The families of tens of thousands of students survive on incomes below the poverty level. Parents cannot afford to spend money on books and magazines. When public schools deprive children of libraries supervised by trained teachers, hundreds of thousands of children may never learn to read, write, or reason well enough to work for a living as adults. In the modern age of television and videos, reading books is going out of style for millions of American children. Unless the public schools are equipped with computers and trained librarians, New York City children will remain dumbed-down in ignorance.
Surveys show the American people vote education as their number one priority.
In New York, however, politicians have been attacking education. Tuition has been jacked up at CUNY and SUNY colleges while funding for lower early grade class size and universal pre-kindergarten has been cut. The lack of adequate library facilities is another example of the state s disinvestment in the city s public schools. Not only does the city receive thousands of dollars per student less than downstate suburban districts. We have a two-tiered educational system, one for New York City and the other for the rest of the state.