How much less can we do?

“There is enormous room for improvement in our educational system. Hardly any activity in the United States is more backward. We essentially teach children in the same way that we did 200 years ago: one teacher in front of a bunch of kids in a closed room…I believe that the only way to make [this] improvement is through privatization to the point at which a substantial fraction of educational services is rendered to individuals by private enterprises. Nothing else will destroy or even substantially weaken the power of the current educational establishment – a necessary condition for radical improvement in our educational system. And nothing else will provide public schools with the competition that will force them to improve in order to hold clientele.”
Milton Friedman

Because it is not enough that our children can say their ABCs or even that they know the correct placement of the semicolon, a permanent revolution in our educational system is desperately needed. In past presidential administrations higher standards, tougher testing processes, and budget increases have been implemented to combat the repeating failures of the current public schools. But these efforts – however well-intentioned – are too lean in their scope. With the Bush administration’s “No Child Left Behind” policy regarding education and opportunity which specifically focuses on the nation’s children and renders stricter enforcement of current regulations as well as tougher standards, it seems that we are taking steps in the right direction but it is not enough. All of these tactics have been tried over and over, year after year, across party lines and always with the same result: instead of seeing more children pass tougher tests, we see tougher tests implemented that only result in across-the-board increases in failure rates. Furthermore, the budget allowance increases allotted have, for the most part, been floundered in astronomically rising administrative costs. In addition, the moneys that actually have reached the classroom are disproportionately distributed. And success, it seems, follows money.

The only solution that would provide a comprehensive enough overhaul is that of privatization. There is a stigma that has come to be associated with “private” schools; it stems from a history of elitist, faith-based school that are racially disproportionate and admission to which is unobtainable by 95% of the general population. These schools, while generally providing a better education than their public counterparts, do not accurately represent the private school systems proposed herein.

The process of privatization is achieved by merging the all-inclusive aspect of government with the cost-effective, goal-orientated tactics of big business. Simply, the management of schools is passed over to private companies that handle all administrative functions as well as the distribution of funds.

The funding would essentially remain the same with the majority of all moneys coming from the government and originating from taxes delegated for education. The pre-set standards currently in place would remain and the only role of the government would be that of a kind of inspector to ensure that requirements were being met. In theory, it would operate much the same as a restaurant with regular health code inspections.

This, however, is the desired end result. The most feasible way to realize these goals is to first propose an appropriate and effective voucher system which would allow parents to choose the education they deem best for their children. This theory originated out the neoconservative movement of the 1950s led by Milton Friedman, a Nobel Prize-winning economist. His proposal stipulated that the government would give money in the form of a voucher to families opting not to send their children to public school to help defer the costs of private education. While there are many points of opposition to this theory the most widely voiced submits that the vouchers given would not be enough to fully pay for the majority of private schools’ tuition, thereby further widening the socioeconomic stratification already present. Though many attempts have been made to enact an educational voucher system, they have all been, for the most part, unsuccessful do to extensive disapproval by various teachers’ unions and the American Federation of Teachers which holds significant political power.

The only other viable next step to privatization, and one that has been put to test in school districts in several states, is the implementation of charter school systems. Charter schools are the most widely accepted form of privatization because they accept all students without entrance exams or tuition costs. Charter schools, in theory, are run by private, either for-profit or not-for-profit educational management organizations (EMOs) that aim to reduce administrative costs of currently publicly run schools in order to generate revenue. However, the largest for-profit EMO Edison Schools Inc., has yet to actually turn a profit. The first large scale trial of the charter system began in November of 2001 in Philadelphia when Edison Schools Inc. took over the management of two-thirds of the district’s 264 schools. Though the results of this trial are, to date, largely inconclusive and opponents criticize Edison’s methods and testing procedures.

The emergence of EMOs has raised several valid questions. One such question, and perhaps the most widely asked, is whether taxpayers’ dollars should be used to generate a profit for private shareholders. This is easily put to rest if thought out carefully: If a for-profit EMO is able to generate revenues’ using taxpayers’ money, then clearly they have executed their objective – they have increased efficiency enough to lower costs thereby creating a profit for themselves.

Regardless of the apprehensiveness of the opponents of any for-profit company dipping their fingers into education, the fact remains that through competition the companies would be required to lower costs and maximize efficiency or be put out of business. This competition would necessarily benefit the consumers who in this case are the students and their families.