KANAWHA County citizens, despite suffering from raising prices of everything, have taxed themselves more with an excess levy.

The hardest-working and most successful teachers will receive the same levy benefits as their lazy and/or lousy colleagues. Even with the evolutionism taught in KCS, terrible teachers will never become excellent educators - at any price.

Neither will the KCS yoga classes conjure student success.

The public should beware of school officials' claims of benefits because the Gazette exposed the state for fudging dropout statistics and West Virginia recently received a D- on a national study for setting standards of student proficiency.

The levy will also bring more technology into schools. Unfortunately, the touted "smart board" may become an electronic chalkboard like computers were used as high-tech flash cards.

Upgrading technology in public schools is like using a chair to replace the wooden stool to hand-milk cows.

Politicians have always wanted to throw taxpayer money (in the form of new stalls, harnesses, and buckboards) into the burning barn of public schooling. The federal government has no constitutional authority to educate children. Both political parties, using different buzz words, have wasted billions of dollars to get us into our current dangerous situation.

Let's evacuate the barn.

Leaving the barn will open wonderful horizons for teachers. Teachers may lead the evacuation because good teachers will have their harnesses removed.

There will be a monetary benefit to taxpayers. Upkeep of expensive buildings, which serve as a type of day-care prison, will no longer be needed. Millions of trees will be saved by nearly eliminating the need for propaganda-riddled textbooks. Transportation's budget-breaking costs will be eliminated without resorting to rickshaws.

Away from the smoke-filled barn is the fresh air of education freedom using distance, or virtual, learning, often referred to as Internet learning.

A Harvard professor predicts (probably underestimating) that by 2019, 50 percent of all high school classes will be taught via the Internet.

According to the North American Council for Online Learning, more than a million students are enrolled in Internet classes.

WVU and Marshall have growing Internet campuses with thousands enrolled. Students can receive undergraduate and graduate degrees without setting foot on campus. Hundreds of universities have courses available for credit and just for learning's sake.

KANAWHA County citizens, despite suffering from raising prices of everything, have taxed themselves more with an excess levy.

The hardest-working and most successful teachers will receive the same levy benefits as their lazy and/or lousy colleagues. Even with the evolutionism taught in KCS, terrible teachers will never become excellent educators - at any price.

Neither will the KCS yoga classes conjure student success.

The public should beware of school officials' claims of benefits because the Gazette exposed the state for fudging dropout statistics and West Virginia recently received a D- on a national study for setting standards of student proficiency.

The levy will also bring more technology into schools. Unfortunately, the touted "smart board" may become an electronic chalkboard like computers were used as high-tech flash cards.

Upgrading technology in public schools is like using a chair to replace the wooden stool to hand-milk cows.

Politicians have always wanted to throw taxpayer money (in the form of new stalls, harnesses, and buckboards) into the burning barn of public schooling. The federal government has no constitutional authority to educate children. Both political parties, using different buzz words, have wasted billions of dollars to get us into our current dangerous situation.

Let's evacuate the barn.

Leaving the barn will open wonderful horizons for teachers. Teachers may lead the evacuation because good teachers will have their harnesses removed.

There will be a monetary benefit to taxpayers. Upkeep of expensive buildings, which serve as a type of day-care prison, will no longer be needed. Millions of trees will be saved by nearly eliminating the need for propaganda-riddled textbooks. Transportation's budget-breaking costs will be eliminated without resorting to rickshaws.

Away from the smoke-filled barn is the fresh air of education freedom using distance, or virtual, learning, often referred to as Internet learning.

A Harvard professor predicts (probably underestimating) that by 2019, 50 percent of all high school classes will be taught via the Internet.

According to the North American Council for Online Learning, more than a million students are enrolled in Internet classes.

WVU and Marshall have growing Internet campuses with thousands enrolled. Students can receive undergraduate and graduate degrees without setting foot on campus. Hundreds of universities have courses available for credit and just for learning's sake.

West Virginia has around 1,500 students enrolled in Internet learning high school (and earlier) courses. Almost 8 percent of Alaskan students are educated in their homes. Florida has more than 10,000 students (nationwide) learning at "Any Place, Any Pace."

While using Internet learning, students do not have to worry about missing part of a lecture if their mind wanders. The fear of being laughed at for asking a "dumb" question, or answering wrongly, is eliminated. Classes would be eliminated that have some students bored and other students lost while the average students are taught.

A market-driven Internet learning system would allow parents to spend their money on the best choices.

New technology will soon eliminate schools as our source of learning because knowledge is increasing so fast that schools cannot keep pace.

The book Leaving Schools and Finding Education points out that schools are nearly unbearably expensive and so "issue-oriented that they are beginning to pull down other institutions."

Americans should not be forced to pay for a failed monopoly.

It costs more than $100,000 to educate one student K-12. This is going to soon drain state budgets. Enrollment and achievement go down while costs go up. Property taxes may soon threaten home ownership.

Home and Christian school leaders have already pioneered a way for transition to educational freedom using the University Model School (UMS) which combines traditional and home schooling.

UMS children receive some classes on campus and are home-schooled for other subjects. Campus classes are offered on a Monday-Wednesday-Friday and Tuesday-Thursday basis like college courses. Advanced-placement courses are obtained from groups like the Calvert School or the University of Nebraska Independent Study High School. Children are not locked into a subject that has been mastered or forced to wait on a course at a certain grade or age. Combine all of these choices with the option of classical learning (see www.insectman.us and click on Exodus Mandate) and Internet learning and the opportunities for children are exciting and unlimited.

Public schools cannot be fixed because they are obsolete relics of the 19th century.

America has everything needed to provide a top-notch education in private homes.

Crawling out of a smoke-filled barn is frightening and abrasive but the only way to survive. Americans can continue to prop up the educational inferno, or move children to fresh air and safety away from the burning barn.

Priest, of Poca, is state coordinator of Exodus Mandate-West Virginia, a group that promotes Christian education and home schooling.