9. Many public schools subject children to drugs, bullies, violence, and values many parents disapprove of.

10. Public schools pressure many parents who have bright, normal children to give their kids potentially dangerous mind-altering drugs to make bored kids "behave" in class. Over four million allegedly "unruly" kids line up for Ritalin every day in public schools across America. Methylphenidate (sold as Ritalin) and cocaine are both listed in "Schedule II" of U.S. Drug Enforcement Agency's Controlled Substances Act (CSA).

11. Public schools are compulsory. They therefore violate parents’ natural and constitutional right to control education of their children. Public school authorities, whose salaries we pay with our taxes, force parents to hand over their children to government employees called teachers and to schools that give an inferior education.

12. Public schools can destroy children's love of learning and self-confidence as learners. This can cripple children's ambitions and desire to go to college. This in turn, can force these children to end up with low-paying jobs for rest of their lives if and when they graduate high school.

13. Public schools force millions of Christian parents to hand over their children to public schools which are decidedly anti-Christian. For example, many social studies textbooks used in public schools have censored out references to such words as 'family,' 'marriage,' 'religion,' 'fidelity,' etc. Many textbooks today refer to a family simply as people choosing to live together.

14. Public schools force children to witness sometimes shocking or obnoxious sexual material in sex-education classes, without parents’ knowledge or consent.

15. The public-school near monopoly and compulsory-attendance laws cripple parents right and ability to choose a quality, low-cost school in an education free-market that has been squashed by public-school monopoly.

Parents should consider taking their kids out of public school permanently. Parents can take advantage of quality, low-cost education alternatives available to them right now, such as new Internet private schools that have low tuition costs.

Joel Turtel is an education policy analyst. He is also the author of "The Welfare State: No Mercy For The Middle Class." Contact Information: Website: http://www.mykidsdeservebetter.com, Email: lbooksusa@aol.com, Phone: 718-447-7348. Article Copyrighted © 2005 by Joel Turtel. Article can be reprinted on ezines or newsletters only if Contact information to Joel Turtel and his website is included.

6. Ben Franklin, George Washington, Thomas Edison, and Mark Twain all went to a formal “grammar” school for less than two years. All were home-schooled by their parents or self-taught after they learned to read. Author John Gatto, in his book “Dumbing Us Down” said that most children can learn to read, write, and do basic arithmetic in only 100 hours of intense study. Yet our public schools keep children locked up for 12 years, yet can barely teach them to read.

7. Once children learn to read and write well within two years of intense study, they doesn’t need a public school at all. With their parents’ help and guidance, they can direct their own studies and education at home. Over two million children do this right now—it’s called homeschooling.

8. Public schools are a government-controlled monopoly. Bad schools don’t close down because compulsory taxes prop them up. Incompetent or mediocre teachers aren’t fired because tenure laws protect them. That’s why public schools will never improve and will always waste children’s precious time.

9. A study by National Education Commissiion on Time and Learning found that middle-school and high-school children spent on average only about 50 percent of their school day on core "academic" subjects. The rest of their time is spent on classes about sex-education, personal safety, family life, consumer affairs, AIDS and drug prevention, save-the-environment, multiculturalism studies, "cooperative-learning" projects, study halls, electives, homeroom, counseling, sports activities, or pep rallies (high school).

If parents value their children’s time, passion for learning, and future success in life, then they should consider taking their children out of public school, permanently.

Joel Turtel is an education policy analyst. He is also the author of "The Welfare State: No Mercy For The Middle Class." Contact Information: Website: http://www.mykidsdeservebetter.com, Email: lbooksusa@aol.com, Phone: 718-447-7348, Article Copyrighted © 2005 by Joel Turtel, Article can be reprinted on ezines or newsletters only if Contact information to Joel Turtel and his website is included