
PARSA MOTAHAR
TREASURER
PARSA MOTAHAR
TREASURER
Parsa Motahar is a sophomore at the UH Honors College. He is majoring in Nutrition with a minor in Chemistry. He plans to attend graduate school after obtaining his bachelor's degree. He enjoys being a Cougar Tutor because he believes it enhances students’ attitudes towards school. Outside of the organization, he enjoys skating, reading, and coding.
PARSA MOTAHAR
TREASURER
PARSA MOTAHAR
TREASURER
PARSA MOTAHAR
TREASURER
Parsa Motahar is a sophomore at the UH Honors College. He is majoring in Nutrition with a minor in Chemistry. He plans to attend graduate school after obtaining his bachelor's degree. He enjoys being a Cougar Tutor because he believes it enhances students’ attitudes towards school. Outside of the organization, he enjoys skating, reading, and coding.
PARSA MOTAHAR
TREASURER
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PROJECTS
The Need for a New Structure: Examples of Bold Policy Experimentation
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by Vishaal Kuruvanka
May 30th, 2022
“The learned say it [America] is a new creation and I believe them, not for their reasons, but because it is made on an improved plan. Europe is a first idea, a crude production, before the master knew his trade, or had made up his mind as to what he wanted.” - Thomas Jefferson
Almost every business leader, politician, academic and American agrees that education is key to unlocking the American potential. Leaders that grew up around the mid twentieth century said they were lucky to receive a robust public education in their youth (David Rubenstein, Warren Buffett, Tim Cook, etc.). But most agree that the current system is failing and is unable to meet the complex needs of the 21st century. This failing system has consequences for our society, the worst of which will contribute to our continued decline. If a student is lucky enough to be born in the right zip code, then they are given an opportunity for a robust education, while those opportunities seem to be inherently scarce for the poor. This downward-spiraling cycle exacerbates the divisions between the affluent and the impoverished until our society gives way to civil strife and war. To reverse this trend and create a true meritocracy, the opportunity for a strong education must be given to every single student in the United States.
While there is much money being pushed into the system through the federal government and philanthropic efforts (Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation, Ray Dalio, and countless others) these efforts can only scratch the surface of the problem but does not fix the already inefficient and ineffective system that has evolved over time. Interestingly, the US government asserts central control over issues pertaining to fiscal, monetary, military, trade, and other facets of our society while education, the essential bedrock of the American dream, is not.
Because we have already skimmed over the economic history from the beginning of the republic, it will be effective to explore examples of political experiments that went on inside the US beginning with the revolutionary war.
As the American revolution broke out, the continental congress was the primary means of government for the rag tag team of colonies. This congress came together and agreed upon the articles of confederation as the document to govern the new nation. After the American revolution ended, political and business leaders began to realize that the articles of confederation were unable to effectively govern the new country as it was a weak document that ceded too much authority, on financial matters, to the states. Shay’s rebellion was one of the fruits of this system of governing and sent shockwaves through the young country. Fearing another revolution, political leaders called another convention to fix existing problems with the articles. After four months of long deliberations and compromises of plans (Virginia and New Jersey), a new document emerged with the hope that vigorous and energetic central government could stem existing problems. Interestingly enough, while James Madison and Alexander Hamilton both believed that this document would effectively work, Washington and others worried that the young republic would not survive for another 20 years. This example is central to understanding how our country was built. Compromise and experimentation were wholly responsible for the formation of a document that still governs the country today. These leaders understood that if something was not working, then it was possible to examine the issue and design a solution to solve the problem. This ideal was also put into the constitution as it was realized that it was an imperfect document but could be amended, by the will of the people, to serve the needs of its people.
Nineteenth and Twenty Century
More than a century later, as financial panics increasingly wreaked havoc on the country’s financial infrastructure, congress looked to overhaul the monetary system. The federal reserve was put forward to centrally control monetary policy and to aid in times of financial crises. It continues to serve this purpose and has also evolved to keep a pulse on the economy. Through research, compromise and ingenuity, congress and President Wilson enacted a system that solved their monetary problems at the time. Similarly the change that occurred in the US government around the great depression offers a great example of bold experimentation with public policy. After a concerning stock market crash and rising unemployment levels, the American electorate began to become concerned with the state of affairs. FDR was elected to an momentous task of bringing the teetering American economy back to growing levels. His New Deal program came up with new, innovative ways of putting the American economy on track. At the time it was not known whether any of these programs would work, but FDR understood that unprecedented times require unprecedented action. Some of the measures that he took include strengthening banking legislation to make sure that the same crisis did not occur again, creating the national youth administration, civilian conservation corps, civil works administration and creating social security as we know today.
Through the aforementioned examples, we see that the American government has undergone a constant change, mostly through experimentation and public discourse. If a system did not work, the American electorate worked to either fix it or discard and form a new structure. In our case, we may not need to discard the entire system but structural changes must be made. In the late eighteenth century, education was believed not possible to disperse among a large population mainly due to resources and funding. But these limitations do not apply for the US in the twenty-first century. As those leaders came together to form a new governing document, new banking system and new social safety net programs, we too today must come together to devise a federal education strategy for the whole of the nation. It is in this sense that a reshuffling of the localized framework would be effective to draw a uniform strategy for our nation.
Thomas Jefferson was among those that believed that the smaller a government, the better the chances at preserving liberty. But is it not education that provides the greatest form of liberty for our countrymen and women? In this view, it is time to add a form of central control over the existing system to ensure the efficient education of our children.
Other Examples in US History
Founding fathers such as John Adams and Thomas Jefferson deeply understood the power of education and made monumental efforts to build into their respective states the right to an education. John Adams succeeded when writing the Massachusetts constitution and it is to no great surprise that we see Massachuseets at the top of the American education system. Jefferson was not so successful within his state during his time as a legislator but after his time as President, he established the University of Virginia to serve as a model for future educational pursuits in the new fledgling nation. John Quincy Adams’s ambitious legislative plan included forming a national university along with a naval academy, and a national astronomical observatory. John Kennedy worked to desegregate the school system in the south as he saw a morally failing and inefficient system. The ebb and flow of American education rarely comes to the forefront on its own but rather is looked to when other crises occur.
The education system, metaphorically speaking, serves as the nutrients and stem cells for our country to grow, and it is our surest way of increasing outcomes for all americans. The next essay will put forward a possible structure that could be used to govern education throughout the country.