Recently, Ohio was chosen as one of the winners for the White House's "Race To The Top" contest that will award $4.35 billion to state schools to improve education. Nordonia Hills will receive over $173,000 of this federal grant.

Of course improving learning and helping failing schools is a good thing. Most who would only look at the surface story of such a grant would think it is a great benefit to cash-strapped schools. As with many federally funded programs, they come with a catchy title and a positive spin.

One only need apply common sense to realize that anytime 'free' money is given there must be strings attached. President Obama's RTTT is no exception.

The result of accepting RTTT funds is described by Prof. Allen Quist, Professor of Political Science at Bethany Lutheran College. He writes, "This [RTTT program] will create a de facto federal curriculum. The Department of Education will financially reward those states that teach what DOE wants [to be] taught."

Do you, as a citizen of Ohio, want the children of your state to be taught what the government that rules us in Washington, D.C. wants them to learn? Or would you rather have them learn what you as a parent, grandparent, employer or just plain concerned citizen of your own state want them to learn? Who should decide?

We should tell our school board to just say no! We didn't become dependent of federal money overnight and it will take quite a while to distance ourselves from these carrot-on-a-stick schemes.

The first step is getting our elected state officials to understand that they are trapped in an abusive relationship with the federal government. They have become dependent upon the fix that federal money provides for our state's budgetary problems. They must admit that they have a problem, stand up for us and just say NO!