ESTEEM exists to promote public awareness of significant educational issues of interest to concerned citizens of New York State.
We seek to work towards real improvements in the education of our children. Our goal is to work cooperatively within the system to promote an environment in which every student is encouraged to reach his/her full individual potential.
ESTEEM seek to encourage individuals to participate in the decision making process in an informed, productive manner.
Our aim is to assist in encouraging individuals to be aware of Educational issues in New York State by offering pertinent information and data. The New Compact For Learning in New York sets forth as a goal the participation of all shareholders in the educational decision making process. We believe shareholders need to be fully informed of all choices and implications in order for them to knowledgeably participate in the process.
ESTEEM desires to promote educational policy that protects the rights of individuals and families while continuously improving the educational process in the state.
We support meeting the need of truly "at risk" children through proven and non-coercive methods of assistance, provided the needs and rights of other children are not jeopardized. We also recognize the rights of the individual and the family to form, express and promote their own unique values and attitudes, according to personal convictions, informed by religion or conscience. The state should not promulgate a single set of values that purports to encompass appropriately all views found anywhere in our pluralistic society.
We further recognize the right of the family to remain free of government intrusion and usurpation of its family functions.
ESTEEM believes that the focus of public education should remain within academic parameters and not spread to social and/or psychological areas.
ESTEEM will support and promote the above principles actively in the legislature, at the State Education Department, and at the local level, and will oppose those elements of the Compact which do not hold to these principles.