Education in Chile and Dragon Ball

Post by **Víctor Paredes** » Sun Jul 17, 2011 7:57 pm

Hi, probably you don't know, but for many years the people of Chile have been asking for public free education.
Pinochet's dictatorship ended with free public education, made it a private market good and we are one of the countries with the most expensive education in the planet.
This year the students strikes have been huge and we are living a beautiful effervescence in the whole country. Many international mass media are looking at Chile, surprised of the bad quality and high price of our education. We have the worst educational system in latin america and many people from different countries is supporting this fight.

In México, the people who dubbed Dragon Ball to latin american spanish language have made a campaign to make a huge "Genki Dama" this tuesday supporting the free public education. It's awesome, because you can listen Gokú, Piccoro, Supreme Kai, Freezer and even the opening of Dragon Ball talking about this big change in Chile.
I know this videos won't be to you as emotive as to me, but imagine, it's the real Goku talking about public education in Chile!

Gokú:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=h_FuUMP6FLo

Supreme Kai
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Irgbb6XsydA

Piccoro
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=viq54oHdpzE

Freezer
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=irUlu1TtuWA

Dragon Ball Opening
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8XT6JenkwV4

dueyftw · Post by **dueyftw** » Sun Jul 17, 2011 10:44 pm

Hey, nothing is Free. I live in New York and pay school tax on my house. Don't have children and most likely never will.

In some southern states they have a lottery games where the people who are bad at math pay for the schools.

We have it here in NY but the profits go into a general fund and seem to disappear.

Also we have good school teachers and some who couldn't teach their way out of an open paper bag. Hard to find out who is bad and harder to get rid of them.

A good solution is to talk to others and push for a system that serves everyone that everyone pays for. The only people who benefit from uneducated is politicians.

Dale

GCharb · Post by **GCharb** » Mon Jul 18, 2011 12:45 am

I too have no children's and pay school taxes.

But it is those children's who will eventually be tomorrow's doctors, and so on and so forth.

So the education I am paying for today, is something that will, to a degree, benefit me one day!

Good thing selgin, always good to hear these news and I hope it brings good to your country somehow!

jahnocli · Post by **jahnocli** » Mon Jul 18, 2011 12:54 pm

We've had public education funded by taxes here for over a hundred years. It's a funny thing, but if something is perceived as 'free' then eventually people come to abuse it. Jobs in the public sector do not attract the best salaries, and this leads to parents treating teachers with disdain. Transfer this to pupils via legislation that protects them, and you have a situation where concerned parents are prepared to pay extra for their children's education because the state system is letting them down. So by a weird route we arrive more or less where you are, minus all the taxes for public education...!

So if you can get this going, that is great, but you will have to be vigilant to make sure that everybody does not get complacent and standards stsrt to drop.

dm · Post by dm » Tue Jul 19, 2011 6:05 pm

Interesting that there's mention of not having kids but still supporting the educational system. That's so 'now'.

Society paid taxes for my education. I see no reason not to pay taxes for education now. And, I do have a child, who is in a private school (who doesn't benefit directly from the educational taxes anyway).

If public education was profitable, it would be supported. Prisons are more profitable, so that's a good place to put the money. Society is generally short sighted, so investing in a better future for us all is a difficult concept.

I don't think the people in Chile think education is free. I think they just want it more widely available, without it being so elite (ie: costly to the people who can't afford it). Unfortunately, 'the people' aren't running things. The elite are. I guess the change comes when the elite are inconvenienced enough to 'do something' for 'the people'.

Actually, it's that way for everyone, isn't it? We're generally selfish and self-centered, doing what we think is best for ourselves-with little regard to the effect on the rest of the world. Generally. Not always.