Brown County, TX
Republican Party

2006 STATE REPUBLICAN PARTY PLATFORM

• Parental Rights in Education – The right of parents to raise and educate their children is a fundamental right. Parents have the legal right to withdraw their child from a special education program or bilingual education at any time. We urge the Legislature to enact penalties for violation of parental rights in Chapter 26 of the Texas Education Code.
• Local Control – The Party supports the concept of choice in public education and believe that quality education is best achieved by encouraging of parental involvement, protecting of parental rights, and maximizing local control of public schools. We believe district superintendents and their employees should be made solely accountable to their locally elected boards. We support sensible consolidation of local school districts.
• State Board of Education – We support an elected State Board of Education (SBOE) with authority over the Texas Education Agency, selection and termination of the Commissioner of Education, and textbook adoption. The SBOE must retain constitutional authority over the governance of the Permanent School Fund. We urge the state to offer subject-area teacher certification without additional educational requirements for individuals who hold a baccalaureate in their field or professionals who have equivalent life experience in a field. We call on the Texas Legislature to repeal Article 5, Section 5.01; and that the legislature instead to work within the established framework of the Texas Education code and the authority of the State Board of Education to enact any academic changes sought by the Texas Legislature to develop a college readiness component in the required curriculum of the state’s essential knowledge and skills standards as developed and overseen by the elected SBOE.
• Textbooks and Curricula – We believe the SBOE must have sole authority over textbook content and state adoption and that the process must include public participation through public hearings. We urge the Legislature to act in 2007 to give the State Board of Education authority to establish textbook adoption standards.
• Parental School Choice – We encourage the Governor and the Texas Legislature to enact child-centered school funding options – which fund the student, not schools or districts – to allow maximum freedom of choice in public, private or parochial education for all children. This measure could only be considered upon passage of a state constitutional amendment that prohibits imposition of state regulations on private and parochial schools.
• Funding of Education – Educating Texans is a priority to Texas taxpayers. In order to prioritize education spending, it is necessary to maximize the percentage of school funds that are directed toward instructional purposes. We urge the Texas Legislature to:
  
  
  1. direct expenditures to academics first (books, desks, and teachers), then to non-academic activities if there are funds remaining,
  2. provide full funding for state imposed mandates on local school districts,
  3. not increase state taxes for funding of schools, U.S. Department of Education – The Federal Government has no constitutional jurisdiction over education. We call for the abolition of the U. S. Department of Education and the prohibition of the transfer of any of its functions to any other federal agency.

• Private Education – We believe that parents have the fundamental right and primary responsibility for educating their children, and the state should not have the power to force any parent or guardian to send their children to public school. We believe that parents or guardians may choose to educate their children in a private school without government interference of any type, be it through definition, regulation, accreditation, licensing or testing. Home education is legally recognized as private education. The courts of Texas have upheld the fundamental right of parents to teach their children at home (Leeper v. Arlington) without regulation, and we call on Texas legislators to oppose any restriction or regulation of this parental right. We call on the Texas Legislature to adopt legislation that will require cities and counties to exempt private school students from daytime curfew ordinances, as they are exempt from the Compulsory Attendance Laws. We also call on the Texas Legislature to adopt legislation requiring University Interscholastic League (UIL) to open participation to private schools and move back to the original mission of the UIL to pursue those activities for the betterment of all the students of Texas.
• Government Regulation of Religious Institutions – The state should have no power over the licensing of clergy or religious institutions for training clergy. The curriculum, faculty, and boards of religious institutions should be determined only by the institution. We call on the State to withdraw all imposed regulations.
• Sex Education – We recognize parental responsibility and authority regarding sex education. We support policies that mandate parental notification and consent before any sex education course or program is presented to their child. Parents must be given an opportunity to review the material prior to giving their consent. To build strong and lasting relationships, we support the requirement that schools teaching sex education must teach directive abstinence until heterosexual marriage with an uninfected person as the only safe and healthy means of preventing sexually transmitted diseases and pregnancies among unwed students. We believe programs should teach the physical and emotional risks of abortion specified in State law and rules. We oppose programs that advocate or legitimize pre-marital sexual activity, advocate condoms and birth control use by unmarried minors, advocate abortions, and condone homosexual, bisexual, and transgender acts and/or lifestyles, and elevate minors’ rights to make sexual and health care decisions equivalent to their parents. Sex education classes, if conducted, should be separated by sex. We oppose the use of any materials from Sexuality Information and Education Council of the U.S (SIECUS).
• Early Childhood Development – We believe that parents are best suited to train their children in their early development years (ages 0 through 5) and oppose mandatory pre-school and Kindergarten. We urge Congress to repeal government-sponsored programs that deal with early childhood development, and phase them out as soon as possible.
• Children with Special Needs – We advocate equal educational opportunity for all students and the requirement that children with special needs be educated commensurate with their abilities.
• Classroom Discipline – We recognize that safety and order are prerequisites for an environment conducive to education for both the student and the teacher. We therefore recommend that local school boards and classroom teachers be given more authority to deal with disciplinary problems. We urge the Texas Legislature, Governor, Commissioner of Education and State Board of Education to remind administrators and school boards that corporal punishment is effective and legal in Texas.
• Support for Classroom Teachers – We commend the many excellent teachers in Texas and continue to support quality education by:
  
  
  1. recognizing the need to maintain and attract competent professional teachers in the classrooms of Texas public schools so that every student receives the best possible education;
  2. recognizing the need for teacher involvement in educational planning and program development for the betterment of education at the local level;
  3. recognizing the need to minimize administrative reports and excessive paperwork;
  4. supporting teacher incentives through monetary and recognition rewards; and
  5. empowering teachers and administrators to remove disruptive students from a classroom or campus for a first-time offense.

• Traditional Principles in Education – We support school subjects with emphasis on the Judeo-Christian principles upon which America was founded and which form the basis of America’s legal and its political and economic systems.
• Multiculturalism – We favor strengthening our common American identity and loyalty instead of multiculturalism that emphasizes differences between racial and ethnic groups.
• Basic Standards – We favor improvements on the quality of education and a return to the traditional basics of reading, writing, and arithmetic with sufficient discipline to ensure learning. We support standardized testing to ensure minimal standards are met, but discourage the inordinate amount of time being forced upon teachers and students for state-mandated standardized test preparation to the detriment of basic academic instruction.
• Social Promotion – We believe the school children of Texas should master basic, minimum skills before advancing to the next grade level.
• Knowledge-Based Education – We believe the primary purpose of public schools is knowledge-based education not job training. We support knowledge-based curriculum standards and tests. We support continuing current successful career and technology programs, such as those established by the Perkins Act that include youth leadership organizations. We oppose mandatory career training.
• School Surveys and Testing – We believe that public schools should be required to obtain written parental consent for student participation in any test or questionnaire that surveys beliefs, feelings, or opinions in the areas of sexual activity, religion, political persuasion or other areas of morality. Public schools should be required to allow prior parental viewing of any test or materials to which their children are exposed.
• Bilingual Education – We demand the abolition of bilingual education as it currently exists in Texas. We believe that the best method is an “English Immersion Program.” All students must pass recognized standard tests that verify each student’s English ability for their grade level before advancing.
• Educational Entitlement – We encourage legislation that prohibits the enrollment and education of children whose parents are unlawful residents in the United States. We do not believe there is any entitlement for these children to receive pre-school, elementary, secondary, or post-secondary educational services paid for by American taxpayers.
• Religious Freedom in Public Schools – We urge school administrators and officials to inform Texas school students specifically of their First Amendment rights to pray and engage in religious speech, individually or in groups, on school property without government interference. We support and strongly urge Congress to pass a Religious Freedom Amendment, which provides: “Neither the United States nor any State shall prohibit student–sponsored prayer in public schools, nor compose any official student prayer or compel joining therein.” We urge the Texas Legislature to pass legislation which ends censorship of the discussion of the role of religion in our founding documents, and encourage reading and discussing those documents in our public schools.
• Theories of Origin – We support the objective teaching and equal treatment of scientific strengths and weaknesses of scientific theories, including Intelligent Design. We believe theories of life origins and environmental theories should be taught as scientific theory not scientific law; that social studies and other curriculum should not be based on any one theory.
• Pledge of Allegiance in Public Schools – We believe that students should be taught flag etiquette and should be led on a daily basis in the Pledge of Allegiance, the Texas pledge, the national anthem and patriotic songs to ensure that the loyal and patriotic spirit of Texas’ and of America’s heritage is preserved.
• Higher Education – We reaffirm its support of local and regional institutions of higher learning (public, private and parochial). We advocate a single standard for college admission for all students based on merit and ability without regard to the school from which they graduated or class standing. Texas students should be given acceptance priority over out-of-state or foreign students We call on the Texas Legislature to adopt legislation that will ensure the state-supported grants and scholarships be made available to all Texas high school students, including privately educated students.
• Gambling and Education – We strongly oppose gambling, in any form, as a means to fund education. School Health Care – We call upon Texas legislators to prohibit reproductive health care services, including counseling, referrals, and distribution of condoms and contraception through public schools. We support the parents’ right to choose, without penalty, which medications, including psychotropic and Ritalin, are administered to their minor children. We oppose medical clinics located on school property and their provision of healthcare to students without parental consent.
• School Transportation Safety – We support the mandatory installation and use of seat belts and safety glass on school buses and any and all vehicles which transport children.
  
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