Ed Emery appointed to Education Committee

Sen. Ed Emery, R-Lamar, who has never had any use for public education and would love to see public money go to private schools, was appointed today to serve on the Senate Education Committee.

As I have noted in the past, Emery has called public education a "form of slavery" and said that our schools are "a pipeline to prison."

This is what Emery wrote about education on the issues section of his website:

Vouchers are one way of providing the power of competition to state-run schools, but they are not the only way. Nevertheless, vouchers have worked where used, and all schools, both government and private, improved scores — some significantly. In addition, dropout rates always declined when competition was introduced via vouchers. 

However, big-government advocates fear competition and individual freedom. They argue that the use of vouchers will enslave private and parochial schools by “accepting government money and the strings that go with it.” They don’t trust private and Christian schools to read the law and make their own decisions about the risks and benefits. Yet, I believe it is a question of personal liberty, of choice. Why should big-government politicians decide whether or not parents and school administrators can make that decision? Non-government schools are capable of choosing whether or not they will accept vouchers; that is freedom. 

Freedom is about choice. The absence of choice is slavery — a form of imprisonment. It is freedom, not slavery, that produces opportunity, and it is opportunity that produces the prosperity and exceptionalism of theUnited States. In education, we have removed all of that choice. 

The accompanying video features Emery explaining how he made the right decision by homeschooling his children and talks about how young people are being indoctrinated in the public schools.