What kind of Neanderthal schooling is being provided by you Philistines?

School budgets need to be cut! But you better not shortchange MY child's education. This is the schizophrenic mantra being shouted by policy-making parents today.

On one hand, when they put on their bean counter hats, they see the excess, the fluff, the areas which can "justifiably" be scaled back. On the other hand, when they wear the hat of a being a parent and they look at the education that their own flesh and blood are getting in our schools, suddenly it's a whole different tune we hear being sung.

Art and music are expendable, non-core luxuries when policy decisions are being made for other people's children. But when it comes to their own kids, if they don't have flutes, paint, percussion, and piano, they bark the accusation, "What kind of Neanderthal schooling is being provided by you philistines!?"

If only the folks that made the decisions as to what's best for other people's kids viewed these decisions through the prism of how they would evaluate the very same questions when applied through the lens of "What would be best for my own kids?" things would be so much different.

When we start to educate our kids as if they really are "our" kids -- and not the kids of "other" people -- we are going to make a heck of leap forward in national education policy.