CACR 12 Centralizing Control of Education at the State Level

The finalized CACR 12 language out of the Committee of Conference:

[Art.] 5-c [Public Education]. In fulfillment of the provisions with respect to education set forth in Part II, Article 83, the legislature shall have the responsibility to maintain a system of public elementary and secondary education and to mitigate local disparities in educational opportunity and fiscal capacity.  In furtherance thereof, the Legislature shall have the full power and authority to make reasonable standards for elementary and secondary public education and standards of accountability and to determine the amount of, and the methods of raising and distributing, state funding for public education.

 


This amendment usurps local control, eliminating our 200+ year heritage.  Acts of Uniformity will follow. Centralized schooling is a pre-requisite of all oppressive regimes.

Home schoolers will become the "responsibility" of the State and regulation will increase.  It's a game changer. Any freedom home schoolers may have earned this year will be reversed.

"Mitigate local disparities" cuts both ways.  It allows the State to use supplementary funding to target poor districts, but also allows the State to curtail excessive local spending.  Affluent towns won't like that outcome.

‎If "No Child Left Behind" is really is a euphemism for "No Child Gets Ahead," then   "mitigating local disparities" under CACR 12 is a euphemism for "No District Gets Ahead."

It will allow the State to downshift its mandates as the Legislature "determine[s] the amount of" funding to public schools.  Forget P1A28-a;  unfunded mandates will be the norm.  Whoops.  They're the norm already?  My bad.  So this is an easy one for the People to see through.

The GOP leadership should hope that CACR 12 dies quickly in the legislature lest it defeats every candidate who promotes it.  That could result in a Democratic governor.  Why should the People trust any politician who wants to usurp LOCAL control of schools?  Especially, when those politicians pretend that CACR 12 "restores" local control.  

The NH Supreme Court didn't eliminate local control of education like GOP leadership insists.  NH isn't ruled by a judicial oligarchy.   The Supreme Court is not a Supreme Being, just a co-equal branch of government.

This amendment is not about averting a fiscal crisis.  If so, it would have focused on supplementary funding, not  ....."mitigat[ing] local disparities," .... usurping the "responsibility to maintain a system" of public schools, or .... granting itself authority to set standards.  

This is a blatant power grab because certain well-funded powers-that-be do not like New Hampshire being the Last-in-the-Nation to safeguard local control of their public schools.

It constitutes a state-level takeover of primary and secondary public education statewide. It will be used to great effect by statist Democrats in the future to ensure that spending is ratcheted ever-upward because of the "responsibility" the General Court is now being given...leading eventually and inevitably to a statewide income tax, sales taxes, or both.   And don't forget any "method" of taxation is now on the table under CACR 12