A long, long time ago I graduated from the University of Minnesota with a degree in education. After a couple of years working as a substitute teacher, I decided that at that stage of my young life I did not have the gifts necessary to do justice to the kids I was attempting to educate.

But over the years I have kept fairly close tabs on my former field. One of the many reform movements that moved across the educational horizon and caught my eye is something called the "Core Knowledge Curriculum" movement.

One of the "Frequently Asked Questions" on its web page is (naturally) what is the Core Knowledge Curriculum movement? The answer given is that it is "an educational reform based on the premise that a grade-by-grade core of common learning is necessary to ensure a sound and fair elementary education."

The creation of Professor E. D. Hirsch, Jr., the idea behind the Core Knowledge Curriculum movement is that "for the sake of academic excellence, greater fairness, and higher literacy, early schooling should provide a solid, specific, shared core curriculum in order to help children establish strong foundations of knowledge."

No doubt you have already anticipated where I am headed. Just as this particular system assembles a common ground of knowledge and skills as a foundation for further learning, pro-lifers have our own core knowledge curriculum that we build on and are attempting to share with the wider public.

We would argue, in the context of the abortion debate, that the common points of reference begin at the beginning. For example, it is difficult to imagine any more core of a course than the basics of human biology.

I am not trying to be factitious but when you read pro-abortionists, often they almost sound mystified as to how that unborn child got where she currently resides. In a word, they are not big on cause and effect.

The body of lasting knowledge--the kind that does not come in and out of fashion--has any number of components. I hope you will e-mail me with your suggestions.

In the interest of brevity, let me offer just one more. It was illustrated by what we learned yesterday of Cindy Barnes, mother of Eddie Barnes and wife of Simon Barnes. Eddie sounds like a heck of a kid who was born five years ago with Down's syndrome.

Like most parents nowadays, Cindy and Simon Barnes knew of this before their second son was born. As Simon Barnes wrote in the London Times November 13, "At the hospital, when they discovered on the scan that Down's syndrome was a possibility, they very kindly offered to kill him for us."

Had Barnes been married to someone other than Cindy, he wrote, "and had that woman preferred to go the way of amniocentesis and termination, I have no doubt that I would have gone along with that, too, and treated parents of Down's syndrome children with a lofty pity."

But "They needn't have bothered," Barnes added. "The idea of not caring for something in your care is an abomination to her. The idea of not caring for her own child was impossible to contemplate."

So, lesson two in our pro-life core knowledge curriculum is adults don't kill those in our care, we look after them. Why? Simply because (to quote Barnes), "There [is] a life that had to be cared for."

Just as justice for all students requires that all kids "have equal access to knowledge necessary for higher literacy and learning," so, too, justice for the unborn requires that we begin by teaching Pro-Life 1001.

If you have any questions or comments, please write Dave Andrusko at daveandrusko@hotmail.com.

Part Two