NOTE: Susan Ohanian wore this sandwich board in the 4th of July parade in Warren, VT and continues to display it in a solitary vigil on Fridays in the popular Church Street Marketplace in Burlington.
Feds Hijacking Local Schools
The Feds impose timetables, labeling young children winners and losers.
Vermont knows a better way: Treat 8-year-olds like 8-year-olds, celebrating their individual diversity and variety and uniqueness.
The Feds define schoolchildren as future workers in a global economy.
Vermont knows a better way: Keep schools local. Put schools at the center of the community and encourage students to explore forests, ponds, farms, artists' studios, industrial sites, museums.
The Feds insist all students must take the same pre-college curriculum.
Vermont knows a better way: Encourage students to work with their hands as well as their heads so they learn that communities need farmers, carpenters, lumberjacks, and musicians along with engineers and chemists.
The Feds demand a national timetable: National Standards and a National Test.
Vermont knows a better way: We must ask, "Who's in charge?" and we must refuse to turn over the control of our schools to the Feds. We must insist on Vermont schools by and for Vermonters.