A Minnesota state legislator on the far right has demanded the abolition of a committee responsible for creating and funding programs that would allow children to access early childhood education.
Republican State Rep. Steve Drazkowski decried increases in publicly-funded early childhood educationWhile speaking on the floor of Minnesota House of Representatives this Week. His approach to child-rearing is short-sighted, as he didn’t appear to address in his comments how parents would manage to be able to raise their children without funding from the government, which provides a vastState funding for child care.
“We should get rid of the early childhood committee,” Drazkowski said while lamenting the funding increases during a debate on an omnibus spending bill. “We should let parents raise their kids until they’re five at least, before the government comes with a school bus, backs it up to the maternity ward room door and takes them to the government school.”
It’s unclear what the GOP lawmaker was referring to. There are programs in Minnesota. provide assistanceChildren can begin preschool and early learning programs as young as three years of age. However, Drazkowski’s statement mirrors language from other Republicans who have been attempting to defundPublic education.
Steve Drazkowski (R), a Minnesota state representative, supports early childhood education being abolished.
“We should allow parents the freedom to raise their children until they reach 5 years of age, at the very least, before government sends a bus to school and backs it up to a maternity ward door. Then government takes them to school.” pic.twitter.com/qV1abRUnaQ
— Heartland Signal (@HeartlandSignal) May 9, 2022
Twitter users were quick to point out that it would likely fall on women to take up the role as sole caregivers to children should Drazkowski’s radical idea be actually implemented, and that families with smaller incomes would be harmed the most by such a draconian policy.
“How long before women are banned from the workforce?” asked one user.
“Oh, so more women out of the workforce. This is the @GOP’s goal,” opined another user on the platform.
“This would hurt low income families the most,” yet another user pointed out.
Despite Drazkowski’s complaints about early education – and his errant belief that a “government school” is a corrupting influence on children – the benefits of early childhood education are widely acknowledged, even several years beyond when students take part in such learning. According to an analysis by Harvard in 2018For example, students who enrolled in pre-kindergarten classes had higher graduation rates than those who didn’t.
Drazkowski is no stranger in attacking public schools. He uses false claims often to justify his fury. Late last month, for example, Drazkowski was among a group of Republican lawmakers in the stateWho grabbed a fake news story about children in a Michigan school districtTheir request for litter boxes was approved because they were cats.
The story is false, but it was brought up by Republican state legislators during a debate in the Minnesota House about the treatment of transgender students at public schools. In the same debate, they made anti-trans statements and made hateful remarks. Drazkowski complained about being called cisgender – even though he is indeed cisgendered – and took callous pleasure in claiming that his gender identity was, in his words, “the way God designed you.”
