Education

Ross Overby’s Vision

A core my my faith is that we are to build people by teaching them. When we fail to teach we not only lose the person, we lose a bit of oursleves.  My father was born a tobacco farmer. The Depression took all that he had; the farm, his parents, his childhood - all gone. He had only one hope, fighting for an education. He made it. He made it on the charity of people, on the moral support of a sister, and on the investment made in him by his country.   I am who I am because of my father and the future his education gave to me. I will fight for education!  There is no greater moral calling than to educate your fellow man.

Education  is a whole-life experience. Our children learn in the school room and in the neighborhood after school.  My vision is to build economic opportunity in impoverished areas. This gives children something to aspire to in their own neighborhood. We need to clean out crime and have the very best teachers in our poorly performing schools. We need to raise teachers pay in our poorly performing schools and tie that pay to extraordinary skills and results. We need to provide after hours tutoring, life broadening cultural experiences, instill discipline, and we need to expand the curriculum to include life and decision making skills.

We need to expand financial aid for those who attend college. We need to provide financial aid for those who need retraining when global competition forces them into the unemployment line. We must increase the availability of grants and provide loans that charge no interest or that can be paid back through public service after graduation.

Has the Republican Party delivered compassion when it comes to education?

Under my opponent's leadership American children still come up below average in international testing. The majority of students studying engineering, science, and technology in our universities are foreign born. People are left unemployed as global competition renders their skills outdated in a 21st century America. Compassion educates our children, compassion motivates Americans into challenging technology-based careers, compassion helps people acquire the new skills needed for their future. Everybody benefits when we educate Americans.

Compassionate Conservatism Has Failed Our Children. We have the “No Child Left Behind Act” which is good for poorly performing suburban schools that need to straighten up, but what about our inner city and rural schools? My opponent leaves children to face crime and drugs after school. My opponent tells working poor parents who may not have an education themselves to get on the ball and help educate their kids.

My opponent asks children who see little to no economic opportunity in their neighborhood to pick themselves up by their boot straps and to venture across the tracks. She fails to recognize that most needy children do not have boot straps; in fact, many of them do not even have boots.

Republican leaders see education as a cost to be minimized - I believe Education pays.

How do we pay for education? Education is free if we strive to see the big picture!  Every developing country pours money into education because they know that when you educate a person you get more back than what you put in. We must invest in our people; it is our moral duty.