Full disclosure up front: I am actively working with the Kira Willis for State Superintendent of Schools campaign.
Kira Willis, a 17 year veteran classroom teacher from Roswell, has entered the State School Superintendent race and is seeking the nomination of the Libertarian Party of Georgia.
Kira is running on what she calls the “ABCs of Education”: Accountability, Budget, and Community.
As a classroom teacher, Kira knows that accountability cannot just mean more regulations on teachers and schools, but that each stakeholder in education should be held accountable for their own products. These stakeholders are students, parents, teachers, schools, and communities.
From her website:
What was once a partnership between the school and home has become a disenfranchised blame game. Parents have been disregarded by the schools and the state as irrelevant to their children’s education. All parents have both a right and a responsibility to their children’s schooling. I can’t think of any parent who does not want his child to succeed. As State School Superintendent, I want to help mend the bridge between the school and the home. This means having parents accountable for their children coming to school ready to learn. It means that parents must help the school in teaching their young people.
Kira wants to eliminate to as much a degree as possible positions that have little to no contact with students. This means minimizing the bureaucracy of the State Department of Education and making it a servant of the local schools rather than a tyrant over them. She will also work to encourage local school systems to follow her lead and eliminate much of the central office bureaucracy that serves as little more than patronage and cronyism. This will help ease Georgia out of its budget crisis as well as help local school systems avoid having to furlough teachers.
Finally, Kira stresses community. Again, from her website:
We need to give the schools back to their communities! What’s best for students in Atlanta may not be best for students in Rome or Valdosta. Our job as educators is to ensure that we are teaching students to reach a specific standard of learning, not to ensure that we teach them exactly the same thing at exactly the same time. Who knows better how to teach students: the state or the teachers within community itself? Taking away the community school was a disservice to the students and to the school community.
Yeah. Does anyone else find it ironic or odd that a member of a party that preaches the rejection of big institutions and government controlled programs is running for office of a big institution that happens to be a government controlled program? Way to go guys!
Connor:
Get a Libertarian in there, and you’re sure to reduce the size of that big institution. Kira’s commitment to eliminating positions she controls with little or no direct contact with students will save the State MILLIONS, and by working to convince local systems that they should have a similar commitment the savings she generates throughout the state will be even higher.
If I must have government, I honestly cannot imagine a person I would want running it more than a Libertarian – at least I know they’re looking out for both my rights AND my wallet!
I understand that her intentions are to reduce the size and power of the state government, and perhaps even the federal, in Georgia’s education system. However, I have problems knowing that she wants to be paid by the same institution she so readily rails against. If anything, she is only giving more power and influence to the “tyrant” of the Georgia Dept. of Education by running. I think a true Libertarian position would really be calling for the elimination of the GA Dept. of Education.
Also, she misses the fundamentals of the Libertarian Movement. That is, reject freedom crushing mega-institutions and intrusive government (that’s putting it loosely). However, she currently works for the government – she is a teacher and her pay is coming from the wallets of people across the state of GA. Again, as a Libertarian, you should be ashamed that someone would make a career profiting off of taxpayer dollars.
Look, I’m no Libertarian, and I don’t want to be. Really, this is just me on my soap box. I hear Libertarians say that a rejection of big government is best, yet they want to run for office and become apart of that supposed “big government.” All in all, Kira just seems to be violating the cornerstone(s) of the Libertarian message.
Connor, let me ask you this: How is any group supposed to bring down “big government” without trying to win elections? It’s not like the Democrats or Republicans are going to do it.
Also, most Libertarians believe that we need some government, we simply reject much of the ridiculous aspects of of that “big government”. But it can’t be dismantled from outside. You have to get in and get your hands dirty to actually do something about it.
Connor:
I have worked inside government for the majority of my professional career, and even when I worked in a “private” business, the bulk of our customers were government agencies. It has been my experience that Libertarians working inside government tend to be a primary source of innovation – they don’t WANT to spend money, so they look for cheaper ways to do whatever it is they are told to do. They use their expertise to identify ways to save money and make government more efficient, and they lobby their superiors for just such improvements.
Indeed, that is EXACTLY what Kira intends to do as State Superintendent of Schools – use her expertise from 17 years in the classroom to more effectively manage what goes on at Ga DOE. She has seen first hand how little middle management actually helps things, and how much they tend to place more and more red tape on teachers actually being effective in the classrooms, and she wants to eliminate this.
But you can’t make these changes from the outside – you have to be inside, at or near the top of the ladder. As State Superintendent, any time a Ga law says something to the effect of “the State Department of Education will promulgate rules” or “the State Department of Education will make plans to implement” or what have you, Kira will be able to maximize local control and minimize State spending FAR more effectively than any of her D or R competitors.
connor.hamm sez: she currently works for the government – she is a teacher and her pay is coming from the wallets of people across the state of GA. Again, as a Libertarian, you should be ashamed that someone would make a career profiting off of taxpayer dollars.
Are you serious? She’s running as a Libertarian – not a Quaker. Is no government employee; retiree; military veteran; law enforcement; fireman; Librarian; football coach; air traffic controller; or meter maid allowed to be a legitimate Libertarian in your view?
I don’t know Kira Willis, but I know other school teachers. They worked to get an education and they work for their paychecks. As citizens, they have a right to run for whatever office they desire. They do not forfeit that right because taxpayers fund their paychecks. They do not need my permission to run and they certainly don’t need yours either. Two terms ago, we had a teacher in the governor’s office. He was a Democrat. Would he have been a hypocrite if he had run as a Libertarian?
I understand everyones’ points completely and I respect your collective opinions. Nowhere in my comment was I attacking you guys. Simply, I was just calling attention to what I think is atleast semi-hypocrisy on the part of many Libertarians. Libertarians champion the ideas of government reduction and ending politicians profiting off of the people. This I can agree with. What I can’t agree with is someone who champions this idea but works for the government, thus, increasing the size and power of the government, and profits off of the people, in this case, having her wages paid by taxpayer dollars. I think we can all agree that this is somewhat contradictory.
Now, in no way do I think that any government official can’t possibly be a Libertarian as well. That would be absurd. Cartman is right – as citizens, we all have the right to run for whatever office we desire. All I think is that honest Liberatarians have to atleast admit that working for the government and profiting off of the people is somewhat hypocritical. Again, in no way am I attacking you guys or any other Libertarians. I just wanted to call attention to this point and hopefully – hopefully – get an honest concession.
I see the point, but since government has made a move to generally control education, what is someone who wants to educate to do? Private schools often have waiting lists for teachers (from what I understand), so should an educator starve until a job opens up?
Also keep in mind that some Libertarians don’t have an issue with government run education…the rub is which government is in control. The fact that the state of Georgia is knee deep in it instead of the counties have full control (and requiring local governments to fund it exclusively), isn’t the individual teacher’s fault.