Multiply that number by 5, 10, or even 15 students per classroom who need additional work, and not only is that additional money Lansing is dangling like a dime bag to a crack addict quickly spent, but now you're infringing on the rights of the children living in that district who have to sit idly by while their teacher(s) now have to focus their attention away from those who want to learn and instead focus those energies on getting other students up to the proper level and maintaining order in the classroom.

Where I come from, we call that dumping your problem in someone else's lap.

Yeah, yeah, KG. We've heard this all before. Tell us something we haven't heard before.

Okay then, here it comes.

The gist of the debate from what I've seen so far can be categorizes as a.) The individual right of an education shouldn't be infringed by others who lack personal responsibility, and b.) Education is important, how we actually achieve that outcome be damned.

So those who can escape failing schools will escape. And in the end, we're still stuck with children in non-achieving schools.

But why do we need to wait for the schools to actually fail? Why can't Lansing take a more proactive step and simply empower the parents to fix where they're already at?

There is a law that began in California backed by a group called Parent Revolution.

Parent Revolution also has an interesting theory regarding how it views the problem with education:

"Parent Revolution believes that our schools are failing because they aren't designed to succeed - they are designed for grown-up, not children.  We believe the only way to fix this and truly transform public education is to make every decision in public education based on what is good for children, not grown-ups.  To make each and every decision as if it would literally affect someone's own child.  The only way to make this happen is to give power to the only people who care only about children - parents."

To address this problem, they have proposed the "Parent Trigger" law which addresses that very issue.

It is a very simple law.

If your child is attending an under-performing school, you as a parent have the right to circulate a petition among other parents sending their children to that school. If you are able to get signatures from 51% of parents (or future parents) attending that particular school, then you have several options:

1) Charter conversion: If there is a nearby charter school that is outperforming your child's failing school, parents can bring in that charter school to transform the failing school. The school will then be run by that charter school, not the school district, but it will continue to serve all the same students that have always attended the school.

2) Turnaround: If parents want huge changes but want to leave the school district in charge, this option may be for them. It forces the school district to hit the reset button by bringing in a new staff and giving the local school community more control over staffing and budget.

3) Transformation:  This is the least significant change. It forces the school district to find a new principal, and make a few other small changes.

4) Closure: This option would close the school altogether and send the students to other, higher-performing schools nearby.  Parent Revolution does NOT recommend this option to parents - we believe schools must be transformed, not closed.

5) Bargaining power: If parents want smaller changes but the school district just won't listen to them, they can organize, get to 51%, and use their signatures as bargaining power.

An explanation of these can be seen here:

This law isn't just limited to only California. It's beginning to take off all across America in states like Colorado, Ohio, New York, Mississippi, Connecticut, and Illinois (promoted by Rahm Emanuel...yes, Pres. Obama's former Chief of Staff).

Much like Freedom to Work is causing the unions in general headaches, "Parent Trigger" laws are causing teachers union that and more. So much so, that school districts and their union supporters are doing their best to impede it.

Case in point, the Compton School District back in April was "unable" to read 275 signatures on a petition submitted by parents.

Another occurred in Connecticut during a teachers TEACH 2011 Conference, the Connecticut Teacher's Union got caught recently with their hand in the cookie jar when a powerpoint was found on their own website indicating how they coordinated sabotaging the efforts to help students by limiting the power of parents (think:RMGN here in Michigan).

I can cite most sources, but it should be readily apparent that this law is scarring the hell out of the educational establishment. So the all important question to be asked now is what will it be?

Will Lansing focus on dumping problems onto others like progressives are prone to do?