Hello -
Is there truly going to be 'No child left behind'? I believe that many of America's children have already been left behind, at home alone, to raise themselves on a thin and cruel diet of junk food, gangster rap, and trash television. How can they come to school ready to learn? Our nation's parents have been hit with a double whammy. Just as society calls for parents to spend more time with their children, the decline in living standards has forced greater time participation in the work force by female spouses to make ends meet. Everyone agrees that parents have to become more involved in promoting change within their local school system.
Genuine education reform in this country cannot take place without involved parents. If we fail to make systematic efforts to engage parents to support public schools, we are clearly fighting an uphill battle with some very unpleasant long-term consequences for this nation. Project Appleseed needs your help, right now, to improve our schools. We are organizing America's parents to stand-up for public schools. I am asking you to back this campaign by contributing to Project Appleseed's non-profit movement to raise $500,000 this year.
No matter where you live in America--suburban, rural or urban school community--I think we can all agree on the need to improve America's public schools. But spending for education currently makes up only 1.5 percent of the two trillion dollar federal budget. The $22.5 billion for education in the federal budget is small when you consider that we are spending $120 billion to rebuild Iraq.
Minus essential funding, how can we require schools in need of improvement to provide extra tutoring, school transfer options or reconstitution? These remedies assume the problem resides in the school, not at home. The parents who are actively involved in their child's education know whether their kids are being left behind. These parents aren't waiting for a signal from the U.S. Department of Education.
Leave No Parent Behind. Project Appleseed is focused on improving parental involvement and increased education funding in each state. Project Appleseed builds consciousness and support to renew local public schools by:
Mobilizing five million parents to volunteer 10 hours each in individual schools by taking our learning compact --the Parental Involvement Pledge. This substantial effort will raise student achievement by contributing over 50,000,000 hours of valuable parental involvement, with a teacher pay value of $1 billion.
- Continue to encourage big and small businesses to let parents volunteer in schools on company time.
- Utilizing the Internet and news media to demand that Washington and the state legislatures back parents in their quest to increase funding for No Child Left Behind and local school districts.
- Establishing a national Political Action Committee for our members called American Parents PAC. Our purpose is to raise funds and elect pro-parent and pro-public education political candidates--regardless of political party.
As a leader in the parental involvement movement in America, and the parent of four public school children, I invite you to join our campaign and make a tax deductible gift through an online donation of $50.00 or more. You have made public education a priority in your life, now let's spread the seeds of school improvement all over your community and across America. Don't stand on the sidelines for this one -- we need everyone's help.
Very truly yours,
Kevin Walker President & National Director Project Appleseed The National Campaign for Public School Improvement www.projectappleseed.org
P.S. Contributions can mailed directly to our national office: Project Appleseed / 520 Midland Blvd. / St. Louis, MO, 63130-4506. Be sure to pass this e-mail on to a friend and keep up with our progress at www.projectappleseed.org!
