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The Department of Justice issued a statement reminding public schools that they are required to enroll all children, regardless of their immigration status.
According to the US Customs and Border Protection (CBP), 62,998 "unaccompanied minors" under the age of 17 have illegally crossed the US border since last October, and the government is integrating them into classrooms across America.
More than 37,000 are ready to begin school when classes resume, the balance of the 62,998 are being held in processing centers and will soon be introduced into the classroom.
Some states will be more impacted by this than others, but all will feel the impact and none feel they are prepared for it.
Clearly this issue will create a crises for local public schools. It is also pointing out, once again, that America's public education is miserably failing even before this latest crises hits the classroom and the budgets next month.
The highest number of illegal minors are in Texas---5,280, New York has 4,244, California---3,909, Florida---3,809 and Virginia has 2,856.
The Washington Post published a color coded map in July showing where the government has dumped these kids, often without the governor of the state knowing about the placement until after the fact.
The Office of Refugee Resettlement shows specific numbers of children and their location as of July 31.
This issue is yet another that is deeply dividing our country.
One thing most agree upon is that our public school system is not capable nor prepared to handle this kind of an event.
Francisco Negrom, general council for the National School Board Association, told USA Today, "We don't know the educational background (of the students), if they've even been to school, the language issue and operational issues could raise costs."
Schools across the country are expressing deep concern as to whether they can even handle this event because public schools are struggling to keep up with their counterparts around the globe.
In fact, American public education is falling further and further behind compared to the other 65 most developed nations on earth.
Programme for International Student Assessment ( PISA) shows the US scores below average in math and only average in reading and science, despite spending more per student ($115,000) than most every other country in the world.
Clearly money is not the problem, nor the solution.
For example, the Slovak Republic only spends $53,000 per student yet ranks at a similar level with the United States.
President Obama has acknowledged publicly on NBC's Today Show that our public education is falling behind the rest of the developed world.
He said, "Historically when we set up the public school systems across the country, we were leaps and bounds ahead of the vast majority of countries around the world."
Why can't he even admit that America was #1 in the world in education at one time? Not just leaps and bounds ahead of a "vast majority."
The president says there are several reasons for our failing. I agree, there are, but the president predictably points to lack of money as the most important issue.
There are other reasons for a failing public education system and, I believe, they are much more important than any budget shortfall.
The Spokesman Review is reporting "Thousands of Spokane-area residents will be soon receiving a letter explaining that their child's school is failing."
"They will be telling 13,500 parents in 29 schools that the schools are not failing" but will be deemed as such essentially due to clerical errors, the Spokesman reports.
Let me share a few thoughts with you as to why I believe our culture and public schools are in such disarray.
Developing the personal moral character of children is an essential prerequisite for the continuation of civilization. Education is a very important component of that process.
Our public or government run school system has been so eroded and compromised that it can no longer function in the way it was originally intended.
Noah Webster and other Founding Fathers had a very different worldview and vision for education.
The ultimate responsibility for educating and nurturing children is that of the parents. Public education is only viable when it contributes to that principle.
When the state usurps the role of the parent, or the parent abdicates that role to the state for whatever reason, the state will invariably subvert that education for its own expedient ends.
In other words, the state will attempt to indoctrinate the child toward some predetermined statist point of view.
We are experiencing that in America now.
Through the misrepresentation of "separation of church and state," secular progressives have seized the public education system to advance their own agenda. And in doing so have stripped traditional morality and values from the educational experience---all under the guise of "separation of church and state.".
Moral education cannot be divorced from education in general. It is not possible for the state to teach the supposed positive facts of the reality while leaving the teaching of normative values to parents. The reason this is so is because normative values always serve as a framework within which the facts of life are given meaning. Without values, facts become irrelevant pieces of information.
The individual brought up in this system sees no underlying principles of action other than immediate personal preference or gratification.
Our public or state run education has been almost irreversibly altered by "Outcome Based Education " which is the mainstay for a progressive worldview. David Hornbeck and others have led in this transformation of public education in America.
Now the state teaches "Pragmatic Morality" and it subverts traditional moral values, becoming a social experimentation lab---thus the decline in public education in America.
Public education no longer educates---it indoctrinates.
Theologian Charles Hodge has written, "A man without character is a man without principles, i.e., in whom there is nothing which gives security as to what his acts will be."
Secular progressivism destabilizes an individual life---and it destabilizes a culture.
Biblical values creates stability in an individual and in a culture.
You tell me which better serves the community and the individual.
Be Vigilant. Be Discerning. Be Informed. Be Prayerful. Be Blessed.