Dear Editor:

In a 2013 government shutdown interview on MSNBC, Sen. Bernie Sanders stated, “Obamacare is just the tip of the iceberg.” He noted that the Koch Brothers and their followers want to abolish and privatize almost every government agency, with public education first on the list.

The easy road to end public education is to limit public education budgets, and use tax dollars to support private charter and virtual schools. Individuals who are in lock step with the Koch brothers are getting on school boards and redesigning curriculum for political instead of educational purposes. The New York Times (NYT) reports that historical facts in the United States are under attack in Colorado.

Civil protests erupted because civil disobedience history was being scrapped. Battles like this are being fought throughout the U.S., including Maine. The Pennsylvania governor cut $1.1 billion in education. That reduction passed to local budgets has caused class sizes to increase to 50-60 students in the K-to-12 classrooms. Similar budget reductions for university systems cause increases in tuition thereby limiting lower income students from the higher education population. Maine has also been reducing its education allocation. Since 1985, U.S. public college tuition has gone up 544 percent.

All of this is happening at a time when other countries have great public education schools, with Finland as the world’s leader. Germany just dropped all university tuition and added higher education to the list of human rights joining six other European nations. In the meantime lack of support for U.S. education has caused massive student debt that takes up to 30 years to pay off.

This has a negative impact on the economy, and is expected to have an impact on what higher education schools our kids select. Why? Because not only is higher education free to every German, it is also free to international students. Students with minimal funds may find that a stint in Germany beats heavy U.S. tuitions. Germany is also tops for vocational training programs. In the world of competition this does not bode well for the U.S., which continues to devalue and de-fund public education.

Jarryl Larson
Edgecomb