Foolin’ with Schoolin’

Welcome to America’s “hot” button. Whether it’s about making sure that your child receives a proper [Catholic, Jewish, Christian, Muslim, Evangelical Christian, Hindu, Orthodox Jewish… well you get the point] education, America has always cherished its right to offer a religiously-based education to its children as an alternative to secular schooling. Some people have carried that notion to another level with home schooling (although some home schooling is just a way for a parent to ensure a gifted child isn’t bored).

Even at the college level, whether it’s the academic wunderkind of Jesuit learning, Georgetown University, the Mormon superstar, Brigham Young University, or the more recently recently created and controversial Evangelical institutions of lesser academic repute, Liberty University or Oral Roberts, Americans do like the religious alternative, even if some of such colleges and universities no longer require adherence to their underlying creed. It’s our right under the First Amendment.

While most advanced countries in the world have a nationally-controlled public school system at the primary and secondary level, the U.S. struggles with 13,000 autonomous school districts, often with conflicting values, always with costly additional layers of local bureaucracy, where battles over the requirement of teaching religious precepts – the “intelligent design” versus “evolution” battle – often occur at the expense of collapsing academic standards that make our children particularly uncompetitive in a world where many developing nations are building educational systems with far more effective curricula than ours. But will we give up “local” control? It’s our right under our federal system of government.

Is there any hope for our schools, despite the critical failure of the No Child Left Behind Act (which allows states to set their own internal standards for what constitutes “success”)? Perhaps a touch (I’ll believe it when I see the results). On June 1^st, 46 states and the District of Columbia, through the National Governors Association and the Council of Chief State School Officers, have agreed to attempt to set national standards for primary and secondary public education, focusing on creating “internationally competitive” students.

The June 1^st Washington Post: “Once the organizers of the effort agree to a proposal, each state would decide individually whether to adopt it… The nearly complete support of governors for the effort -- leaders in Texas, Alaska, Missouri and South Carolina are the only ones that have not signed on [notably states where the obligation to present “intelligent design” as an “alternative theory” to evolution is still one of the highest priorities] is the main issue -- is key.”

In some countries, however, religious schooling is the backbone of local literacy. Without the involvement of religious institutions, for all practical purposes, many of these nations would see education virtually disappear except for the elites; literacy rates might plunge back to the level last seen during the Dark Ages. One such country is the much-troubled Pakistan, where Muslim schools, based on a thorough understanding (and even memorization of the 77,701 words of) the Qu’ran, are quite prevalent.

No, most of these schools (approximately 20,000 “Muslim seminary” schools according to the May 29^th Los Angeles Times) are not hotbeds of Jihadism, but many do in fact teach a pretty fundamental brand of Islam. On the other hand, Pakistan does have a few hundred such schools that do seem to live up to their reputation as Jihadist processing plants. These madrasas represent about 2% of such student populations, but they seem to have the tacit support of the Pakistani military, who see these bearded and fundamentalist young warriors-in-training as potential recruits in the underground battle to take India’s Kashmir, a state with a large Muslim population (the major of India is Hindu). India still looms as the huge mythical beast that is Pakistan’s mortal enemy, even though India most certainly has other priorities.

But these same madrasas provide recruits for terrorist activities all over Pakistan, Afghanistan and even participate as “freedom fighters” in campaigns thousands of miles from their native land. Taliban leaders are revered in many schools, and many students find their way into that vitriolic organization after “graduation.”

“‘The madrasas are a symptom, not the cause,’ said C. Christine Fair, an analyst with the Santa Monica-based Rand Corp. think tank.” LA Times. A corrupt and feudalist government has led many factions to build their own private religious armies and apply their own religious laws to fill the vacuum that exists in this explosive and unstable nuclear nation. It isn’t these schools that have generated the fairly strong generally anti-American feeling within Pakistan; our alliance with a corrupt government and our constant perceived “manipulation” of that government to implement “American policies” against “terrorism” (not viewed as much of a local problem) has bolstered that feeling.

But in the end, the few “terrorist” schools and universities that do exist in Pakistan have created new violent anti-American leaders and recruits willing to kill, maim and destroy Westerners and Western values, to attack and train others to attack… it is their sacred mission, not just a right, but a mandate from Allah. The passion of religious fever is a difficult power with which to negotiate peace, harmony or even détente.

The initial step in defending ourselves against this “holy” onslaught is to understand the problem. The second is to understand how the conflict with India is Pakistan’s main focus, not indigenous “terrorism.” The third is to let the inherent suspicion of Pakistan’s masses to react to the internal extremism that finally has got their attention. The Taliban went one giant step too far in their recent attack outwards from the Swat Valley. Tolerance of extreme religious views is an American right; other countries express their own version of that right. It is a very complex world.

I’m Peter Dekom, and I approve this message.