Our Kids Deserve a Free-Range Country
Sen. Mike Lee's addition to the Every Child Achieves Act is a start.
As I reported last week, Sen. Mike Lee (R-Utah) worked to ensure that a Free-Range Kids section made it into the Senate's final version of the Every Child Achieves Act—an important bill that would tweak major federal education laws. Thanks to Lee, the bill would also provide legal cover for kids who walk to school.
In a recent piece for Politico, I explain why it's so important for kids to have the freedom to explore the outside world (just like their parents did when they were kids):
Can you imagine a country full of people who have been listening to Mozart since they were in the womb, but have no idea how to organize a neighborhood ballgame? My friend was recently telling a high school-age cousin about how he used to play pick-up basketball in the park, and the cousin couldn't understand how this was possible without supervision. "What happened if someone decided to cheat and fouled all the time?" the kid asked. "We just wouldn't play with him anymore," my friend replied. Said the cousin: "That's exclusion!" and that, he added, was a "form of" bullying.
Agghh! We are crippling kids by convincing them they can't solve any issues on their own. And as depressing as all this is, now there's another barrier to free play: The government.
Read the full thing here.