Vouchers for Private Schools & Education.

From the Elections Thread. We were getting off topic.

We were discussing why Republicans and others feel a voucher system for private schools is better than public schools.

There are those who believe that our public education system is busted and instead of trying to fix it, that it should simply be scrapped entirely for vouchers for the (admittedly) stronger performing private schools.

However there are those who feel this would put many at a disadvantage as well. What if there are no private schools near by? Not to mention private schools are well...private industries and thus carry the faults of such a thing (being for profit first and foremost)

Personally I disagree. Schools should not be treated like businesses. Simple as that.

edited 19th Jan '12 9:46:01 PM by Thorn14

Approving this thread, but you might want to flesh out the OP a little more.

Alright. I'll give it a shot (I'm bad at this)

Copy/pasting my response in the elections thread. Also, I find the voucher thing to be insulting, a waste of time, and an inefficient way to allocate education funds.

I don't think schools should be forced to compete that way; this is not a luxury where we can just choose not to partake in it. Education is mandatory under current laws; therefore the government needs to make damn sure that each and every public school is fairly and equitably funded and its staff paid in such a manner that they don't have to go on food stamps. The schools must be repaired regularly to prevent building code violations, and students must have highly educated and competent teachers to teach them.

The government has a clear responsibility here, due to the laws it enforces, to make sure that all schools are fairly taken care of. None of this "if you fail a certain amount of students then you lose funding" shit, because that's an extremely unfair disservice to the students who made the effort and succeeded.

Private schools don't have those problems because parents pay out the nose to keep their kids away from the poor rabble. Parochial schools I think are still subject to governmental review, as I think most of those aren't truly private. Thus the same standards that apply to public schools apply to them.

Regarding your comment on private schools increasing the societal gap...

I do not believe that one should ever close a wealth gap simply by pulling down the people on top. The elite should be obligated to help the poor up, certainly, but they shouldn't be simply prohibited from helping themselves.

Thus, let the rich send their kids to private school so long as they're paying school tax.

edited 19th Jan '12 9:45:33 PM by Ramidel

But Ram, improving education by definition pulls everyone up. This isn't about bringing the top down, but improving the starting conditions on the bottom.

Right, we should be aiming for everyone to have a GOOD education. Not everyone to have a BAD education.

Other countries have amazing public school systems, why can't we?

My theory? Our society simply does not respect teachers.

At all.

edited 19th Jan '12 9:47:02 PM by Thorn14

That's wealth redistribution. This is education.

Schools competing for parents willing to send their students there are better than schools that do not compete and thus have license to do a lot of stupid things without consequence. I really don't see why this is an issue. As for the Taint of Money, public schoolteachers aren't volunteers. They work for a paycheck. Let them earn it.

What I was talking about, Ace, was Thorn's comment (sorry for the unclear comment) that allowing private schools lets the rich avoid the problems of public school, thus increasing the societal gap.

Anyway-

"Competition causes schools to have to improve or die!" is a problem because it makes a few fallacious assumptions.

First of all: It's entirely plausible that there school, in the short run, simply can't improve given the resources allocated to it. We're not operating in a scenario where the school automatically has the proper resources and they're just poorly funded-sometimes, we're dealing with a scenario wherein the situation is just shitty.

Secondly, the assumption is that the private schools actually foster adequate competition. However, because schools are fairly limited in number for a given area, the situation is like that of an oligopoly at best. So even if standard market forces did apply, Monopolistic Competition is the better model. Which basically says, yes, people will send their kids to the schools that best suit their preferences but in the process of doing so, each school obtains a certain amount of market power-artificially being able to raise prices.

Public schools can counteract this effect, but only if they're actually sufficiently funded as to stay in existence.

Finally, there's the issue that there's no reason why public funds should be used to fill the coffers of private institutions.

Schools aren't stores or gas stations or whatever.

They require teachers (who are becoming fewer and fewer) and staff and supplies and all sorts of things.

It is MUCH more different than businesses.

Also how do you grade "performance"?

Tests? No Child Left Behind has showed that makes schools just test drill grounds. Not actual education. It forces the schools to prioritize their own existence over teaching.

edited 19th Jan '12 9:49:04 PM by Thorn14

If it's chosen on a customer-by-customer basis, it beats all hell out of a straight-up bailout. There is market sensitivity involved.

Yes, tests. Short-answer tests, though, so there's no time wasted on radio-bubble and six-trait voodoo - teachers actually have to teach the material. "During what years did the Civil War take place?", as an example. Then you track each student's performance on an individual basis, so you can pick out the good teachers, the bad teachers, and the teachers who cheat the tests.

edited 19th Jan '12 9:53:19 PM by DomaDoma

The consequence is low test scores, and reduced federal funding. All of these public schools can't be intentionally shirking off and gleefully taking the taxpayers' money.

Our society doesn't respect teachers because politicians have successfully made education useless in the larger world. In any case, competition in schools just leads to teaching to the test, which my mom, who actually does teach, has pointed out is completely useless as an educational standard. (And makes her field, art, incredibly difficult to deal with

Again, this is a public service people aren't allowed to opt out of; their children have to be educated in some manner. Thus, the government has a responsibility to see to it that all public schools are as good as they can possibly be. Let the private schools compete; the public schools need to be fairly funded so those students don't get fucked up the ass.

If we had free teleportation and parents could go "Oh this school is much better lets go there 'zap'" maybe.

But schools are chosen by their location. And many parents cannot drive their students to class if they have to go a distance for work. And buses aren't certainly going to go past a certain distance.

Test scores are a TERRIBLE TERRIBLE indication of how well a school is doing. And guess what happens when they get lower funding? THEY FUCKING DO WORSE. Did our politicians expect them to buck up and just go "Welp we cant afford books anymore so lets just try our best to learn through the magic of cultural osmosis!"

Its like having a car and going "Well clearly this car is not performing well, so lets lower its horsepower and gas per mileage. That'll improve it." Or every time a football team loses a game every player gets hit in the kneecap with increasingly larger and larger mallets.

edited 19th Jan '12 9:54:32 PM by Thorn14

Nope. It's "clearly this car is not performing well. Let me go back to the lot and use the same money I would use to buy this car to buy a better car instead."

NCLB is pretty much your analogy, though. As I say, half-measures blow.

edited 19th Jan '12 9:55:20 PM by DomaDoma

Except you can't do that.

For many many areas there is only one school people can go to because of how close they are.

We aren't exactly swimming in schools you know.

edited 19th Jan '12 9:55:32 PM by Thorn14

If private school money isn't layered on top of pre-existing tax dollars, that's a much broader customer base for private schools. But yeah, the boonies aren't going to gain population. Vouchers are just one means to the end of getting a decent curriculum, though, and one that works in crowded areas without much affecting the isolated ones.

edited 19th Jan '12 9:58:12 PM by DomaDoma

What are we supposed to buy? I often see the teachers blamed, but they're often dealing with issues beyond their capacity to handle. (As my statistics teacher observed, "Half of my students have probation officers!")

Edit: As for going to a better school, can the big, fancy schools really fit all those students? It seems more effective in terms of space to find ways to make the schools that currently aren't fancy be as good as the schools that currently are.

edited 19th Jan '12 9:58:18 PM by feotakahari

Because schools aren't a fucking Burger King.

They require large building zones, teachers (who are hard to come by now), proper zoning (close to students), electricity, water, all the things needed to make new major buildings.

And if you make too many then the schools would be underpopulated by students and thus not make money.

Education isn't some metric that works as "works or doesn't work". Look at detroit public schools. My dad taught there, and thank god for onlya short time because he'd probably be dead by now otherwise (was almost killed once in an elementary school parking lot).

There are MANY factors that lead to success or failure of a school.

edited 19th Jan '12 9:58:11 PM by Thorn14

Education is not a car, Doma. It is not an optional private business. It is something that most people couldn't afford if the government didn't provide for it through taxes. Part of fixing it is making it so that the poor areas are funded just as well as the rich areas. Because it's the poor areas that suffer more from poor funding. And they don't suffer from lack of effort on the part of teachers.

We cannot treat a mandatory thing like a private business. For some kids, shutting down a school means that they quite literally have no places else to go.

On that note, do you know why teachers are hard to come by? because teaching is a lot of pain with very little gain. Paid shit, long hours, constant stress, and nowadays absolutely no gratitude whatsoever.

Exactly. Its like I said earlier, our society HATES teachers. So why would anyone want to be one?

I belive Norway (or somewhere near it) has 3 fucking teachers for every class room. 2 main teachers and 1 to help out students who are struggling.

And society places them on the top of the societal pedestal.

Despite all those mill levies. Because there is no incentive to allocate funds to the proper place.

A librarian I know says not many people want to become teachers because "the Ministry is interfering a bit much at Hogwarts these days". Those pap math textbooks I mentioned in the other thread would be one example, but I admit I've been out of the loop for a while, so I don't know quite how smothering it's gotten.

edited 19th Jan '12 10:01:22 PM by DomaDoma