There are many things that make America great but one of them is the fact that any citizen can participate in shaping our nation’s future. Among many of our freedoms we can vote, we can hold government officials accountable and we can assemble, publicly or privately, for any purpose, even in opposition to those in power.
We are so proud of our American and South Carolina history that we require our students to learn it as part of the social studies standards in elementary, middle, and high school. We require high school students to study U.S. History, the Constitution, and economics. Yet our current efforts do not prepare our children for the challenges they face when they leave our schools nor the opportunities they have to engage in citizenship. This is wrong.
We should prepare our children for citizenship; for the duties and obligations that a responsible member of a community should hold. This means that we have to prepare them to take advantage of the tremendous opportunities to influence the government left to us by our Founding Fathers but also to participate in our free enterprise system.
An important way to improve our students' preparation to participate in our Republic is to speak more plainly on civic engagement. I commend the years that our State has invested in teaching history and the Constitution and we should continue to do this, but we can strengthen our efforts by helping our students understand the power that the local and federal government has over their lives and how they can remove these limits on liberty.
We also need to help our students better understand the ways in which they can hold government accountable, starting with local governments—including school boards—but extending to include members of our congressional delegation and the President.
Our God-given freedoms laid out in our Constitution and laws are reinforced by capitalism. The free enterprise system is essential to our form of government. These rights extend to our right to create, to take risks, and reap the benefits of our efforts. We teach our children macroeconomics as part of the required standards that they must cover. However, we need to better prepare them to be citizens by placing greater emphasis not just on microeconomics but on actual personal finance.
Our children should leave school understanding the essentials to operating in today's economy. Yes they need to understand supply and demand. They need to know the difference between a budget deficit and national debt. They need to know what a tariff is. But, they also need to understand how to balance a checkbook, how to calculate their effective tax rate, and how much interest they will pay on their credit card. They should leave school knowing how much they will pay for their home with a 5% interest rate and 30 year mortgage. Why not help them understand the difference between leasing and buying a car? These are essentials that allow us to either freely participate in today's world or be enslaved by a lack of knowledge.
As your next State Superintendent of Education, I will fight to make sure that every child who receives a high school diploma in South Carolina is prepared for work or college and citizenship.
Our children are born citizens but it is our obligation to ensure that they are ready to meet the duties, obligations, and functions of a responsible member of society so that when they enter adulthood they can operate with the full liberty that their citizenship brings.
We are so proud of our American and South Carolina history that we require our students to learn it as part of the social studies standards in elementary, middle, and high school. We require high school students to study U.S. History, the Constitution, and economics. Yet our current efforts do not prepare our children for the challenges they face when they leave our schools nor the opportunities they have to engage in citizenship. This is wrong.
We should prepare our children for citizenship; for the duties and obligations that a responsible member of a community should hold. This means that we have to prepare them to take advantage of the tremendous opportunities to influence the government left to us by our Founding Fathers but also to participate in our free enterprise system.
An important way to improve our students' preparation to participate in our Republic is to speak more plainly on civic engagement. I commend the years that our State has invested in teaching history and the Constitution and we should continue to do this, but we can strengthen our efforts by helping our students understand the power that the local and federal government has over their lives and how they can remove these limits on liberty.
We also need to help our students better understand the ways in which they can hold government accountable, starting with local governments—including school boards—but extending to include members of our congressional delegation and the President.
Our God-given freedoms laid out in our Constitution and laws are reinforced by capitalism. The free enterprise system is essential to our form of government. These rights extend to our right to create, to take risks, and reap the benefits of our efforts. We teach our children macroeconomics as part of the required standards that they must cover. However, we need to better prepare them to be citizens by placing greater emphasis not just on microeconomics but on actual personal finance.
Our children should leave school understanding the essentials to operating in today's economy. Yes they need to understand supply and demand. They need to know the difference between a budget deficit and national debt. They need to know what a tariff is. But, they also need to understand how to balance a checkbook, how to calculate their effective tax rate, and how much interest they will pay on their credit card. They should leave school knowing how much they will pay for their home with a 5% interest rate and 30 year mortgage. Why not help them understand the difference between leasing and buying a car? These are essentials that allow us to either freely participate in today's world or be enslaved by a lack of knowledge.
As your next State Superintendent of Education, I will fight to make sure that every child who receives a high school diploma in South Carolina is prepared for work or college and citizenship.
Our children are born citizens but it is our obligation to ensure that they are ready to meet the duties, obligations, and functions of a responsible member of society so that when they enter adulthood they can operate with the full liberty that their citizenship brings.
