PrintMay 26, 2008
Avoiding humiliation for the public schools?
Subway sandwich shops have chosen to sponsor a story-writing contest for students. Very laudable considering the serious decline in writing skills among Americans in recent decades. But why has the sandwich shop chosen to exclude home schoolers?
The parade of home schooled children scoring high in the National Spelling Bee in recent years has proven embarrassing to the government schools see. Given the catastrophic state of many schools (and many schools of education), there is every chance that best story-writers in the country would include many home schooled children if they were allowed to compete.
So how is it that Subway decided to exclude home schooled children? The website announcement includes an offer of $5000 of playground equipment for the school of the winner. Perhaps the chain does not want to reward a household? Of course, home schoolers pay taxes and receive no educational benefit from those taxes. Having home schooled a child myself, I know that parents make a great sacrifice in time and money to provide a superior education in most home schools, and can use all the support they can get. Few ed school grads are going to do as good a job educating a child as a devoted and intelligent parent will.
I want to know why Subway is discriminating against home schools. If enough people share my outrage (contact Subway here), perhaps the chain will reverse itself. This is like the Boston Marathon banning Kenyans, and makes the contest into a joke, and the winners into losers unable to face the very best. A shame all around.
I want to know why Subway is discriminating against home schools. If enough people share my outrage (contact Subway here), perhaps the chain will reverse itself. This is like the Boston Marathon banning Kenyans, and makes the contest into a joke, and the winners into losers unable to face the very best. A shame all around.
