The British educator Robin Alexander reads the blog and has a question about whether American children have a right to an education. His thoughts were spurred by Jill Lepore’s article in The New Yorker, posted this morning, about whether education is a fundamental right. He wondered whether American education has been influenced by international agreements and norms. The short answer is no. The national education goals were set in 1989. I did not work for the U.S. Departmentof Education until mid-1991. I never heard anyone refer to international conventions or treaties about the rights of the child. I feel sure Betsy DeVos has never heard of them.
Robin Alexander writes:
While it’s beyond my competence to comment on the constitutional and legal aspects of the case for or against education as a fundamental right in the US, it might be worth broadening the debate to take in relevant international commitments to which the US is a signatory. These include:
1. The UN Convention on the Rights of the Child (UNCRC). https://www.unicef.org.uk/what-we-do/un-convention-child-rights/ . Article 28 states that ‘Every child has the right to an education. Primary education must be free and different forms of secondary education must be available to every child …’. Unfortunately, although the US is a signatory to UNCRC it stands conspicuously apart from the rest of the world’s governments in not having ratified it https://www.humanium.org/en/convention/signatory-states/ .
2. The UN Millennium Development Goals (MDGs), adopted but now superseded (see 3 below). Goal 2 was Universal Primary Education http://www.un.org/millenniumgoals/education.shtml .
3. The UN Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs), unanimously adopted by all UN member states in 2015. Goal 4: ‘Ensure inclusive and equitable quality education and promote lifelong learning opportunities for all’ with a target date of 2030. https://www.un.org/sustainabledevelopment/education/ .
The problem here, it will immediately be recognised, is that the US hasn’t ratified UNCRC while although it has adopted the MDGs and SDGs these were/are directions of travel rather than legally binding obligations. In any event, even if the US had ratified UNCRC, Trump’s record on ratified treaties (e.g. on climate change and Iran) shows that as far as he is concerned these exist to be upheld or disregarded at will. On the other hand, many signatories to UNCRC, adoption notwithstanding, have in practice displayed little commitment to many of its articles so they are hardly in a position to condemn the US for taking what is perhaps a more honest line.
Yet although US administrations tend to prefer to avoid tying their and the states’ hands on such matters, the UNCRC and SDGs (and the weight of international support they have attracted), might at least be invoked to exert a degree of moral leverage to accompany the legal forensics in Jill Lepore’s article at the state government level to which education is constitutionally reserved under the US Constitution’s 10th Amendment and which I realise is one of the problems here. Or perhaps not … Were you in the US Department of Education when the six 1991 National Education Goals were agreed? Food for thought?
Diane Ravitch's blog 
America has never outgrown the Wild West. It’s not grown up yet. Unlikely it ever will, preferring fantasy and myth to reality and commitments.
shocking when so many in US political office openly refer to “good guys” and “bad guys” — using this phrasing as actual logic for action
Looking back…
November 22, 2014
Many wonderful stories… UNICEF’s The State of The World’s Children, 2015. [1]
Admittedly, the story “Pee Is for Power” [2] grabs, well, the imagination, right away. It is a story by and about a collaborating and inventing group of students that gives a real meaning to innovation, and authentic learning. The students’ story is very counter to the politically transient “college and career ready” and now “Future Ready.” [3]
Does any element of the Common Core Standards expect kids to know anything about pee or to come up with the unexpected answer? Anyway…
By invitation, Diane Ravitch contributed to The State of the World’s Children, 2015, the chapter “Policy, responsibility and equal opportunity in education.” [4]
Ravitch concludes her contribution with this wisdom:
“Education must be recognized as a public responsibility, not an opportunity for entrepreneurs. Just as the government is responsible for public safety and for protecting the air and water, it is responsible for assuring a sound education for all children. Governments must provide and protect and adequately fund public education, while working to improve the lives of families and reduce poverty. There is no other way to assure equity for children and societies.”
Now hold in mind Ravitch’s wisdom as you read the Declaration of The Rights of The Child. [5]
Looking for gift giving ideas this Holiday Season? Then consider shopping UNICEF Cards and Gifts. [6]
Ed Johnson
Advocate for Quality in Public Education
Links
[1] http://sowc2015.unicef.org/stories/
[2] http://sowc2015.unicef.org/stories/young-inventors-urine-powered-generator/
[3] http://tech.ed.gov/futureready/
[4] http://sowc2015.unicef.org/stories/to-achieve-equity-in-educational-opportunity-get-the-policy-innovations-right/
[5] http://www.un-documents.net/a14r1386.htm
[6] http://shop.unicefusa.org/on/demandware.store/Sites-UNICEF-Site/default/Default-Start
Seeing as how we still don’t seem to feel that everyone has the right to some level of healthcare, it is not at all surprising that we still have some almost religious belief in the mythical quality of bootstraps (or “grit” as they like to call it nowadays) when it comes to education as well. I don’t care how wealthy someone is, those bootstraps belonged to a whole lot of people who, in one way or another, contributed to the success of the individual who ended up reaping the economic rewards. I don’t begrudge people their success, but I do resent their attempts to keep others from having an equitable chance at some measure of success. It is shortsighted as well as petty.
Googling around, I see Mississippi was the last state to enact compulsory education, in 1918. Those laws, started in MA in 1852, were about grammar school (I’m assuming thro 8th grade). So we can say, all US provided free pubsch thro 8th grade since 1918, & reqd all resident kids to attend. Since then & for a long long time, all US states have established free public schsys K12, & states long required kids to attend at least age 16 [more recently many (32) states have raised that to 17 or 18)]. As regards undocumented immigrants: to one degree or another, most states have found it sensible to include any resident child under the same laws.
So does that mean in US we have a “right” to [K12] education? We seem to view it a tad differently. Though our fed constitution is silent on the issue, our states uniformly view education as a requirement — to attend public school, provided by the state, until the age of 16/17.
The UK educator Robin Alexander says he worries that our constitution does not declare ed as a right, so it hinges on 10th Amendment/ state constitutions. That’s silly & disingenuous. Our states are in constant competition for residents/ business: states which lower their ed reqts walk a queasy line between attracting biz w/lower OH vs alienating co’s who want an educated labor pool [& whose incoming labor want decent ed for their kids].
Alexander has an intl agenda, namely, the UN Convention on the Rights of the Child– & the fact that we haven’t signed on. Why haven’t we? [Guessing it’s aboutTrump…]
I’m assuming that the GOP still would definitely not want to ratify something as wild as the “Rights of the Child”. Those brown kids are taking up valuable tax dollars that could be spent on the military or more tax cuts for the wealthy. Keeping children in jail, tents or cages should be considered criminal. Our priorities are in the sewer.
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The Convention on the Rights of the Child has been adopted by every country apart from Somalia, South Sudan and America. North Korea ratified the convention in 1990. [Ratification doesn’t mean it’s being followed.]
As of June 2018, the Trump administration has not ratified the convention.
The child-rights convention has never made it to a vote. Although Presidents Clinton and Obama supported ratification, opposition by Republicans in the Senate has made it clear that the treaty would not pass.
The U.S. is not officially a party to the UN Convention on the Rights of the Child. The U.S. signed the Convention, but it has never been ratified, so it is not part of U.S. law.
I imagine corporations would not want the US to support some of the statements. Most corporations do not support any notion of equity. Corporations support authoritarian corporate structure where CEOs are paid royally, but those that do the actual work are paid a lot less. Privatization, corporate driven education, supports individualism, not collectivism.
What would the implementation of a right to a free education look like? My view would be a public school system, solidly funded by a responsible state government and helped by a federal government that mitigated the migratory tendencies of an American workforce that concentrates dollars in a few places. It would feature strong investment in public library programs for adults and children, making the public library a sort of community center. It would promote healthy, public debate of ideas.