Rejecting Charlie Ross's Premise

Charlie Ross has said that instead of spending money sending students to college, the state should concentrate on training them for the labor force. See post “Charlie Ross’s Education Plan”.

I refuse to accept the premise that the state government of Mississippi can’t find a way for the children of working families to go to college. They do it in Georgia, Arkansas, Louisiana, and every serious Democratic candidate for Governor in Kentucky is talking about how they’re going to do it. And those states are the ones who are a generation behind places like Indiana, Pennsylvania, and Ohio.

It’s immoral and it’s bad public policy. These aren’t good jobs he’s talking about. A globalized market demands educated people. Innovation happens in state funded universities with big student populations. Innovation drives the economy, which is what it’s about, stupid. See Bill Gates thoughts on the matter:

BILL GATES: "...There's an almost perfect correlation between the number of jobs in a region and the strength of the universities. And, that will continue, whether it's new fields like nanotechnology, or those two fields I mentioned, on the ongoing strength that they'll have. ... And legislators have decisions to make about the level of investment that is made there, and really thinking through what the follow-on benefits for them are in terms of not only the country, but also their state as well."

"I had a chance to speak at a governor's association meeting earlier this year and I was pretty blunt in talking about the need to change the high school system. I literally used the words that it was obsolete relative to the task at hand. So raising the standards was actually necessary in that. And I'd say that's probably the top issue for the United States. If we do that well, if we really push on that, that will keep us in the strong position we want to be in."

I think this is generally accepted stuff among policy people. That is, people who read reports issued by people who know what they’re talking about. Charlie Ross apparently doesn’t. And that is doesn’t read and doesn’t know.

This guy is a serious contender for a job considered the most powerful position in the state and that pisses me off.