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I won't answer for InformedConcent, but I've got two kids in high school, and a third who's K-ready in two years. So I've got cars in this race.
Then I'm sure you care very much about the issue...
It is important to note from InfromedConcent's lovely references.. that american students don't start off behind.. they fall behind...
4th grade performance is in the top tier internationally in both math and science..
and interestingly enough.. American students fall behind as they get older, and the social aspect of school becomes a bigger focus to them, and genuine discovering and learning attitudes fall by the wayside...
I certainly would not rule out problems at home either.. There's just so many factors that pay into it.
High school in american society is idolized and become a cultural experience mor than a learning experience..
I think it is middle school and high schools that are failing our kids... That is where I teach.. it saddens me.. and certainly is a wake up call for all of us...
That is why I am a strong advocate of parental involvement..
At the grade school level.. seems there is very active PTO's and parent's more than willing to get invovled.. but when their kids get older.. schools becomes a place they send them.. and you don't see as much parental interaction and involvement...
I agree with a lot of what you said, except for what is in bold above. Education IS a legal right for Special Ed students, but not for anyone else. Special Ed students are the only ones with a legal right to an education. Everyone else gets whatever the public school monopoly provides, which many sources expose as inferior to that of other countries, unless parents have the extra money to pay for private school.
Show me, please, where it's stated in the U.S. Constitution (specifically the Bill of Rights) that education is a right. Unless it's defined in the Constitution, then it isn't a right, and it beomes a privilege. There are many freedoms we have in this country which we take for granted as being "rights", when indeed many are not truly rights becuase they're not in the Constitution as such. Two such freedoms are procreation and operating a motor vehicle. Both are privileges ... not rights.
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Originally Posted by backfist
I won't answer for InformedConcent, but I've got two kids in high school, and a third who's K-ready in two years. So I've got cars in this race.
If you pay for their education entirely out of your own bank account, more power to you. However, sorry to break this to you, but if you are using public schools, then you are yet another sponger who is taking advantage of taxpayer money. One reason that this country has an enormous federal debt is all the entitlement programs. Public education is an entitlement program which is KILLING state budgets, and is a huge part of federal money as well.
I do agree with you, though, about how private schools shouldn't receive public funding. In reality, education should be like any other business: privately run, competitive, and profitable. If you read some of the statistics, you'll see that students who attend private schools generally perform better than their public school counterparts. The free market works in all aspects, including education. Don't knock it until you try it.
You speak the truth. It was in middle school and the first years of high school that our kids lost focus, and school became a means for a social life rather than a means for education where one occasionally socializes.
We live in a "nice" suburb, and the high school is regarded in the area as a "good" school. And although I'm not crazy about the notion of the school making the neighborhood, instead of vice versa, I can't fathom the idea of the government funding people's constant desire to flee. What I am OK with, is the ability to freely choose whatever public school a family desires. Yeah, that might mean that we can't control the admission of less-than-desirable kids, but it also gives parents and kids a true opportunity to pursue the education they value. But when we have mothers being arrested--yes, arrested and tried in court--for fibbing about their address in order to get their kids into a decent school, then we know that there's a problem. And if that can happen with public school--where there is public accountability--it would surely happen in the private sector, as there would be no public accountability at all.
I totally understand the argument of free market principles... but having millions of uneducated poverty stricken masses.. all around will become a greater burden on society in the long run...It is unfair to the child born into poverty to not have access to education because his/her parents can't or won't pay for their education in the free market..
Also, excluding students who can't perform or have special needs for the sake of having test scores that are the envy of the world is not a sound and proper approach to education... Our education system might be the beacon of innovation and results.. but our greater society will not be...
The ends don't justify the means here....
Show me, please, where it's stated in the U.S. Constitution (specifically the Bill of Rights) that education is a right. Unless it's defined in the Constitution, then it isn't a right, and it beomes a privilege. There are many freedoms we have in this country which we take for granted as being "rights", when indeed many are not truly rights becuase they're not in the Constitution as such. Two such freedoms are procreation and operating a motor vehicle. Both are privileges ... not rights.
If you pay for their education entirely out of your own bank account, more power to you. However, sorry to break this to you, but if you are using public schools, then you are yet another sponger who is taking advantage of taxpayer money. One reason that this country has an enormous federal debt is all the entitlement programs. Public education is an entitlement program which is KILLING state budgets, and is a huge part of federal money as well.
I do agree with you, though, about how private schools shouldn't receive public funding. In reality, education should be like any other business: privately run, competitive, and profitable. If you read some of the statistics, you'll see that students who attend private schools generally perform better than their public school counterparts. The free market works in all aspects, including education. Don't knock it until you try it.
No. Profit-driven education, where only those who can afford a quality education can get one, is the surest way to maintaining a permanent underclass of under-educated, under-achieving, and under-skilled people.
because public schools are all inclusive... and private schools can dictate who is accepted and who isn't...
What about selective enrollment public schools - Thomas Jefferson HS, Stuyvesant HS, etc.? They're public schools and they can dictate who they do and don't accept. Their students have less of a chance of being undereducated, but there are not enough schools like them to meet the need.
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Also, if the best private school is 40 miles out in suburbia.. and no way for a poor inner city child to get there.... there is a problem...
the private schools will create more homogeneous schools that reflect the area they are in...
There are inner city private schools thet perform well, and geographic homogeneity is already practiced by the public schools by definition of residential boundaries. If anything, private schools overlap residential boundaries, making for a LESS homogeneous population.
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There are programs where inner city kids are bussed out to suburban schools that are better performing... Put a private entity in charge of it all.. and you will certainly see such programs become non-existant.. Not necessarily because they want to keep anyone out.. but because of costs.. and then by default... the problems that do exist now.. will become exponentially worse..
Why would a private entity be put in charge of it all? I don't understand why the either/or mentality persists in this debate. Both public and private coexist; the family makes the choice from among the options.
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its more than apparent that you have an axe to grind with the public school system... My question for you is... do you have children? if so.. what are their ages? and what are the important issues that you care about for them specifically? Lets leave all the baggage out of this.. and talk about some substance.. rather than ideologies... I actually am curious about your personal situation regarding schools in america...
I consult in the post-secondary realm, frequently for several of the top universities in the U.S., so I see what the best of both public school and private school have to offer in the students they enroll. There's always been a noticeable difference between private school and public school grads (with the exception of the two public high schools I've noted above and the few others like them), but I became alarmed and involved when it became apparent that the gap was widening, significantly. As this is personal experience, and I'm not at liberty to share students' records, I can't support that with any evidence. You asked for a personal motive; you got one. Discard it at will.
I totally understand the argument of free market principles... but having millions of uneducated poverty stricken masses.. all around will become a greater burden on society in the long run...It is unfair to the child born into poverty to not have access to education because his/her parents can't or won't pay for their education in the free market..
Also, excluding students who can't perform or have special needs for the sake of having test scores that are the envy of the world is not a sound and proper approach to education... Our education system might be the beacon of innovation and results.. but our greater society will not be...
The ends don't justify the means here....
It seems like the people with the worst kinds of survival-of-the-richest, natural selection education ideas, are the ones with no kids in school.
No. Profit-driven education, where only those who can afford a quality education can get one, is the surest way to maintaining a permanent underclass of under-educated, under-achieving, and under-skilled people.
If I"m not mistaken.. Valley Native is just bitter because he has to pay property taxes that go to schools and doesn't have kids in school. I've gotten into this whole tiff with him on another board.
Only reason why he wan'ts privitized education is because he seems to think that it will benefit him in not having to pay taxes toward school
He doesn't value education, nor does he understand that the fact that we have education for all is one of the reasons why we are the country we are...
Third world countries don't have education for all.... only their most rich and elite.. that's why they are third world countries
His point about schools have NOTHING to do with children or the quality of education !!
My argument's not "blown", as you merely recited what I already said.
You said:
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Any neighborhood can become "coincidentally" homogenous if the people want it. And when the neighborhoods become "coincidentally" homogenous, so do the public schools. Now, if private citizens are funding this "coincidental" homogeneity, then so be it.
Private funding is not public funding.
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What you cannot refute is that ethnically/racially/economically homogenous schools who want to remain that way, have no business receiving public funds.
Actually, I agreed with that.
The economic segregation factor is reduced with school choice because the per student school funding follows the student, regardless of family income level.
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Not all private schools discriminate. But some do. And if that's what they want to do, that's their business. But they're not getting our tax dollars.
Again, I already said the same thing in a previous post.
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