General Discussion

If they made me king of America, that would be my number one policy objective.

1. Free masters degrees for anyone going into teaching. Eventually free college for all will be a goal, but first, teachers.

2. Massive investments into schools. I want a single class to have a maximum size of 7 students. This will require a lot more teachers but also a lot more physical space. In the 6 years it takes to train up new teachers, also build new buildings.

3. Hire all those teachers with masters degrees for very high salaries. Comparable with private industry. Be very strict with teaching credential requirements and require ongoing testing and studying to maintain a teacher's license. Hire 2-3 teachers aides per teacher.

How do we fund this? Nationalize all state education departments. School funding is no longer tied to how much the property in that neighborhood is worth. Base it purely on enrollment, with no incentives for helping kids graduate. Minimal restrictions on funding except strong oversight against administration hoovering up all the money for themselves.

I think if you get highly educated, well-paid teachers in small class settings with adequate funding and an assistant, the teachers will go above and beyond for students. You don't need so much top-down control. Hire very good teachers, and then give them the freedom and the ability to teach well.

One generation of this, and so many problems will fix themselves. The Republican party will collapse. Climate change will become the #1 priority (though hopefully by that point we've stabilized our GHG output and are in the sequestration phase). We'll be inoculated against misinfo. We'll have an explosion of new products and businesses.