

I have been saying for years that our national defense, our national security, depends on an educated electorate, and the state of education in our country stinks. We should take half the defense budget and direct it to educating all our children, and adults too while we catch up. In time, we will no longer have full prisons and, excuse me, idiots for voters who can't see beyond the scare tactics of the Swift Boaters. We are conditioned by commercial television and the same tactics are used in politics, and we are very much the worse for it. I fear for this country and the world because of our idiocy and reliance on violence and force. It stinks.

Oliver Wendell Holmes said, "Taxes are what we pay for civilized society." But taxes are politically toxic, especially to Republicans and big business. They want to keep their money, civilized society be hanged! But when the bridges are collapsing and the schools are crumbling and our new college graduates are entering on their productive lives burdened with really serious debt--trapped in debt prison!--it makes it hard for even rich people to thrive. How far do we have to fall before they see that taxes are not the enemy, but the way out of this mess.

I have watched education being destroyed over the last 15 years. Less and less support, including funding, cutting of programs that develop the "whole child", subsituted by testing, testing, testing! All the while, the wealthy are sending their children to private schools and lobbying for voucher systems.
If as a country we truly believe in and support our children, we will refocus on education. We will establish programs that allow for individual readiness and abilities at the same time sets standards and benchmarks. The flood of testing does neither. It only drives out good teachers and kills the love of learning of our children. Shame on us! I totally support Al Gore's emphasis on education.

It is absolutely amazing that education is always one of the first cuts when there is ever any budget crises. Education is one of the most important services that our government should provide in order for our children and grandchildren to succeed in a world of technology. I am sure that there are other areas that could be cut that wouldn't hamper our educational system, i.e., pork, lobbyists, salaries of our congressional representatives, to name a few. Also, being proactive, rather than reactive, in planning for the budget would be a refreshing change! With planning, these cuts to our most needed services wouldn't be necessary!

This is obviously a critical message. I was pleased to see several of our elected officials respond. Thanks, to Al Gore and Courage Campaign for doing this. However, how will this message get translated into state, even federal, budgetary action? The first round of pink slips to teachers have already had devastating effects.

This is common sense. It is refreshing to hear Gore speak it so plainly. I just heard, a friend say that if the profits of Fortune 500 companies were taxed fairly (& honestly) this would be enough money to offset the education budget cuts. Just because the earth is shaking up doesn't mean our public leaders have permission to go bonkers. Yes, Al Gore, I'm with you. I don't understand Gov. Schwarzenegger's decisions either.

HERE'S AN IDEA AL, RUN FOR PRESIDENT LIKE WE WANTED YOU TOO SO YOU CAN DO SOMETHING ABOUT IT!

I am so happy to read that Al Gore started this campaign! I am really upset that these budget cuts have affected and will keep on affecting the education system.In the city I grew up in there have already been 3 schools that have been closed due to the budget cuts!

The education budget cuts have affected my family directly more specifically my younger sister.She has been double majoring at CSULB and will be graduation next week for one of her majors and was supposed to finish the other major she was majoring in this summer and because of the budget cuts all of her classes for her major have been cut from the summer schedule! My sister was devastated since she has been doing her BEST and working hard.It makes me upset since I am an alumni from CSULB and did not have to go through these budget cuts that are ridiculous.I hope that everyone supports Al Gore and countless students,family,educators to bring an end to these budget cuts that will be hurting those that want to pursue an education.

I will make sure to let my friends and family about this video and what Al Gore is about.I want the best for the children and youth in our country so they can be able to have an education and not worry about their school being closed or their classes not being available next semester because the courses have been canceled due to the budget.

I have always been passionate about our youth having the education they deserve and need.It seems that education system(the future of kids,youth) is last on the list of the priorities in this country.

I agree that a shift in consciousness is what's needed here in America, in order to engineer the social, political, and industrial change. I also agree that education is one of many catalysts in that shift of consciousness. Speaking specifically to budget cuts in California, the programs of instruction shouldn't be the first areas cut. How about cutting salaries ? How about cutting some of the "enormous" salaries of State employee personnel ? If California must cut in the Department of Education, how about looking at the salaries of some administrative personnel, and maybe even some professors ? California has long been the leader in technological advances, trend setting, and yes even high paying job opportunities. But now that we're all in this leaky boat (economic down turn) together, it's time for an adjustment in our direction. An adjustment in our behavior will be the shift in consciousness of which you speak. There are several cliche's that capture the situation in which we find ourselves. "I am my brother's keeper"; etc. Can you figure out why an individual or even a family of four needs a mansion with 36 rooms ? Why does one need a $5.00 cup of coffee ? I could go on and on. I didn't want to bring up politics, but one of the democratic candidates has awakened this sleeping giant in America. Greed has caused the American spirit of "benevolence" to slumber for far too long. We must continue reminding our fellow citizens of the blessings bestowed upon us and how the only way those blessings will flourish, is to continually sow the seed, over and over again. "Salary cuts" would be a good starting point, not on in California's Department of Education, but perhaps in the California Legislature and other state agencies.

We are wasting 3 TRILLION DOLLARS on these war and spend almost half our Federal budget on DEFENSE. Small wonder this country is going bankrupt. We need to PUBLICLY FUND our elections to get the Military Industrial Complex, Big oil, and the insurance companies monies out of our govt and influencing budgetary policies.
Maybe then we can spend our tax dollars on Education, Universal Health care, Social Security, Alternative Energy and solving global warming.

Until we get the Corporate money out of our goverment we will only get more of the same.

I agree. Education is CRITICAL! Education is the way to point people to ...hopefully enough wisdom to know what is best for themselves and the world in general, never mind, just our country or any specific issues you might address.

The necessity of budget cuts is a great excuse for cutting back on education. And it's a great way to keep people in ignorance and to keep them powerless and not in any kind of control or betterment of "we the people". OH WAIT, who cares about THAT any more?. I honestly think this could possibly be the true motive....no paranoia here (lol).

I know, let's cut the budgets/perks of the especially corrupt, egotistical, power driven so called "elected" officials,,,(not mentioning any names here). I wonder if there are enough of them to make a difference.

And, btw, I do not count YOU sir, as one of them.

Our government, in general is broken in a major way. I'm afraid it'll be a long time before Humpty Dumpty can be put back together again.

La Familia

It is interesting because it is relevant at the highest level. Education is one of the most important foundations...so needed at this critical time so we can reverse the disastrous path we are taking...

Check out 11th Hour DVD for more insight of the global warming disaster all around us...."turn mankind's darkest hour into its finest"...

I agree with Al Gore completely. It isn't that California, the Federal government or other states don't have money, it's the priority education is given.

The priorities of the current administration and the collective corporate mentality is ALL for themselves and right now. Unfortunately, this selfish mentality has infected all aspects of our society and is embraced all to many in politics, the judicial system and law enforcement. This is very short sided and self defeating of course.

The good thing is, everything cycles. We happen to be at a very bad point, and I'd say it's time to reverse it and get better.

While I'm on the subject of education - we can start by slashing the salaries of the top level(s) at Cal State University Monterey Bay or CSUMB. I must say, there was inadequate access to computers and the very software I was enrolled to learn and there was a very limited amount of equipment for my other classes - but, BUT the Dean or some upper echelon person received a $47,000.00 a year raise while I was there. Even better, they paid a crew to apply and paint a faux cobble stone surface to about a 100 yard stretch of the street in front of the administration building. And I won't mention the problems with the IT department.

After driving to and from the school time and again trying to get computer time between other students, I can't say how disgusted I was with that faux street surface and $47,000.00 a year raise.

What did I learn from CSUMB? I'll just stop there and say that I will NEVER go back to that school again.

As far as the lower grades go - why are we trying to institutionalize our children into being servants of dictators?

Great topic President elect Al Gore.

I agree with a lot of the points made here. But it's surprising that in 136 comments, Proposition 13 was only mentioned twice.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Prop_13
This was touted as as money-saving tax cut to the population at large, but of course the main benefciaries were large property owners - and our schools have suffered ever since.

Repeal Prop. 13!

Absolutely, Mr. Gore; I couldn't agree more about the sheer value of education.

Quality afforadable and accessible education is not a privilege, but a RIGHT to everyone in this country. Saddling our students with post-graduate debt, scaling back college outreach programs, refusing to pay our teachers a decent living wage, and much more are cheating are youth of their right to education as Americans.

A dearth of education in this country is the root of practically all our nation's ills. We need to raise our children in an educational system which will make them into informed, courageous, and righteous citizens of this country and this world, to demand more of our politicians, to explore the boundaries of all disciplines, and to create a better world for the next generation. Otherwise, we'll end up back in the same position we find ourselves today.

Above all, we need to create a world in which we understand the universal truth that set up this problem in the first place: that there's NOTHING we as humans can't accomplish when given the right tools and that denying this ability is only propaganda peddled by powerful interests who want to keep us stupid and take advantage of us. It is shameful, absolutely shameful for ANYONE to deny a child their right to accessible quality education from pre-school to graduate school.

I don't want to rant on too long, but education has always been my number one issue. The image of what our education system can be, compared to what it is, angers and embarasses me to no end.

As many people know, good schools and good education make for good kids. The idea that cutting the budget for education is the solution to the economic crisis that we are facing is preposterous. These are the future leaders of our country, do we really want to dumb them down to save ourselves from having to make the hard decisions to cut spending elsewhere? How in a country that the top 5 major oil companies can boast a profit in the last quarter of 36 billion dollars could we possibly think cutting funding for our children's education is a good decision? Once again the innocent seem to be the ones to suffer most.

Education is extremely important. It is the base for generating the needed scientists, engineers, medical doctors, etc. to continuously advance our civilization. The international competition for market share made it a must for USA to have the best educated to compete. Other wise we will be like the country who go to war to defend itself without having the essential trained personal in every aspect of the military. Country like that is doomed to fail and it will be eventually defeated. Let's have the upper hand in this world and give generously to education. And remember the lessons learned from the Ancient Egyptians, to the Greek to the Romans, etc. Education was the key to their civilization.

Education is the best long term investment that we have. But we have to redesign the entire system so that we can move FROM the old factory model that shuttles groups of same-age students through curriculum that is designed to the middle learners, TO a system that acknowledges individual learning styles and speeds etc, and helps learners, LIFETIME LEARNERS, progress successfully to their full potential.

We need to provide an environment where learners can discover what they passionate about. We all have gifts; we all have disabilities.

It will be more expensive because of the need for more individualized attention. But that is what works. And, once again, investing in our human capitol is the best thing we could do for our country.

The federal government can and should take the lead in this REVOLUTION that makes EDUCATION a priority. The whole country is ready to do this. Let's go!

Susan Yackley
The Yackley Group
Los Angeles
Overactive parent/Education advocate

We should stop the war and fund education. Otherwise, we will continue our vicious circle and America will completely lose our competative edge in the future.

Ah, but what has caused the credit crises? Could it be that we are borrowing through the roof (thank you, China) to pay for our blunder, oops, I mean, war, in Iraq?

Why is it that no one seems to be talking about the real cost of this war?

If we want a strong and healthy country, we need an informed and educated population.

Proper education will be the salvation of our young

I'm hoping the governor is just creating drama so that California's politicians finally get real about tackling our budget problems seriously this time around. He came from show business, right? Too many times the hardcore politicians just push off the real $ problems into the future and live in denial. Like it will work itself out eventually some day, wrong!

The disrespect for education is a symptom of the general disrespect we have as a society for life in these modern times. In the ancient Greek times, education and the cultured mind were highly regarded.

We must find that regard again. Education is not a commodity like shoes.And it is not disposable like a plastic bag. We could stop spending money on shoes and plastic bags and we'd be fine.

We can start by turning off the TV (not Current!) and talking more and having town hall meetings and learning to care about langauge and conversation.

The bottom line, without education, how are we going to add up all those huge budget numbers? Get the Chinese to do it?

www.jorgensenforcongress.com

I think that it's absolutely critial that our government turns back the focus to supporting public education. I think that the well being of future generations depend on education. Education is what gave this country its technological and economic advantage in the world community. We need to stop the nonsense tax breaks for the super rich and channel more money to educate our children because they are the future.

One hour of teaching math and history, even read a book together with your kids, will solve the education problem. Do not expect help from government. Everybody is on corporation’s pay roles including Mr. Gore. He just want more educated slaves working 12 hours shifts for Google. We should consume less and refuse to work fulltime.

The problem is if you are men/woman enough to just throw that video game and TV all together into street and start living life with your kids.

We will kill three flies by one shot.

1. Get rid of the stress advertisement poses upon us to consume more and work more and live less.
2. Our kids learn something worth learning, not the crap they get in school.
3. We send a message to corporations that we might be stupid but they are the losers.

I do not have a TV for years and I love it.

Drawback, we will stay in recession for another 5 years. Who cares if you are happy with what you got and you will have plenty of life.

John F Kennedy said, "A child miseducated is a child lost." By cutting funding to education in our present situation we as a society of free people run the very real risk of losing a generation if not future generations to a dismal and difficult life. Ignorance breeds contempt and fear. With the impending crisis of global warming our nation, along with the rest of the world, requires the best and brightest minds in order to resolve this threat to our very existence. It is time to increase efforts at restoring a balance on the planet and that has to begin with a strong educational system that will act as a catalyst for positive change. To cut funding now is to hide one’s head in the sand with a false impression that one’s troubles will just go away. If we fail to act now we will not have another chance.

This is what I think:
Dumb down the people with addictive pain killers, fill cable tv with crap on famous people's lives that most American couldn't care a hang about, throw us a bone with a $600 check that wouldn't cover most people's monthly mortgage or rent, keep squandering our money in Iraq...and keep on telling us lies.....THIS IS WHAT IS CURRENTLY HAPPENING.

This cut in education is one of the worst things to happen...we need MORE teachers...our children are our future...we can make jobs in this country by building manufacturing plants to make solar cells that are affordable...put SOLAR on every roof in American, build auto plants that make only electric, solar (yes, they DO exist) & bio-diesel cars. Outlaw any county, state or federal department from purchasing gasoline powered cars for governmental use, build factories that make windmills and put one on every house and put them up where there are strong winds, plug our cars into our houses at night, build more high speed interstate magnetic type trains along the middle of existing freeways so people can travel on them state to stat, even in their cars like they do on a ferry crossing...for long distance, etc Make and distribute solar battery chargers and rechargeable batteries...and make all this in America!

Penalize and tax every corporation that has moved their plants to China or to other countries to help pay for more schools and teachers wages in THIS country.

We can do it America!

BUT YOU GOTTA WANT IT BAD ENOUGH AND TO DO THIS WE MUST HAVE MORE AND BETTER EDUCATION OPPORTUNITIES IN THIS COUNTRY!!!

Al Gore...you rock! Congratulations on your winning the Nobel Peace Prize...I cried when it was announced. American loves you! Here in Humboldt County, CA we have a huge Green Party and many progressive thinking people..many who have even lived off the (electrical) grid for 20 years or more BY CHOICE! We are also protecting our ancient redwood trees here that are the lungs of the earth...

May God Bless you, Al Gore! You are truly an enlightened person!

Sign me:
Cherish our planet...it is all we really have to leave to our children's, children's children, And they deserve to have the best and greenest technologies available to them...not a planet raped of all her natural resources!

Peace,
Cherish Our Civil Liberties

Al Gore would have made a GREAT president, in place of George W. (can you imagine, though, have Joe Lieberman running as the Democratic Party candidate in 2008? WOW ... what a scary thought THAT is ...).

America has taken two giant steps to the right, since Reagan. We need to take three giant steps to the left. Starting with increased commitment to intelligent public education is a great place to start: free pre-K for all kids, better salaries and better quality teachers, free or low-cost college for all Americans (like nearly all other advanced nations have for their citizens at the present time).

The Democrats are NOT a progressive party. They are a second conservative party. Our only hope is to move the Democrats way to the left, quickly, and provide a REAL and COMMITTED alternative to the Reagan corporate right that has dominated and damaged our nation and the world in so many ways since 1981. Right now, the Democrats should really be called the Republicrats ... Republican-Lite. That won't cut it. We need real democracy, not a watered down version of the neo-fascism that the Bush Crime Family has force-fed us these past 7 years.

America needs education ... to be sure. Beginning with Civics instruction, which has been cut from too many schools. Young people don't care about the Constitution anymore, they don't know what it is, what it means, what it's worth. We must teach them these things. A people that doesn't understand and value democracy deserves to lose it ... which is what's been happening in America since Reagan.

Our national education system fell apart after "Reganomics" commodified education along with everything else. This comodification led to measuring educational productivity with immediate post-graduate job placement. To promote this, industry was allowed to set (and sponsor, with tax write-offs) the curriculum. This turned our educational institutions into worker training factories for industry, and subsadized industrial R&D at taxpayer's expense to create "academic product" for their mills. Lost in this paradigm was the sacred mission of American education to cultivate and nurture critical thinking - the wellspring of the high standard of American living amd the font of the American Dream. We need to continue public sponsorship of education, but more importantly, we need to recast what we expect from education - not in terms of easily measurable "productivity goals" as proposed under the simple terms of Reganomics, but in terms of the fantastic - and sometimes incomrehensible ideas that are cultivated in an academic setting.

I agree 100% with what you said. I am a teacher in Los Angeles facing possible huge budget cuts while 12 billion dollars a month is being spent in Iraq. Bush definately believes in bombs over education and so does most of the radical right. Education is the only thing that can save the United States and this world.

Can't we just send our tax money (or even just a portion of it) to schools and organizations actually doing something important to us instead of the IRS? That would change things in a hurry.
I would be HAPPY to pay taxes if I knew the $$ would be spent on something that actually does some good.

Education is what creates free thinking minds. Our current government does not value free-thinkers. They want thinkers who think "inside" the box - especially the "big box" ,,,stores...they seem to think our sole purpose is shopping. After all, isn't that how we keep the economy moving? No. Of course education is the most important of all democratic values. Yet, people who are educated are not easily led...after all, most liberals are highly educated! And this particular regime wants a populous they can manage. That is the most frightening of all, so because of that, we must change the conversation, and work together to keep public education alive and well in this country!

Dear Mr. Gore,
What you are doing with regard to educating the world about the greatest threat to civilization as we know it--educating the peoples of all nations about the most important issue of all time, that of global warming--is the most important work that any person can do and has ever done. Along with you, thinker and educator, there are others--inventors and tinkers--who tirelessly work in laboratories and garages, in fields and in their backyards, trying out inventions to meet the challenges their fellow citizens face. These are "unsung heros." There are many to them, but we need so many more to participate in this endeavor to save our Earth and its inhabitants from the looming catastrophe just on the horizon. One such inventor is working in Manchester, New Hampshire. You probably know him. His name is Dean Kamen, and he has many innovative inventions which are environmentally friendly and right for this decade and the decades to come. He is not only an inventor, but is essentially an educator, exciting young people around the country about education, innovation and invention. He promotes creativity and critical thinking, while taking his message to youth, both here and abroad--that working in teams, and with cooperation and skill, young people around the globe can find solutions to many of the problems for which they will be the the inheritors. I hope you will contact him and other inventors, who with you, and all of the other alliances you are building throughout the world, your great, great work will be realized within a decade. Thank you for dedicating your life to the great and noble cause you have embraced. All of humanity are the beneficiaries of your work.
Very respectfully, Earthdreams, San Francisco

Cutting funding to public education fits the pattern of a premeditated objective to keep 80-90% of the americans uneducated, poorly paid and too busy surviving to complain.

An uneducated, preoccupied people are easier to manipulate for the benefit of the remaining 10-20% educated ruling class.

It's not a conspiracy as much as it is an unacknowledged agreement to go along with the program. Just as most of the agents selling immoral loans will testify, now, after the crash.

The answer? Reclaim our government, our means of production and our banking.

Obviously as the parent of an 8 year old I do not want to see the funding for education cut. I also believe that the state of California should follow the lead of Vermont and remove ourselves from NCLB and this ridiculous system of teaching our children to be good "bubble fillers". My son is bright and bored out of his mind so I try to make him stretch his brain at home.

I am also a returning college student and have seen the community college having to teach new students how to write an essay. The quality of public education is waning and rather than cutting funding, it should be increased so that no high school student leaves without being able to write an essay. Being able to express yourself in writing is so important. I see a bleak future for a generation that thinks that a college professor or a supervisor at a job will accept "text speak" as a valid form of writing,

Kids are extremely interested in environmental education, yet it is not part of the curriculum in public elementary schools. This is partly because schools and teachers are afraid of offending parents, partly because the textbook publishers shy away from it and therefore the teachers have no material to work from, and partly because change in elementary education moves a glacial speed. Provide good, useable, easy to teach materials and the teachers will follow. As a parent, an environmental scientist, a credentialed teacher, and the (ghost)writer of the first main-stream middle school text program on the subject, I'd be happy to help develop such materials!

Having now read through the posts here, I must say there is a lot of wisdom in this thread. A couple of thoughts:

1. Thank you, Al Gore, for Assault on Reason. I also read your book and thank you so much for it. It should be required reading for every American.

2. About the other teachers' posts...they absolutely reflect my experience as well. Christine C.'s said:

"Every year, California's teachers are expected to do more with less. Parents abdicate any responsibility for educatiing their child, and in my district, for feeding them, clothing them, and in some cases even providing shelter for them. District administrators decide what to teach and how to teach it, and pile on the new programs that will "fix" everything, while eliminating everything that makes learning interesting and fun. It's a very sad commentary on society when I have to be subversive to teach my students basic science, or history, or even to just enjoy learning.

To all those politicians who will go along with the Gov's education funding cut, I have only this to say: The kids you're underfunding are going to be the adults who are your surgeons, your pilots, your bankers, your car mechanics. You reap what you sow."

EXACTLY. We have to get this right.

3. Gore/Obama !!! :)

Absolutely right on! In 1964, on a college work study project a group of us physics, chemistry and geology majors noticed the beginnings of evidence of the fact that the whole world was losing its protective layer. This was not the purpose of our study which was top secret. You know why, it was 1964. We were not allowed to publish the this information. I find the current level of education of the average high school 'graduate?' disgraceful for this country. These cuts are also endangering 100's of jobs in a little CA county that has dozens of emerging green businesses. If you cannot educate people as to why they should spend money now for the future, these businesses will fail even though they have some of the most astonishing solutions to the average person having an impact on the 'green footprint'. Ignorance not only equates to lost opportunities for solutions, but also to lost jobs in a declining economy.

I'm a lifelong advocate of self-education as an avenue for higher knowledge. Everything I've ever accomplished has been by my own incentive and initiative. (In decades past, this required time-consuming and bone-numbing trips to libraries and the expensive and space-cluttering collection of books and printed data.)
The Internet seems to be the perfect conduit to allow and encourage people to learn on their own, or with an academic advisor, without reliance on an imposed curriculum or extrinsic rewards or scholarly approval or geographic proximity, etc.
If free Web access was universally available, coupled with some sort of Non-partisan Non-commercial Clearinghouse Search Engine/Website that could channel users to their desired research destination (rather than being shunted aside and misdirected and frustrated by dozens of interruptive ads for products that have, at best, a syllable in common) then perhaps millions of people might get some scientific and objective knowledge that is, unfortunately, being dissuaded by commerce and political agendas.
It seems to me that the Internet offers an excellent opportunity for an alternative, inexpensive, ubiquitous avenue for education if innovatively implemented.

The common sense approach is always best. How do we improve ourselves and our world? By learning through education what has/hasn't, doe's/doesn't work. By using education to provide individuals with the proper tools to make well founded decisions for themselves.
Both my husband and myself are born & raised San Diegans with a majority of our families still here. We now have children in the public system & are amazed at the difference a zip code makes. I was one of the lucky one's, my parents choose a good area for education, but there are numerous individuals I've encountered who grew up in other parts of the county that very obviously did not get the same education. My children now are getting a different education from their cousins in other areas of the county still. In my neighborhood, both parents work which makes it hard to get involved directly in helping out at school, keeping up on work assignments for even 2 children, or joining in a community conversation on the best teacher for a difficult child. The more affluent neighborhoods have stay at home moms who volunteer and are on top of the school gossip on which teachers are best and how one class or another works well for their children. For parents who work so hard we deserve to have our hard earned money go where it belongs...towards our children and our future.

But wait, there's more: It's not just the budget, it's the long-term economy and the class system. Denying the majority of average citizens a good education results in Americans barely able to reason or problem-solve. This, in turn, guarantees an endless supply of cheap labor and military enlistees. The ultra-mega-conglomo-rich know this.The budget wasn't so tight when the education cutbacks started in California; when "Prop 13" was passed.

Last year while no one was looking, the courts abolished teachers' first amendment rights at school -- Mayer v. Monroe County Community School Corporation. The National School Board Association piled on amicably by agreeing that "a teacher's speech is a commodity that she sells to the school for a salary." I only know this because it happened to me. I was unemployed for nearly three years. So, in addition to funding, it would be nice to regain the free speech rights granted to us by the Constitution.

Last month, because property taxes were cut so severely in this state leaving inadequate funding for schools, my district in central Florida pink-slipped 900 educators while surrounding districts let go thousands more. So I'm again looking for a job. Anybody need a good teacher or principal?

You're still walking on P.C. eggshells and claiming education is not a partisan issue; to resolve anything, you MUST face the obstruction of education committed by the right wing - from imbecile programs like "No Child Left Smart" to the push for the 13th century-style religious dogmatism and dumbification-promoting "if we don't understand it, it must be a god and we better just obey the power" ideologies.
GOP, KKK, NRA, etc., are the enemy. They want to achieve total obedience by promoting stupidity, it is THAT simple. It is not the only reason why education in America is a ridiculous joke, but it is an important one because without defeating or converting them, nothing will be changed. Other reasons are cultural - Americans love money, leisure and material "values" too much to spend it on abstract and intangible -ergo, worthless - ideas like education. It is obvious in the fact that there is no Ministry of Education in the country and even an illiterate junkyard dog like Bush or his failed librarian wife have a say about education - in France or Germany, they would be laughed at, and then told to just shut up and let the grown-ups think and talk, pretty much. Americans are cheap, mentally lazy, shallow and complacent - so act upon it, find a way to compete against the trailer-chic of reality shows and Hollywood, then you might stand a chance; otherwise, these people won't wake up until they're really, really hungry and hurting for a job - and that might not be very far, either.

Despite advances in technology, humanity has not been in such a disastrous shape in thousands of years.

Never ever in history of human kind, collectively, such a huge proportion of resources have been used for destruction.

Every politician in this country is hypocrite, period! Including you Mr. Gore. A fraction of resources that US has put to produce forces of destruction like atomic Bombs would have solved all the energy problems and environmental disaster that you champion to solve not only for us, but for the whole world.

The green party is another joke! How come it is safe for thousands of atomic bombs to be around but it is not safe to use the same type of technology to produce electricity.

A country Like Iran, want to do exactly the same thing and produce electricity for its people and we want to wipe them out by using atomic bomb!

Humanity, humanity, humanity how low have you sank in the crap! Like if it does matter that if we use the bomb against them or they use it against us. In both cases the victim is the same, humanity.

It is just sad to see people are so ignorant that see some of the representative of big power as their liberators. Yes you Mr. Gore. You are as much as a salve of big corporation as the person sweeping the floor there, maybe you more. Your soul has only a higher price tag. Once again I have nothing against corporation or capitalism. I know humanity can produce so much wealth that some souls will end up gathering the surpluses. Their life’s goal will be just that. That's every human choice! Nobody can take it from anybody. No communism here. We are born free and should be able freely to sink ourselves in material world if we desire to do so.

I see through you, you and so called Green Party, Democrats and Republicans. You guys have same mentality. The mentality that says we against them. We should educate ourselves so we can be rich and help Africa! You know what! Everything you are is coming from Africa! Your moral, religion even you genes!

I have news for you Mr. Gore. There are no we and them.
There is no African and American.
There is no employer and employee.
There is no poor and rich.
There is no Iraqis and Americans.
There is no Palestinians or Israelis.

Deep inside, if we deserve it, we are all HUMANS!

There is only one essence to care about, HUMANITY.

Next time, when you stand in front of a mirror.
See if you can feel the pain!
See if your eyes see the pain of a mother in Palestine who's child is killed by a bomb, made by YOU.

See if you can see the pain of an American mother who receives a visit from a MP, with the ultimate horrendous news.

If you can feel the pain! Then ask yourself. "Why didn’t I speak up against destruction when I was in White House?"

Even if you save the earth for next generation is not a noble thing to do if the next generation is worse than us, promoting destruction.

In essence these things are not important as long as Humanity suffers.

Religion, Capitalisms, Communism, Environment, Politics, Economy, Hunger, Jobs, even Happiness are not important, cause a person can be poor, uneducated, sick, miserable, hungry with no future, but can have the most important gift of all, he/she can be a HUMAN, maybe that last person on earth that deserves the title.

Just take a good look at yourself, people around you. Look for the signs of humanity, look beyond the clothes, cars, perfume, look for somebody that give to humanity without expecting a reward back for it.

Yes you can find these people, maybe in deserts of Africa, or Iran. Under a tent of wool, there is a piece of bread and the owner of the tent will share it with you and that's almost all he has. Not knowing even your name and fully knowing your country treating to obliterate his country. Then if you have backbone, go out and tell people that “YOU WANT TO OBLITERATE HUMANITY”

I am a software engineer with master degree.
I have hard time to find a job in Silicon Valley.

Big cooperation decided to export high paying jobs to third world counties, to save a buck or two. That's OK. People of India, China and Pakistan also deserve to have a chance.

Nobody in his right mind will go and study 6 years for a master degree, just to get offer from an outsourcing companies to move to haydarabad.
Not because dieing of malaria would be that bad, but just because that he has a family and friends here and rather want to stay and suffer than accepting black mailing tactics from Google, Yahoo and Macintosh etc.

Get a grip Gore. You are really a loser despite your Noble price and Oscar. Show me an official statement from Apple and Google, that you work for saying, they are not outsourcing a single job, then you are in a position to lecture us on education after all you care for us. Don’t you?

I am not angry at you, corporations or anybody else for my situation. I just wonder how long, you politicians are going to sell carp to people as ideas of future.

Here is the bottom line. Earth has finite resources and we as society have finite resources as well. So even if all of us were doctors, we would still die of hunger, because we need somebody to produce the food. The question is this. Should we use these finite resources to advance humanity or kill it?

It's not all about information jobs - it's about all jobs. It's about the dignity of our citizens, being able to do any job well. Why can't politicians get that this country is in trouble and stop the earmarks in bills trying to be passed and put that money into education? It seems so simple to do the right thing. Or is it deeper than that; that this country wants to have uneducated people think that the only way they'll be able to afford an education is to join the military. If we stop the war, have politicians get only the same social security as everyone else, and the same retirement and health care as everyone else, then watch change happen. A shift in consciousness will not come until we even the playing field. Sweeping change? you bet. it's the only way, short of an American Revolution.

An investment in education is an investment in the future. We need to stop settling for short term solutions at the expense of long term sustainability. Thanks for speaking out, Mr. Gore.

"Education is not a partisan issue. It is a crucial building block toward creating a more informed democracy."
--Al Gore

I believe these words. I believe our common democracy is one of the most important reasons to support public education. I am also a teacher...retiring on June 4th...because of the punitive nature of NCLB (I teach in a Title I school). I am afraid if we don't get this right on education, we face the end of public schools.

I was trained that schools (and teachers) should be dedicated to teaching children to think and to develop a love for learning that would sustain them through the challenging times ahead...times of multiple career changes due to globalization and our changing world. Since NCLB, we only teach to the test (math reading and writing only), practice test-taking skills, and take tests...not yearly, but FOUR times a year. History and science...favorite subjects of both students and teachers alike...are rare. It's no wonder the children aren't loving school or developing a lifelong love of learning. How do children learn to value democracy when history isn't valued enough to be taught?

And now... sadly... good, young, enthusiastic teachers in my state, California, are being pink-slipped due to lack of funding. Older 'veterans', like me, are being pushed out through early retirement...I think illegally...to save money. It is really discouraging to dedicate your life to the kids at one school for 20+ years...and because of NCLB policies, find yourself on the way out.

Please, Vice President Gore, fix our education system. I know fixing the planet probably leaves you little time :) , but anything you can do would be appreciated. :)

Al-I'm so glad to see you getting the word out on this cause. I live in CA and our school had to issue pink slips this year to all Principals and Teachers. The district will be hiring back based on seniority. The districts are also eliminating class size reduction for grades 1st-3rd and as any parent will tell you, having 20 kids in a classroom in elementary school is tough let alone having 30-40 kids in a classroom. Also, kids are now being taught to the test. Art, Drama and Music classes are few and far between and when they are offered it's usually because the parents raise the money to bring in outside help to the school. Mind you, we live in a very nice part of Southern California where the state collects substantial amounts of money from both property taxes and mello roos taxes. Where is all of the money going? Why should the kids of this great nation suffer because people in office do not know how to manage funds? When will we get rid of No Child Left Behind and let our children's minds soar again? There are so many pressing concerns about education in our country. How can we find ourselves competitive in the global market if we do not give the children in this country the tools they will need in order to prevail?

My husband just obtained his Masters degree in Education. He's been an English Teacher and Director of Special Education for children with learning and emotional needs for over 14 years and he finds himself losing hope in this system every.single.day. This loss of hope has led him to write a book about changing the education system in this country. It's called "Teach The Future" and let me tell you, he has a lot of great ideas and insights.

Now is the time for us to stand together and use our minds and voices to make it clear that we will no longer accept the direction this country has taken.

Interesting because it's true.Has it occurred to any body that this administration always has money for blowing people up but never for helping people? They don't have money for education because they don't want smart and educated people.

Yes, I absolutely agree. We should be making our children - our most precious resource - our number one priority. Our educational system needs to become a reflection of this.

The message is correct, the delivery is off. This is a perfect example right out of Journalism 101: Don't bury the lead! The message is "we're cutting funding for education" - don't start with the mortgage criunch or other reasons why we're cutting funding - start with the primary subject - students are at risk!

Al Gore is right on, again. As an educator I whole heartedly agree that we desperately need to increase our investment in education if we are to remain world leaders. The decisions made by the American public in the last eight years reflect our growing ignorance of world issues and science. We must reverse this trend or suffer the consequences.

This is Great. We need so badly to put money into education. It's should be a number 1 priority. I had a great public education back east in the 50s and 60s. It's sad what's going on now in CA. I think a good idea would be to show how much CA education has gone downhill, and that it's a travesty. We are failing our children. Wake up parents!! Educators themselves should revolt somehow. We need to obviously take drastic measures, even if it means protesting in the streets! We as a society here in CA get a failing grade on education. That's is not acceptable!! What about an initiative!! THey use it for everything else.

What I think this comes down to is, America is fat, happy and only semi-stupid right now. As long as they can keep Americans stupid with the only hope for a "real education" being stint in the war, we really don't have a hope.
If Americans brighten up, they most certainly wouldn't follow the government like sheep thinking they will really take care of them.
They would have critical thinking skills, question policies and prevent ones that actual HURT our COUNTRY.
That's the way I see it in a nutshell.

Dear Al Gore , I hope you are reading the responses here , because they are PUMPED with WiSDOM ! i have no-thing to add except to say , that the AMERiCAN PEOPLE ARE WONDERFUL!!
THEY DESERVE A WONDERFUL GOVERNMENT AND EDUCATiON-SYSTEM .
yes,Sir.

I believe the topic is extremely important and our current educational system requires dramtic changes.
Bushes "no child left behind" does not work.
Not all students can or will be our next engineers, doctors, scientists. Our schools, teachers, and especially our parents have to join in on educating our children. The serious students should be given all the opportunity to advance at an equal and/or progressive pace. Those who do not excell should be allowed regular courses. As for the few "bad apples" who hold back others thru bullying in any form, should be separated from the rest.

Al Gore says it like it is. He has no political office to lose, and so he increasingly is able to do this. He also explains it in a way that most Americans can understand. Great job, Al!!! We love you!

The cutting of funds for education is a short term solution to our budget crisis that will in the near term and long term jeopardize the future of this state. We need to continue to invest in education and, in fact, should increase funding. We should return arts and sports programs to schools to encourage interest and attendance. We should increase teacher's pay and not ever expect that they should have to spend money out of their own pockets to buy supplies.

California has thousands if not millions of companies operating in the state. Who will work in these jobs if we have an uneducated workforce? Further, do we really think it is in the best interest of this state to have millions of people without an education and the ability to support themselves.

Thanks Mr. Gore for once again being the voice of reason.

I am encouraged to see and hear that more people are taking notice of the drastic cuts to education. I’d like to share a more personal story about these cuts and the effects presently and the near future. My wife and I have been teachers in the San Diego Unified School District for five years and have been laid off by our school board. The board has reacted to the proposed cuts and has planned for the worst-case scenario that laid-off over 670 teachers and 1200 support staff including nurses, counselors, and class aides. I can tell you that in my district currently moral is low, Laid off personnel are worried about making their mortgages and supporting their children and families. Students are worried about what will happen next year with the less academic support and class choices. Parents have voiced concern to me about higher class sizes and lower teacher to student ratio. Administrators are uncertain that San Diego can meet AYP goals and meet NCLB requirements with less staff and support.
California ranks 46th in per pupil spending, yet has the 6th largest economy in the world, but cannot fund education to the levels needed to build a sustainable workforce ready to enter the world’s job market?
I agree with you Vice President Gore, we need to increase in our capacity to excel in today’s and tomorrow’s job market by placing education as a priority!

there is nothing magical about why politicians cut funding for schools. there simply is no immediate effect from the cuts. oh class size might increase a little and maybe a few less books get bought, but its not going to generate the headlines the way closing a prison or a highly used state park will.

in the late 1950's and early 1960's, California made a great leap forward by investing heavily in education, not just K-12 but also higher education. it took 20+ years to see the results but no one can deny that the computer revolution that was sparked in silicon valley and Stanford and Berkeley was the biggest change in the way we think and communicate since the invention of the printing press made books and newspapers available to the common people.

how long will it take us to see the effects of the skrimping and cutting that has been going on in California's schools since the 1980's when the full force of Prop. 13 took hold. we see it every time the test scores rank California near the bottom of the country, and the US near the bottom of the industrialized world. the current cut back is just one more gouge out of the heritage that started 50 years ago.

we should be spending much more on educating our children. we should be going into debt to make sure their education is the best that it can be. they will more than pay off that debt in the future when they are sparking the next great cultural change with ideas gestated in great public education systems.

I'm a 5th grade teacher in a poor area of SoCal, and have been for the last 20 years. Education has been the target of every bully in politics for all that time and longer. It's common practice to make promises and break them, and then cost the public schools even more in court costs to hold them to the promises.(Although, despite some union bashing I've seen here, it's been the CTA that has absorbed the cost in dollars and hours to fight the egregious political cuts California has imposed on its schools).

NCLB has been the most damaging event in the history of public education, but how surprising is that when it's the signature education piece of a president who hates public education and wants to see it dismantled, or reserved for the destitute only?

I work for a district that pays well, compared to other school districts, which isn't saying much. No district in California pays teachers anything approaching a decent wage. And, of course, this year, teachers are once again taking the hit, with no raises of any kind, not even cost of living, because of the looming budget cuts. Class size reduction is in danger, and has been abandoned by some districts. Of course, they never ever funded any sort of class size reduction for upper grade classrooms, so this year I taught, or tried to teach, 37 10 year olds. And of course, given the nightmare of the STAR test and the punitive measures dispensed to schools that don't meet its ridiculous goals, absolutely no funding was available for anything other than language arts, ELD, and math. No science, no history, no art, no music, no $ for PE (but mandated minutes for it). And next year? We can't even mention those things in our school plan, which allocates all the school's money.

Every year, California's teachers are expected to do more with less. Parents abdicate any responsibility for educatiing their child, and in my district, for feeding them, clothing them, and in some cases even providing shelter for them. District administrators decide what to teach and how to teach it, and pile on the new programs that will "fix" everything, while eliminating everything that makes learning interesting and fun. It's a very sad commentary on society when I have to be subversive to teach my students basic science, or history, or even to just enjoy learning.

To all those politicians who will go along with the Gov's education funding cut, I have only this to say: The kids you're underfunding are going to be the adults who are your surgeons, your pilots, your bankers, your car mechanics. You reap what you sow.

I agree 100%. People are becoming so naive as to what is going on in the world. We need to ensure that our schools are educating our people. Those who are poor are not given the same opportunities to learn that everyone else has. In addition, we need to steer away from biased mainstream media and wake up and find out what's really going on in the world.

Californians could do allot by changing the 3 $rikes LAW.
Putting all 3 strike people behind bars is a wa$te of our money. No one who does not harm another person belongs in jail because of a 3rd strike.
Let all persons out of jail because of a 3rd $trike who have not done harm and we will have more than enough money to help our kid$. The last time this law was up for vote, Our Governor ( I hate to use name) got on TV and lied about who would be released from jail if the 3 strikes law was changed and scared many voters. It almost passed but for 3% of the votes fell short of passing it. The prison union for the Guard and builders of prison got the Governor to make that lying commercial to brainwash voters to vote against it.
We are waisting too much money keeping people who do not belong in jail for 25 years. Most of them could serve a 1 - 5 year sentence and serve justice completely. Think about it. Change this stupid, money wasting law. It is sick. My son is in jail for 25 years to life for leaving the scene of an accident where no property or people were injured The off duty cop private car he barley hit acted like a total threatening jerk at the accident and my son left the scene. So now he is in jail for 25+ years for nothing. Change that law and release people like my son from jail and wasting our money. Thanks

A well education citizenry is a requirement for the continuation of our democracy. Too often funds are cut from education because that is the easiest area to do so. It is easy because to many people do not actually value what teachers are able to do in the classroom. They do not see teaching and education as a professional endeavor. also, because the point at which most people participate in our educational system is during the childhood, many people do not se this as a significant issue in our society. The education of our young people should be a primary concern, just as important as which war we will fight or the price of gas.
Successful people seem to forget that they have been able to obtain their accomplishment because of the knowledge and skills provided them through the education system.
Unfortunately, teachers as a group are not the most aggressive people in our society. So when cuts are announced they too often feel as though they have to accept what is offered them. Instead they need to become more vocal and active in order to preserve and develop our educational system. But it is not all the teachers or educators failure. The greater failure is the the leaders of our greater society often listen and give greater attention to large business interest rather than to those iwho help build the foundation upon which our society exists.

It is interesting that everyone understands we must have a total change in thinking, and it must happen soon, and it must come from the top down.

We all understand it, almost as well as you do, that the incumbents will not allow it. They are stuck in the old way, too much money involved. The incumbents only care about being incumbents, and that is exactly why there will not be a change in consciousness. The people are there, but we are NOT in control of our country, and the incumbents make sure they remain incumbents. There will be no change. They all need to go. Congress could only be forced by a real president. Obama and his ties? Hillary and her ties? McSame? The USA is gone, lost I believe. Only the people can maintain our democracy. They have been dumbed down. That is why they cut edu funds for years now. No civics, government, or history required now in FLA via Jeb Bush...the EDU governor, they say will be the new EDU CZAR!!! Gads...

I agree completely with your statement. I am a teacher in California and these cuts will have a devastating effect on the education of our future citizens.

The skills necessary for the 21st century do require higher order thinking skills, creativity and a deep knowledge base. If we do not educate and prepare our children for the job opportunities of the future, companies will be forced to go to elsewhere.
Part of the cuts being proposed in a complete elimination of "gifted and talented" funding. We are loosing the minds of our most precious gifts by doing this.

All children need and deserve the finest education we can provide. Not doing so will have devastating effects on the future of our nation. We need to invest in the future.

Lets cut the tax deducation for yachets instead!

I couldn't agree with Al Gore more. It is appalling to hear that the first thing state governments want to cut is the education budget. The teachers in CA have fought hard against this and I think they are gaining ground.

I also feel that state and federal money should be spent on research and development to deal with climate change. We need to support the top scientists in this country and encourage innovative thinking that will lead to the development of new technology that will work with our natural environment rather than against it.

HIGH SCHOOL STUDENTS MUST LEARN HOW TO THINK! Americans who have graduated from these ghastly schools have no idea how to reason. Just look at the political arguments- sophistry and fallacies. Its horrifying. Dialectics is a science governing the development of nature, society and thought. Originally it meant the art of debate by means of questions and answers, and the art of classifying concepts into general and specific, analyzing the conflicting aspects of motion and plurality and how every property changes into its opposite.

Plato defined truth as being identical and immutable but admitted that things can only be conceived as being and not being, as equal to themselves and not equal to themselves, and as passing into something else. Therefore, being contains contradictions: it is single and plural, eternal and transient, mutable and immutable, at rest and in motion.

In feudal Society, dialectics was used to denote formal logic as opposed to rhetoric.

The Encyclopedics examined contradiction as a condition for historical development. With Hegel, for the first time the whole world, natural, historical, and intellectual, was represented as a process, in constant motion, in change, transformation and development. The attempt was made to trace out the internal connection that makes a continuous whole of all this movement and development. Marx and Engels did away with the idealism and based their understanding of the real and material process that takes place in nature, society and thought. Scientific dialectics regards thought and cognition equally as being in a state of becoming and development. Things and phenomena are what they are and at the same time, are becoming, in the process of development, what they will become.

Contradiction is the chief category of dialectics. It contains the key to development by passage of quantitative changes into qualitative ones, interruption of gradualness, leaps, negation of the negation, and repetition at a higher level of some of the features and aspects of the original state. This understanding helps to assess objectively the historical requirements of social development, between old forms and new content, the necessity of transition to higher forms stimulating the progress of mankind.

The amazing thing about public education--and I agree that free, high-quality education for everyone in a working democracy is second in importance only to a free press--is how deadly boring and ineffective it has become.

We, as human beings, are natural learners. If you've ever watched a toddler, you know that it is all you can do to keep their naturally active, inquisitive nature within the boundaries of safety because they are driven to explore their world and everything in it.

Our education system needs to be well-funded and well-supported by parents, teachers, administrators and legislators so that we can capitalize on the natural impulse for young people to learn! It is our best and only hope for the future.

In the educational system in this country there is a major deficit of public involvement. Both in financial terms and also in terms of parent attention. I wonder sometimes if the education of the past has only prepared us for this dumbing down.

I am fortunate, I have much time to spend with my child -- even then she refuses my invitations to drop out of grade school. (Really, I'm proud that she resists. Although I can certainly imagine giving her a high-quality education through friends, the community, myself, the Internet, etc.) for her the social aspect of many children her age remains important. I agree.

As I look around, the creativity is there to make the United States public educational system a finely tuned response mechanism to the challenges of these times and those to come as well as a source of personal enrichment in the lives of the children benefiting. All that remains is our collective social attention and, quite specifically, our backing with our tax dollars.

It seems absurd that it is become almost cliche to speak in terms of trading war dollars for education. That in itself is a sad commentary to me. Cliche or otherwise, now has been and remains the time to elect leaders who will steward our public trusts in alignment with our true values. I maintain that these values are in fact, for each and every one of us, the welfare of our children, the quality of the time we have with them, and those futures. Endless wars for a sadly confused mix of thinly concealed private interests, human rights, and political philosophy, benign or otherwise, do not now, nor have they ever represented my values. Nor do I believe they would represent the values of anyone who would consider the alternatives.

I hope these words will hold some value to the purpose of the more educated, more well considered future.

I agree that education is the key to many of our problems. We should not cut spending on education; but I think we should make it more relevant to what we need as a society and make it more relevant to young people so they see why they are spending so much time in the class room.

I absolutely agree, Mr. Gore. I think it's easy to cut funding to public education for many reasons - for one, I don't think children have unionized or hired super-powerful lobbyists to stand up for their interests in congress. Silly kids. Also, as is so evident with our snail-paced response to the climate crisis, we aren't very good at taking action in the present with the interest of the future in mind, especially when that action requires us to overcome a great deal of inertia we've already generated in the wrong directions. This is just as true for education as it is for the climate crisis. However, I think it's not always so easy for people to immediately see the link between the problems we have today and the declining quality of public education over the last couple of decades (at least) - it's much easier to make those connections about the climate crisis, now that the physical evidence is becoming so overwhelmingly undeniable. Necessity is the mother of invention - I guess we just need to invent some way to help ourselves as a country to make more thoughtful choices and investments in our future, rather than waiting for crisis to knock our doors down before we take decisive action.

And as an addendum to my previous comments, education budgets should be redone to slash the huge salaries of administrators and use that money to provide for our children's needs... In my town, children sit in classrooms with old desks and supplies while administrators ride around in Lexus's with tvs in them. ? So if states want to slash budgets they perhaps should start with their own.

The education of our children should also be primary in preserving Democracy. So in that vein I also believe we must teach our children about civics, our Constitution, voting, and their responsibility as citizens. Slashing education budgets only leads to the very viscious cycle of poverty, crime, unemployment, and other social ills we need to confront which leads to the erosion of Democratic principles and infringes on our unalienable right to life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness. These rights are inherent in a quality education.

Thank you again Mr. Gore for your astute and dedicated vision on these important issues. Hopefully, the dialogue will lead to action on the part of more people.

Oh Al.

Al is the symbol of everything that should have been,
in place of everything we have now, broken, corrupt, misguided, wallowing, sorry-ass, mistaken, wrong...

I agree with the people that have suggested we change the current education curriculum. One class that NEEDS to be taught is FINANCIAL MANAGEMENT! Kids need to know what to do with their money when they start to make it so that we don't have these "economic crisis". In high school, economics is a requirement, but the actual class is a joke. They don't teach you how to invest or the dangers of credit cards. The govt needs to get it together and put more money into the education system, and start cutting some state jobs and programs, starting with welfare for illegals.

And, I would sure like to see something USEFUL taught to our kids like financial literacy, languages, conflict resolution. Thank god my kids like to read, are inquisitive, and have access to information on what interests them. It would be a great thing if everyone did.

In the eleventh hour of an administration that seems to have its priorities completely backward, we must not only provide more funding for all of the different categories and many facets of education, we must also show the children, the youth in this country and the world, that they have a future worth living for... I also believe that creative new programs would the first step in the long journey toward bringing the level of education and the awareness of students back to the respectable position that it should be, through all levels of education...

The creative resorce of the brilliant young minds coming forth into this world must not be wasted because of the selfish priorities of misappropriated funds...a mind wasted is a disparaged one...think positive...be creative...

Thanks Al, for your diligent service to this country and to this world...you're still on top of the game...and will always be number one in my book...

Sure, we need more money to educate our citizens. Couldn't agree more, but that's just the tip of the iceberg. Sure, it's the credit crunch, but what created that credit crunch?
Oh... our crooked banking system among other things, but nobody wants to talk about that... (google "Money as debt") And what of the zillions of dollars (Money we don't even have!) being spent on wars that nobody but corporate oil interests want might have something to do with why there's (supposedly) no money to spend on education and health care. Educating people would definitely be good for innovations that may or may not save us from ourselves and for the economy, but businesses hate to pay better wages even if it means that people can buy more of their stuff.

You can't really talk about lack of funding for education as an isolated thing. The situation doesn't exist in a vacuum. You have to ask why the priorities are the way they are for everything we do and don't spend money on. No matter how the story is spun, the spending shows what is really important to the people who make the spending decisions (and that's not us, folks.) The whole government/corporate/banking enchilada is rotten from top to bottom. You can educate people, and it's a good thing for sure, but unless somebody takes out the trash and cleans up the financial system and the government and reins in corporate interests, and changes the priorities, it's still going to stink in this country.
Saying that we need to spend more on education is true and good but it doesn't go nearly far enough. It's kind of like saying "Here, have a bandaid for your cancer. You'll be ok."

thanks for the sentiment, but uh, you're going to have to do a little more than that to really fix things and contribute to making this country (and the world) as great a place as it could be.

Al Gore is always interesting and so well-spoken. I completely agree with his thesis that we must put more, not less, money into quality public education. As the mother of an elementary school teacher, I agree.

I agree that education is the last thing that should be cut. We all need to change our priorities.

Dear Al Gore,
As a substitute teacher in a Central California school district, it breaks my heart every time I walk into a classroom and see broken chairs and swap meet tables (instead of desks). These great kids deserve better.
However, the reality is: we are having a national crisis on just about ever issue I can think of (I don't think I need to list them). I feel like I'm reliving 1968.
There is only one thing that would bring our country out of this downward spiral: An Al Gore Presidency. And since we cannot go back and get the 2000 election right, I'm hoping that a deadlocked Democratic convention in Colorado will create an Al Gore/ Barack Obama ticket. I'm convinced that a Gore/Obama ticket would recreate the optimism of JFK's New Frontier.
Sincerely,
California Dreamer

I fully agree with you Al. We have sufficient money in education to do a good job of educating our citizens. The policy toward education that is needed would divert most of the money to educating children in the classroom. A separate and distinctly unique policy is required to provide quality libraries in all schools with a comprehensive plan to promote reading throughout the schoolage population. To achieve quality education we must challenge our universities to provide competent teachers for all categories of learning.

The federal government must work with each state to provide at least one university capable of producing highly educated students capable of extending the frontiers of practice, research and development in their respective fields.

You can count on me to assist if this is a goal that you also seek.

It is not a shortage of information that prevents our solving the problems that face us. It is not about growing economically OUT of our problems, but growing the courage that it takes to change our patterns and IN to new-clothes.

Education of course. But it takes more than money. I graduated in a class of seven in a small union school that in the 1940's refused to be absorbed into a newly centralized public school district. I am now one of the formost designers of affordable housing worldwide. What did Chadwick Union School have to offer that New Hartford Central did not? Personal attention from teachers and freedom to shape my own education.

Bottoms-up, Emperors, as Barak says it well...

Al... I am reading your book right now, the assault on reason, and it is fantastic.

The reason the first place they slash money from is education is because these people don't want smart citizens. They don't want us to know the truth, to be well educated. They want us to be productive numbers in their factories.
Television is of course the best way for them to replace education with indoctrination. This is something my professors have discussed both at UCSC and UCLA. Having gone through the public school systems in Los Angeles, I know they are crap. I attended a charter school in 11th and 12th grade and it was amazing, although very flawed. The kids actually liked going to school! The answer is more charter schools with specialized programs, and my mother is currently writing her dissertation on differentiated instruction...that each student should recieve specialized attention.

The Bushes of the world would rather us be ignorant and happy than smart and angry.

I find everything that Mr. Gore presents interesting. He is credible and reasonable on every issue. However, I'm not sure I picked up the "call to action" here. In addition to telling you that I agree with everything I heard here and telling you what I think, which will reflect the opinions already expressed, what is it that Mr. Gore is asking for? What do you want us to do, Al?

I like the look of the Current News Web site. You include important news items. It's my first visit. I'm committed now.

My President Gore, of course, is correct about education.
The elite government has been so corrupted in the past seven years, they see the masses either as ignorants or as cannon fodder and they're not going to educate them further.
Civil disobedience might help right about now, too.

I totally agree. Public education can make and has made this country a much better place to live. It is one sure way to decrease poverty and to address the social issues that we face. Public education teaches people to think and exposes them to new ideas. It can also teach people to work together for the common good.
We should be willing to pay for good public education as it will determine what type of world we are building.

Mr. Gore, I agree totally with you. However we as a country must begin to seperate students that show signs of excellence and those that come into school unprepared and or unwilling to learn. Those that do not get the mesage that "school is their job" just like mom and dad have a job. We must find a way to hammer into kids heads that grades in middle and high school = acceptence into a better college. Acceptence into a better college = more $$ when the get out of college and start to climb the ladder in business.

On to Energy Policy;
Please, please, please take another look at nuclear power in this country. There are tens of thousands of people dieing each year from being down wind from COAL BURNING power plants. Coal power has killed more people in this country than any other industry, not only people down wind, but think about how many miners have died. A SINGLE COAL POWER PLANT puts 3,700,000+ tons of carbon dioxide (CO2), into the air each year, the primary human cause of global warming, or as much carbon dioxide as cutting down 161 million trees. 10,000+ tons of sulfur dioxide (SO2), which causes acid rain that damages forests, lakes, and buildings, and forms small airborne particles that can penetrate deep into lungs. 500 tons of small airborne particles, which can cause chronic bronchitis, aggravated asthma, and premature death, as well as haze obstructing visibility. 10,200 tons of nitrogen oxide (NOx), as much as would be emitted by half a million late-model cars. NOx leads to formation of ozone (smog) which inflames the lungs, burning through lung tissue making people more susceptible to respiratory illness. 720 tons of carbon monoxide (CO), which causes headaches and place additional stress on people with heart disease. 220 tons of hydrocarbons, volatile organic compounds (VOC), which form ozone. 170 POUNDS of mercury, where just 1/70th of a teaspoon deposited on a 25-acre lake can make the fish unsafe to eat. 225 pounds of arsenic, which will cause cancer in one out of 100 people who drink water containing 50 parts per billion. 114 pounds of lead, 4 pounds of cadmium, other toxic heavy metals, and SIGNIFICANT amounts of uranium and other radioactive materials.
Physical waste from each plant: more than 75% of this waste is disposed of in unlined, unmonitored onsite landfills and surface impoundments. Toxic substances in the waste -- including arsenic, mercury, chromium, and cadmium -- can contaminate drinking water supplies and damage vital human organs and the nervous system. One study found that one out of every 100 children who drink groundwater contaminated with arsenic from coal power plant wastes were at risk of developing cancer.

Please visit my website; www.mortgagewrangler.com and click on the "Energy Petition" button to sign my Energy Independence Now! petition. Thank you for your time.

Cutting education funding--a truly uneducated decision.

Anyone in business knows that when a company declares a Chapter 11 bankruptcy, it is a way to continue to exist while the management refinances the company.

This financial crisis we are in is exactly the same situation.

California needs to borrow a massive amount of money in order to get out of the situation we are in. However, the other side of that is that we have to stop spending money on "non-critical" expenditures.

And that is the problem. As a society, we Californians cannot decide what is and what is not "critical".

I agree that education is critical, but there is another side to this as well. Just some of the examples:

1) In the Half Moon Bay (named "Cabrillo") school district, the president of the teachers union was asked at a school board meeting of parents and union about the welfare of the students. His response was "When the students begin paying union fees, they will be my concern." In the meantime, the school deals with incompetent union member employees who do a terrible job and they can't be fired because of the unions.

2) The Cabrillo School District is one of the poorest districts in the state. My girlfriend is the Director of the Nutrition Program, and the school is going broke handing out over $600,000 a year worth of free lunches to students of migrant workers, most of whom are children of illegal aliens according to the school records. Most of those funds are not refunded by the federal government.

3) The school has to spend more money than they used to on teacher salaries because they have to hire bi-lingual teachers to teach children that don't speak English.

With this kind of mis-management in our public schools of the money we spend, it is no wonder many advocate cutting education funds.

There is so much waste, politics, and power-entrenched bureaucracy in the school system that if these factors were dealt with, there would be plenty of funding.

Has anyone seen the link between certain conservative elements who prefer an automotonic public to a discerning electorate and cutting funds for education???

have not seen anyone bring up the issue of stupendous pay scales for school administrators. Why not at least share the budget cuts with some of these guys making hundreds of thousands of dollars with retirement deals that would make a pasha blush.

The problem with public education is the huge salaries administrators make and the fact that they have captured the accreditation process for teachers and administrators. They are only want teachers and administrators that are part of their own system. There are many roadblocks to those whom may wish to teach from science backgrounds in government and the private industry. You may have been a Physicist or a Biologist for 30 years, but if you haven't taken the required science college units in the last 7 years, you are not qualified to teach high school science. This is clearly insane. We spend too much building these monuments to education and not nearly enough on the education itself. We need to rethink education- even the universities are little more than businesses selling coursework. We can change this. Anyone that can qualify for medical school should get a chance to go- not just the privileged few. Enlightened social change is the key. Thank you!

Cutting funding from education is short sighted to the point of being just plain stupid. It ensures a future of undertrained, frustrated, unqualified workers who contribute far less than they could to the country and the world. It leads to an increase in poverty, hunger and crime, and an even wider gap between "haves" and "have nots". Just as importantly, though, it's simply unethical and cruel to deny children the tools they need to grow into happy, productive, well rounded adults.

I belive the reason education gets cut is because bad crime rates scare people more than bad grades--but studies indicate that more years of education are always associated with higher paying jobs, continued employment, marriage, and better health, which all translate into productive citizens. So cutting funding for education simply increases the ever-increasing chasm between the poorly-educated in public schools and the well-educated who attended private schools. California, for one, used to be number 2 in education, and now is somewhere like 46th in the nation. Wrong-headed, short-term thinking.

We as a country are "pennywise and pound foolish". There is always money for aggressive acts and yet the educational sytem is the first to take the hit with cuts. An investment in our schools and students is an investment in the future. We can ill-afford to diminish our schools anymore than they are because what does that leave for the future but a populace ill-equiped to lead us forward. The schools are the ONLY hope. We MUST fund them appropriately. Drop tuition....not bombs.

Mr. Gore is quite correct, but the situation will not change without a fundamental change in our government.

I believe that Senator Obama does in fact offer a real change in the political climate and could possibly bring about a peaceful revolution in our beloved country.

If either Senator McCain or Senator Clinton is elected in November, the result will be a continuation of the current policies, and continued decline. Our country is in great jeopardy unless there is a change in Washington.

Thanks, Al Gore, for trying to promote rational approaches to problems. We need much more of these kinds of activities.

This may seem simplistic but the reason education gets cut during budget crises is the negative effects are not short term. Our culture and especially our corporate culture is oriented to the short term. We do not have habits of thought that would lead us to think, "Well, that might help a bit in the moment but what will be the effects down the road a bit." Few of us would consider adjusting our standard of living for the good of the community, and even fewer give any thought to the impacts on tomorrow of what we do today.
Another reason education is not valued in our society is we are inclined to think, "All anyone needs to know is what I know," in other words, we are just dumb enough to think we are smart enough.

California would have plenty of money for education (and emergency rooms) if we eliminated the illegal immigrants, their offspring and the anchor babies.

I agree with Al Gore 100%. I have always believed that the key to progress, both socially and economically, must start with education. Cutting education costs is a travesty. Our countries education system should be one of the best in the world and instead we are embarrassingly behind. Cutting costs now can only set us further back, instead of moving us forward.

Though many may try, it is impssible to deny the fact that the economic crisis is related to the current administration's global war on terror and their obsession with national security, an obsession which has caused our country to spend more on one figter jet than on an entire year's worth of affordable housing through HUD. Our country is paying $6,000 per household per year to fight in an illegitimate war without results while slashing funds for education. It is a sad and sorry state of affairs, and, as the most recent cliche goes, anyone who is not outraged is not paying attention.

However, looking at these issues and at the unrest occurring all over the globe, it is important not to focus purely on smal battles but to look at the systemic causes of these problems. Our budget crisis stems from a combination of many factors, two of the largest of which are the war on terror and a completely unregulated system of free trade that allows those making money from the war on terror (as well as on other endeavors) to acquires absurd amounts of money.

The gap between the rich and the poor right now is definitely the largest it's been since the Great Depression and, according to some scholars, even larger.

What needs to be done? We need to truly work together as a world. We need to rise above our national interests and work to abolish war. It has been proven throughout history that creating ever larger systems of government brings peace to those that unite together to create them.

The United Nations is outdated and no longer works. We need a democratic, federal system of world government. Maybe then our paranoia, our expanding nuclear arsenal, and our lack of ability to think and act rationally as a country will come to an end. We need money to go into education now, but we also need a plan to cut the roots of the problems that have been sucking money out of education.

The United States is no longer competitive with our Knowledge Workers. Cutting funds for Public Education doesn't make sense. Cut funds from Pork Barrel Projects. Cut the funds for the Iraq War. The cash shortage isn't just about the credit crunch, it is about funding efforts that are proving to be a disaster for the U.S.
Georgia Ireland

In addition to the statement that Mr. Gore stated, could someone answer this question for me? Why are funds being cut for public schools, when there is money in California for new jails? Is it more important for a child to end up in jail as an adult instead of using tax payers dollars for a child to get a better education? Where is this country going?

Don't hear too many solutions.
1. Legalize Marijuana.
2. Release all people in CA prisons for marijuana offenses. Saves millions per year.
3. Tax all sales of marijuana

Magic, problem solved.
However, I don't know why we are even having this problem. The CA lottery was supposed to fund a good amount of Education already in the state.

http://www.liveworld.com/transcripts/CaliforniaLottery/9-07-2000.1-1.html

I think a little investigation into that that program will show monies being diverted from education into other things, like yachts for republicans.

Education is our number one priority for changing the collective consciousness. Mr. Gore educated the world about Global Warming and now we have a growing industry to assist in reversing it. Let us turn our attention toward educating everyone on our earth in order to grow the world economy, but also to abolish outdated and false notions that war, poverty and slavery are acceptable.

I believe education is often one of the first things to be cut because:
1). So many educational systems are failing its students due to infatuation with test scores rather than teaching, or school prayer rather than curriculum. This in turn has led to the popular argument that publicly funded schools are hopeless and the incorrect conclusion that we should therefore stop "throwing money at the problem."
2). There are no "big business" interests in education. Too many politicians are more concerned with returning favors for big campaign contributers than doing what is best for their constituents.
3). Too few government officials realize that poor education is the root of so many other problems, and that better education can be the solution. It isn't a quick-fix, though, and that makes investing in better education policies unappealing to politicians who are more concerned with keeping their job than doing their job.

California's educational system is in a shambles.

We started homeschooling our children when our son was getting sick as a result of asthma and allergies caused by filthy, moldy filters in the classroom ventilation systems. The school district refused to do anything. For two years, we fought them while he was hospitalized nine times with pneumonia. Once we started homeschooling, it stopped. After a year, he went back and it started again. School PE teachers wouldn't accept doctor's excuses and instead forced him to participate in athletics. That was it; our kids were out of the public school system for good.

In an odd way, that was the best thing that happened to our kids. Had he been part of the school, he would have been institutionalized in a system that is designed to process kids like meat.

No child left behind means no child gets ahead. Bright kids with wonderful potential are dying of boredom in the classroom while they wait for the lowest common denominator to catch up to them. They're losing interest in school, and aren't progressing to college in some cases because they just want out of the system.

Instead of punishing kids for being smart, inquisitive, and craving knowledge, we need to reward them with the challenges they want and need. Spark an interest in learning at an early age and it continues for a lifetime.

Bring back the arts. Studies prove the study of music improves mathematical ability. If you want to cut something from schools, cut the extracurricular activities that aren't going to be useful for kids later in life. Cheerleading, football, baseball... Activities that cater to an elite few, but cost money that could be used to fund more important programs.

Don't get me wrong--I think sports are an important part of growing up, but if it comes down to kids knowing how to read a book vs. reading a defense, I think the former is going to serve them better in life.

If we want to retain our competitive edge in this world, we need to refocus our priorities on education, and turn the system upside-down. Make people want to be teachers. Make kids want to go to school. Reward those that show potential with scholarships, and squash the myth that sports is the only way for underprivileged kids to escape their situation. Make college affordable and available to anyone who wants it. Stop grading kids on their ability to take tests. Dismiss the idea that we have to constantly boost self-esteem by not failing kids or holding them back a grade.

We're at a crossroads. We've already lost our edge as a state and nation. Let's not allow our arrogance to continue leading us down this same path where a quality education takes a backseat to corporate interests and the tax break culture.

Most of us know in our hearts that cuts to education end up hurting our economy in the long run. It makes no sense whatsoever to cut education funding while simultaneously expected less educated workers to be able to drive the economic engine of commerce.

As someone who has spent nearly 20 years in higher education, as a student and as a faculty member, I can say that today's students are more informed but less prepared. They have more information at their fingertips and less knowledge of what to do with it. It seems that analytical thinking is something that is lacking in the public school systems from which my students emerge.

VP Gore:
I totally agree with you. Every other country in the world invest in education. Even the poorest nations do. But also you so wisely point out: we are cutting education, and we loosing our preeminence fast... we will pretty soon be a third world country.

I grew up here in California in the 1940's through the mid 1950's when we had one of the best school systems in the country. In the recent decades I have seen more and more money taken away from the schools. I think this is because it is an easy target for the politicians as kids do not have a voice.

The latest scam is the present governor is planning to upscale the lottery (Set up originally to add to education funding) by adding lottery centers with ganiing machines. Then using this new revenue stream to help with the general fund problems. This leaves out the schools which he is also cutting back on and jeopardizes the income streaam from the indian gambling which he also needs.

I am already seeing the results of the deterioration of our school system, gangs, people not ready to enter the work force and general crime. We spend billions in this state keeping people in prison when if we had good schools much of that problem would go away.

We need to make education the number one priority not use the school funds as a source of government revenue.

Al Gore is completely right about the critical role of public education and the need to MAINTAIN OR INCREASE FUNDING, NOT CUT IT.

What I bitterly resent more than how badly the educational funding has been cut, is how ready the government is to throw cash at private education (vouchers) or publicly traded educational industries like the Bush brother's COWS ruse. Then, to add insult to injury, we dole out H1-B visas like candy to foreigners with credentials no better than Americans who can't find jobs to pay off their high interest student loans. It's madness. We're severely undereducated to justify our underemployment in the perverse global market economy wherein we're deliberately undercompensated.

Al, you are right; we must pay more attention to all education; from Preschool-12 and higher education. Our children and (in my case) grandchildren are being ripped off big time, considering what kind of education I have had the good luck to have. It is time to strenthen higher education while making it more accessible at the same time. Even state colleges and universities have lost money, time and again, because the state has to face a budget crunch. The same thing happens to Pre-12; let's cut education money is a prime theme at the state level.
I am a Washingtonian, although I was born in Northern Califonia; but I agree with your sentiments and the Courage Campaign.

Gosh. Does it help to state the "obvious"? It seems that some people just hate the idea of shelling out more tax dollars to educate someone else's kids. I guess they're afraid that more educated neighbors won't laugh at their ethnic jokes or maybe won't buy enough Bud when they throw the neighborhood Superbowl party. One thing I have trouble understanding is to what extent the credit crunch is at fault vs. spending a trillion dollars on a war. If we can sustain that sort of deficit, maybe what Congress should do is spend another trillion on education. Oh. Wait a minute. That would be an investment in our children. Sorry. Stupid me. Forget I said anything.

It is vital for the United States to enter the new world as educated and as technologically savvy as we can be. The reasons for this are two-fold. One, we need better educated people to compete in a global marketplace. Two, a better education helps fight crime both because people do not need to resort to crime to survive but also because educated people can see the danger signs of crime before it happens. I am increasingly concerned with how little we read in this country and how poor our ratings are in language, math, history, science and understanding how our government is supposed to work compared to other countries.
Funding education, from pre-school to a bachelor's degree should be a priority. A plan such as Obama suggests (originally Bill Richardson's great idea) whereby students get four years of college in exchange for four years of public service in either the military, education, public safety, child care or rebuilding our infrastructure is one way in which we can all be enriched by a better educated populace.

I agree with Al Gore. We need to make the necessary sacrifices to preserve and expand spending for education.

I agree with the many comments forwarded to me about the importance of, and obstacles to, truly excellent education in California and this country in general.

For those passionate about education and would like to be inspired, please read, if you haven't already, Three Cups of Tea, by Greg Mortensen. It's fabulous--and while it deals with building schools in Pakistan, the principles behind the drive to do so are as relevant here, I believe.

I have no answers except, as some have said, to wait it out until the repercussions of the general apathy and malaise of the populace catches up with them/us. Not my usual M.O. for dealing with important issues, but this is a tough one . . .among many right now.

God bless Al Gore. We need lots more people like him.

The question is an excellent one. The answer, I'm afraid, is that the right doesn't want educated people looking over their shoulders.

Also, even if we succeed in reversing this plan we still need a quicker solution before the nation goes the way of all empires.

I think that all of this can ripple. We stop the war - move the cash into education. We position ourselves as we should - as a country to emulate. Acheive the spread of democracy as we did during the cold war - not by ramming our ideals down people's throats (which is what we thought would work) but by representing a beacon of hope that inspired others to achieve what we had. Nothing lasting is achieved by force. To start this process, we need to send a strong message - elect a "historic" Democrat and end the war. Start talking to everyone. Couldn't hurt to get Mr. Gore in there in any significant way...

Of course we are all for education and funding it.

I guessed that the real reason Mr. Gore put out this video was to boost the sites web hits and not having it really be about education.

Lo and behold I go to the FAQ and Al Gore is the chairman of this business www.current.com

So I consider Mr. Gores video using the education of our children as a way to boost internet hits on his companys website prety lame.

Alex Jones is right when he talks about Gore and Bush and all the other corporate minded politicians.

Gore has spoken at and is a part of the Bilderberg group and part of the whole Neocon agenda to control the population thru the ingenious guise of global warming. He hides unvder the veil of Global warming which is a naturally occuring event and that has happened in the past before cars.

Mr. Gore we are not stupid we know your motives and are not falling for your pretend concern for the education of our children.

I am appalled that the Governor of California is thinking about selling bonds using as collateral the projected increase of gambling to fund education. This is ludicrous. It is using the addiction to gambling to fund education. Years ago when we voted that Calif. would use lottery money to help increase funding of education we were told that it would increase the money available for education. What happened in reality was a bait and switch. The funds provided by the state for education was decreased when the lottery kicked in, so that there was not an increase in budget for education. Now, local schools are facing enormous budget cuts, and he's offering gambling once more as a way out. This doesn't make sense, and the non-partisan observer says that this plan is risky and overly optimistic and if it fails, our schools lose out once more.

He is right on the money. As a retired prof. of biology at a private university, I had watched the quality and abilities of students falling for thirty years. This country desperately needs a "Manhattan Project" for education. Allow me just one anecdote: My weakest and whiniest students were Education majors! As Gore says, this is no time to cut education. It probably ought to be increased TENFOLD.

Thank God and Mr. Gore -

We started with 'No Child Left Behind' and that's what we did. It is true that education budgets are the first to be slashed, and if we don't create better educated children, we will kiss good bye to our one superpower status.

My wife is an eductor and I have two children in public schools. We are fortunate to live in a district that has enough people with upper middle class incomes that we can usually make up for the short-comings in the school budget. We are very fortunate, yet even with our extra donations we are still lacking in the arts & sciences.

To be spending the billions we are spending in Iraq and cutting back on education spending is shameful.

I couldn't agree more. It seems elemental.

No Child Left Behind is the final death blow to education in California, in the battle that began with Proposition 13. It leaves teachers scrambling to teach to a test so that their schools won't be down-graded, while leaving no time to teach the important things that kids need to know in order to be able to live in this increasingly complex world. In California, school funding is cut year after year while budget requests for new prisons never fail. Any idiot can tell where the priorities are. I have two friends who dropped out of teaching credential programs because it was clear that class-room atmosphere has changed so radically in the past 8 years. We need to be not only talking about this but taking the next step and actually doing something about it. Read Jonathan Kozol's "Savage Inequalities" and then let's all get to work.

Keeping people dumb keeps the war machine turning.

It keeps cheap labor cheap and military recruitment goes through the roof.

I'd rather be poor than fight anyone for any reason. We are well beyond that and anyone that thinks we're not is buying a lie perpetuated by corporate interests.

The truth is that people just aren't fed up enough yet. Until people get VERY uncomfortable, they will sit idly by and say "it's not my problem" until it IS.

That time, I fear (but with optimism) is near.

it's time to invest MORE in education.

I absolutely agree with what Gore is saying, but I think, to increase the impact of his message, he needs to "grab" the viewer/listener right out of the chute. I think it would help if he said something like, "Cutting education budgets is the LAST thing we should be doing at this time!!!" and then go on to justify his stance.
But it's good & I'm glad he's speaking out.

I like the commerical and believe very stronger that educating out children should be at the top of our to do list. Through education we can make them better citizen and stewards of what we have. I have said the we need to teach environmental in our school for quite sometime. How long can we afford to turn out uneducated children and expect things to get better. The time is now this must be done. We can't change the past but we sure can make a better tomorrow for our children and the children of the world.

Al,
The inadequacies of the Education System (oxymoronic!) as we know it are in part responsible for the degradation of values and morals in this nation, a phenomena where Karl Rove' politics and internet porn can be not only accepted, but very popular. The Education System is not accountable for its most foundational flaw: it is not developing citizens. We say that this is a home responsibility, but our economics virtually require two working parents in California. Sometimes two working parents still fail to meet even minimum standards of quality of life. We have inter-generational education failure since the beginning of the babyboom and now parents and grandparents marginalized by a 'one size fits all' education standard are less-prepared to even support their childrens' educational growth, let alone truly educate through discipleship their youth towards a respectful citizenship that reflects the founding values of this country.
I urge you to look beyond the presumption that money will convert to desirable outcomes and use your political capital to begin the difficult process of redesigning our educational system to meet the evolving needs of this nation.
Thanks for the ear,
Scott Dudley

We need to increase our investment in financial and economic literacy for all our K-12 students and their parents so they have a chance to use their earnings wisely and to choose skills that empower them to create a future for themselves and their families.

We need to open the schools to parents so they can relearn and refresh their skills and create a literate community in the home and in the classroom.

As a school board trustee, we need to put the decisions for what is taught back into the hands of people who want to educate children to be curious, critical and competent. We need to stop wasting funds on testing and put more money into schools not war and prisons.

+++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
Parent Volunteer in Maine needs a little help getting unique fund raising tool for school groups to the next level. I have taken them as far as i can as a volunteer.:
+++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
http://www.usatoday.com/news/education/2004-06-07-education-auction_x.htm
These are not substitutes for government funding but can help support school groups that are already seeking funding through a link to their existing donation page.. This unique project can help channel funds to education and the environment, instead of enriching sites like eBay. The sites are partially down now but ready to re start within a day if you are interested.

There are two similar sites:
One for Education through school groups called:
www.classsroomclassifieds.com (sorry down at the moment)

and one for environmental and other charities called http://www.classifiedcircles.org (also partially down due to financing) .

These are free to use for all. We link directly to the existing charity or school group's donation page.

Sellers donate 1-100% of the sale directly to their group. I have letters of Interest from Florida Education Foundation Consortium and many others.

Thank you for your critical work;

Respectfully,
Carolyn Gillis

http://www.theforecaster.net/story.php?storyid=11237

http://www.classifiedcircles.org/newslinks.htm

Thanks, Al. My sentiments exactly. In March, I wrote the following letter to the Governor.

The Honorable Arnold Schwarzenegger
Governor of California
State Capitol Building
Sacramento, CA 95814

Re: Education is too important

Dear Governor Schwarzenegger:

I am simply outraged that you would cut education funding by one penny, much less $5 billion.

The single greatest reason for the slipping of America's status in the world is our under-funded educational system. So, it is with genuine alarm that I receive the news of these drastic budget cuts. I am not blind to the need to balance California's budget, but taking money from our children to do so is, without question, the most counterproductive thing you could possibly do. If ever there were a more short-sighted solution to a problem, I frankly can't imagine it.

The future of our country depends on an educated, skilled workforce. How can Americans continue to compete for jobs in an increasingly service oriented economy when we simply aren't graduating enough engineers, scientists, and other skilled professionals? How can we continue to innovate and invent, solve complex problems, and add to our intellectual capital if we don't allow our children the opportunity to master the basics?

Everything our country has come to represent starts with basic education, and that requires well funded schools and well paid teachers. There is no other way. There is no way to pay teachers, buy textbooks and computers, stock laboratories, or maintain modern and safe school facilities without adequate funding, and there's no way kids can learn what they need to compete in this world without every one of these things.

So, I compel you, Governor, for the sake of our children and our future, please reconsider your position--please return the money to our schools and teachers now.

Thank you.

Sincerely,

DM

Al Gore is exactly right. Here in California we used to have the best education system in the world, but now other states are coming in trying to poach the teachers we are having to lay off due to the budget crisis.

My younger sister is about to graduate with a certificate in elementary education, but I have been warning her away. There just aren't any jobs for new graduates. California is really losing out, especially when we are about to see tens of thousands of baby boomers retire. This is exactly the wrong time to drive away qualified teachers from the state and the profession.

The repeated increases in tuition costs are driving students away from our colleges, and saddling others with huge loans.

We need to be investing more, not less in our future and our students. California needs to build back our education system to its former luster in order to grow our economy and develop new technologies to reduce global warming.

Thank you to all of the Democratic legislators for taking the time to record responses to Al Gore and for all of the work they are doing to improve our primary and secondary education systems.

As a research scientist the idea that cutting money for education does anything positive is ridiculous. We (the state of California and the nation) should focus on what truly raises the standards, expectations, and overall quality of a society. Most every problem in this world can be solved either directly or indirectly through education.