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November 03, 2005
Not ready for primetime
I suppose it is a sign of the grumpiness of a geezer, but for all his promise, I don’t think Seth Cohn, the Free State Project candidate on Tuesday ballot for the Concord School Board, is ready for the job.
I’ll admit the board is too plodding and homogeneous. It has too many lawyers, and too many of its members live in the same neighborhood. The board could use an iconoclast like, say, John Stohrer, who used to challenge the status quo.
Maybe Cohn would do the same thing. During his interview with our editorial board, he did not come across as a bomb thrower – someone who wanted to abolish public schools, as some libertarian extremists do. He seemed smart, earnest and articulate, committed to Concord, serious about serving. And he was anything but conventional.
In years past, I’ve occasionally pushed our editorial board to endorse such a candidate, but several things stopped me here. The main one was the wrong assumptions behind many of Cohn’s solutions for Concord schools. To cite just one example, when we asked him about all-day kindergarten, he said that kindergarten was “day care in a lot of ways” and suggested that he might favor a charter school approach because it would cost less.
There are aspects of day care in kindergarten, but they’re minor compared to the main mission. Kindergarten is a year for acclimating children to school and assessing their needs, and it is vital to public education. Every study I’ve seen shows kindergarten makes a huge difference in making successful lives. Some kids come from families where the house is full of books and they are read to regularly; some have never heard of Goodnight Moon. Most need some formal school to prepare them for first grade. If I ruled the world, I’d institute two-year half-day kindergarten for 4 and 5-year-olds over one-year, full-day kindergarten. The point is that Cohn, who has no children, seemed cavalier and dismissive about kindergarten.
Like him, I like the idea of charter schools. But so far they have proved to be impractical in New Hampshire, many of whose politicians have embraced them without figuring out how to pay for them. Before he proposes charter schools as an answer for Concord, Cohn needs a plan for financing them. He says they’d be a cheaper alternative, but that is neither a self-evident truth nor a primary argument for them.
If Cohn loses on Tuesday, I hope he’ll do some homework. He’s already been diligent and perceptive in finding out about Concord schools without ever having gone to one himself or sent a child to one. But he needs to know more. And he needs to ground his political philosophy – more personal liberty, more individual responsibility, less government – in the actual circumstances of the city’s schools and the state’s tax structure.
With a little work, he could become the iconoclast the school board needs.
Posted by Mike Pride at November 3, 2005 07:22 PM
Comments
Your headline doesn't seem to match the blog entry very much. If anything, Seth Cohn seemed ready for prime time to me, especially compared to some of the other candidates who I happened to meet on the trail.
WKXL 1450 and the Kimball-Dewey Elementary School PTO hosted a forum with the candidates. I moderated it and was under-impressed with most of the field. But after going back and listening to the audio of the forum again, which was later rebroadcast on the station and is posted at our Web site, wkxl1450.com, Cohn and others, like Casko, Dion, and Wilkes, came across as geniuine without being wonks or stiff, like lawyers.
I assumed that Cohn was the Free State candidate in the race, but I thought his answers were well thought out, looked towards the future, especially with technology, and surprisingly competent.
I didn't know that Cohn supported charter schools and I am personally a little leery of them; I would prefer to support vouchers for those parents who would like small property tax breaks. But whether he was more serious about kindergarten or not doesn't mean he wouldn't be a good addition to the current board.
One guy who surprised me towards the end as being quite flippant was Blakenbecker. An audience member wrote a pretty good question about diet issues and the food the school's served; he cracked a joke about it, and another question asked which he thought was dumb, as if the huge spike in obesity and childhood diabetes - much of which is based on the food consumed by children, in cafeterias - wasn't to be taken seriously. A serious disappointment from someone who seems smarter than that.
I also didn't like Dion's main issue - that she promised to run for the seat after her daughter wasn't able to take that band trip to Florida. It is good that she was motivated to run by a controversial vote by the board and the desire to serve. But her lack of acknowledgement of the underlying - the serious caste problems we have in our society and the inability of poorer students in band to come up with the cash to go on the trip - was a disappointment. She did have other good answers and is the only woman running. But she isn't the complete package yet.
Posted by: Anthony Schinella at November 3, 2005 11:39 PM
Hi Mike,
As one of Seth's employers I'm hardly unbiased, but I've found Seth to be intelligent and efficient in the projects he's been given. Which translates to he does his homework to find out what the options are and then rationally proposes the ones that make the most sense.
As to your point that he hasn't gone to Concord schools or doesn't have children in the Concord school system, does he not pay, directly or indirectly, property taxes? Are you trying to propose a school board system that flies directly in the face of "no taxation without representation?"
And based on your statement, "[H]e needs to ground his political philosophy - more personal liberty, more individual responsibility, less government - in the actual circumstances of the city's schools and the state's tax structure," he sounds like he already is the iconoclast your school board needs. (Seriously, while I don't know you, you aren't proposing we need less personal liberty or less individual responsibility?)
Seth is a good man, I expect if you elect him your schools will educate more and cost less. Which would be the goals of schooling?
Regards,
M.J. Taylor
Publisher
from Reason to Freedom
Posted by: M.J. Taylor at November 4, 2005 12:01 PM
Frankly, I prefer that the Free State Project's people go back from where they came, and that they leave the rest of us alone.
Posted by: Ben at November 7, 2005 06:13 PM
Wow
Ben you are rather hostile!
Do you hate Liberty?
Do you hate freedom?
Or is it that you only want those God given rights for people that think like you?
I never realized that we were bothering anyone.
Can you enlighten me as to how we are bothering you?
The FSP wants freedom and Liberty for every American not just those that agree with us!
Not all of us are Libertarians either.
You have the makings of a good Republicrat Ben I wish you well...but I am not moving back to the Peoples Republic of Massachusetts we are here and we are staying so I suggest we/you find common ground and try to get along.
Peace
Billy C.
Posted by: Billy C. at November 8, 2005 07:30 PM