The U.S. Federal Government Should Abolish the Department of Education

I would like to point out that my opponent has addressed me as a man. I'm actually a woman. So there just needs to be some pronouns changed in the next round and everything will be alright. I will now go down the list in supporting my rebuttals. To start off, there's the issue of responsibility. The actual argument was that schools didn't have a choice, however, my opponent never said how this was a bad thing. There are a lot of schools that would make some extremely poor choices concerning curriculum if the federal government allowed them to. The Department of Education requiring schools to act in accordance with a national standard is not a bad thing, and I can just say that without evidence, because my opponent has not provided any evidence otherwise. We are both making assertions, and as long as he has the burden of proof, I have no obligation to back up a statement that counters a statement he didn't back up. My second point is regarding the 1.4 million dollars. My opponent has essentially provided a logical syllogism as follows:P1: The Department of Education has spent 1.4 million dollars to attempt to reach its goal. P2: The Department of Education has not reached its goal. C: The Department of Education has wasted 1.4 million dollars. One can accept point one and point two without accepting the conclusion. My opponent has not provided a spending plan of any sort, nor have any alternative causes been considered. I have a couple subpoints in this point of rebuttal to go over. The first is that not all 1.4 million dollars have been wasted by necessity. While the Department of Education may not have had as great of an affect as it would've liked, that does not mean that every dollar spent was ineffective. In fact, it could've wasted 5,000 dollars out of the whole program. That would still be a logical conclusion in the syllogism adding a point 3 stating that all but 5,000 dollars went to waste in the program. Therfore, the harm is not significant. I would also like to point out that my opponent has not addressed the fact that the states will also need some sort of similar funding overall, thus the drain of 1.4 million dollars would still be in effect. The second point is that the failure to meet a standard is not the department's fault by necessecity. Keep in mind that the department does not actually teach children. The teachers at schools teach children. If the children aren't learning, then perhaps a majority of teachers aren't doing an ample job. It is also possible that a majority of students are lazy and prefer to party instead of do their homework. There are two other very plausible factors that count into the failure of the Department of Education to meet a standard that do not have to do with the department. Onto the third point. My opponent essentially says that reform won't work because it hasn't in the past. This isn't a strong argument at all. There are plenty of things that people tried to do in the past, and the goal was completed later because someone learned from the mistakes of the past. Past failures do not bar future success. If anything, they ought to aid it. Regarding the Constitutionality, I will admit that I forgot to bring that up. I feel the solution, however, is very simple. Under my side of the resolution it is possible to make an amendment to change the way the nation works. Now, it may be said that amendments really shouldn't be made just to change the Constitution to be how the current politicians want it to be. However, the part of the constitution that my opponent is talking about is an amendment, and it was made because the politicians at the time wanted that to be the way the Constitution was. However, America was very different back then, and our Founding Fathers weren't perfect by any means.