Monday morning, my state and local government class opened with a group discussion of education policy.

While my classmates passionately debated issues of teacher pay and student achievement, my mind (naturally) wandered to John and Kate Gosselin, the divorced parents of “.Plus Eight” fame.

The Gosselins, who put their octuplets on reality television only to make a public spectacle of their deteriorating marriage represent, to me, the real problem behind the decline of the American education system: They’re not serious.

No parents who are sufficiently serious about their kids’ futures would ever expose them to the glare of national television, allow that glare to drive their family apart, and then sell themselves to the tabloid press.

And no country serious about its children would watch them do it. It’s plain that, at least in our state, government leaders aren’t serious enough about children, either.

In February, Gov. Pat Quinn issued an ultimatum to state legislators: Either approve an income tax increase with exemptions for the poor and middle-class, or cut $1.2 billion from education statewide. Moreover, in his state-of-the-state address, Quinn described his plans to become the “building governor” with road projects and a new high-speed rail.

Meanwhile, Republicans, led by Quinn’s opponent State Sen. Bill Brady, have dug in their heels against any tax increase, even though the state’s flat tax rate hasn’t changed in decades.

Both approaches are wrong.

As former Republican Gov. Jim Edgar noted last week, the state’s budget can’t be fixed without both cost cuts and higher taxes.

But neither state Republicans nor Democrats are serious enough to embrace that approach.

Instead, they seem to prefer budgetary gridlock and political fundamentalism.

As troubling as our politics and our culture are, we can’t lay all the problems of American children at the feet of celebrity wannabes and politicians. The fault, as Shakespeare noted, “lies not in our stars, but in ourselves.” Indeed, many of us here aren’t as serious as we should be about education.

Two weekends ago, I overheard another Eastern student complaining about student teaching in a small (though, to my experience, quite nice) central Illinois town.

“All of south Illinois is a sh**hole,” she said. “(The town) is a big sh**hole, the people are just stupid . kids all want to be farmers.”

She went on to illustrate the students’ idiocy by explaining that they didn’t know what a “graphic artist” is. To be honest, after four years of college, I don’t really know what a graphic artist is, either.

But it seemed to me that a woman who couldn’t see the value in her students or their community and gleefully both at length cannot possibly take her duty as a teacher seriously.

But there is hope.

Most of us who have made it to (or through) college have done so because someone took us seriously. That someone could have been a mother who helped us with algebra homework.

It could have been a neighbor who helped us practice piano. It could have been a basketball coach who taught us discipline. It could have been anyone who cared.

Whether a parent, a politician or a university student, we can all make a difference in kids’ lives and education.

We just have to take them seriously.

Joe Astrouski is a senior journalism major and can be reached at 581-7942 or [email protected].