4 ms·

Given the dismal record of the government in running schools and improving schools with poor records, the answer should be instead to privatize all the schools.

Given the dismal record of the government in running schools and improving schools with poor records, the answer should be instead to privatize all the schools. Most private schools have lower per pupil spending that government run schools.

megiddo 8y ago
No, no. Let's double down on the existing system. Also, we should eliminate fancy restaurants, because that's where rich people meet other rich people. And nice houses! Housing advantage is a clear indicator of classism. Now that I think of it, pretty much everyone in the US does better than rural Somalis. We should equalize the class divide by reducing the US standard of living until we're all equal.
- rhacker 8y ago
  Yeah, that's exactly what I was thinking everyone 1000 years from now, after we've decided how everyone should be will live in a 10x10x10 box with a screen that shows a beautiful mountain.
- acangiano 8y ago
  This is a great concept that will resonate with many young people. We could divide the resources equally among the population and no one would receive less than anybody else. I bet it will work out just fine and in no way lead to the death of millions of people.
- wwweston 8y ago
  If the point is that it'd be difficult and absurd to try and equalize all outcomes, that's reasonable enough. If the point is that any attempt to equalize an opportunities is conceptually the same, though, that's much less reasonable. Education is often one specific focus because it's in the overlap of (1) a common and early place where inequality of opportunity presents itself (2) early maximization of individual potential has potentially cascading effects (3) baseline tractable social projects (raising the ceiling on outcomes for everyone may be hard, but providing a reasonable floor more most is one thing it already does) (4) seems plausible that everyone benefits the more educated the population is (especially in a representative democracy). And while eliminating fancy restaurants may be absurd, if you're thinking about the question of when/why it might be important for poor people to meet rich people, then it may well be entirely worth trying to address that problem. To pick one issue near and dear to the heart of HN folks, access to capital is key for many entrepreneurial folks.
btilly 8y ago
Private schools also have the luxury of being able to reject expensive to teach students, and generally do. Of four children in my household, one costs over twice what any other does to teach. Guess which one stayed in public school?
- chillaxtian 8y ago
  Why do they cost twice as much to teach?
  - btilly 8y ago
    The expensive one is on an IEP because of ADHD. The school the others go to passed because they weren't set up to accommodate. Public schools, by law, have to accommodate.
- deleted 8y ago
  [deleted]
- tomohawk 8y ago
  Yes, that is a good point. However, to balance it out, private schools generally do not take on children with IEPs because it subjects them to all kinds of overbearing regulation from the government. They don't have much freedom in acting differently than what the bureaucrats want. So, it is unlikely your child would be allowed to get a better education at the private school, as it would be dictated by the same people running the government schools. Source: my mother had a career as a teacher of learning disabled children
  - btilly 8y ago
    Actually this year we're sending the last to http://cdc.uci.edu/ http://cdc.uci.edu/ specifically so that we can get his needs better looked to than the public school does. So yes, it is possible to find a private school. Even with an IEP. However it costs over twice as much as https://www.vandammeacademy.com/home https://www.vandammeacademy.com/home. And isn't as good academically.
wwweston 8y ago
Assuming your premise is correct (I don't know if it is or isn't), I'd guess that running a good private school is a pretty different prospect than successfully privatizing public education. Do private schools do better because The Problem With Education™ is essentially who is administering/teaching and private schools are more effective at that? Or do (some) private schools do better because they select a demographic of students (directly by admissions or indirectly via who applies for various reasons) that's effectively less expensive to bring to positive outcomes? From what I've heard about charters (which seems to be one good place to evaluate this) it seems that while some students who switch have better outcomes, as a whole, it's a wash at best, which suggests to me the problem is less a question of public vs private and more like student selection (maybe a question of scarcity of educator talent).
- tomohawk 8y ago
  If you think about it, all US universities are essentially competing with one another as charter schools. You have to wonder what would happen if college education was made mandatory and the Department of Education took over all of the universities and created a common university core curriculum.
  - wwweston 8y ago
    I'd be more interested in that question if: (a) I'd ever encountered a credible case that common core is a driver of educational problems (most of what I've encountered seems like both sensible pedagogy and a convenient ad hoc test for big 5 traits like modest-to-low openness and high orderliness). (b) It seemed likely to create a significant difference in the status quo. From my experience examining curriculum over half a dozen majors and universities, common baselines are already pretty, well, common, and where there's variation it's more about how much any institution exceeds the baseline. And I expect this is a function of the facts that the conception of the academy extends beyond individual institutions combined with the fact that there are already accrediting bodies that higher education has to reckon with. So, I don't see much that suggests public initiatives for baseline standards or accountability are likely key problems for secondary ed.
notacoward 8y ago
> the answer should be instead to privatize all the schools. Do you mean "privatize" in the honest sense that would leave many people with no school at all, or in the other sense that would privatize only the profits while the funding still comes from taxpayer dollars? Usually when I hear about "privatizing" schools people mean the latter, with a side effect of shedding regulation and liability as well. > Most private schools have lower per pupil spending that government run schools. Citation needed, particularly a citation that accounts for factors like cherry-picking students, relying on a large private endowment from a more exclusive era, or failing to meet various standards - e.g. certification, curriculum, health and safety - that are applied to public schools.

megiddo 8y ago

No, no. Let's double down on the existing system. Also, we should eliminate fancy restaurants, because that's where rich people meet other rich people. And nice houses! Housing advantage is a clear indicator of classism. Now that I think of it, pretty much everyone in the US does better than rural Somalis. We should equalize the class divide by reducing the US standard of living until we're all equal.

rhacker 8y ago
Yeah, that's exactly what I was thinking everyone 1000 years from now, after we've decided how everyone should be will live in a 10x10x10 box with a screen that shows a beautiful mountain.
acangiano 8y ago
This is a great concept that will resonate with many young people. We could divide the resources equally among the population and no one would receive less than anybody else. I bet it will work out just fine and in no way lead to the death of millions of people.
wwweston 8y ago
If the point is that it'd be difficult and absurd to try and equalize all outcomes, that's reasonable enough. If the point is that any attempt to equalize an opportunities is conceptually the same, though, that's much less reasonable. Education is often one specific focus because it's in the overlap of (1) a common and early place where inequality of opportunity presents itself (2) early maximization of individual potential has potentially cascading effects (3) baseline tractable social projects (raising the ceiling on outcomes for everyone may be hard, but providing a reasonable floor more most is one thing it already does) (4) seems plausible that everyone benefits the more educated the population is (especially in a representative democracy). And while eliminating fancy restaurants may be absurd, if you're thinking about the question of when/why it might be important for poor people to meet rich people, then it may well be entirely worth trying to address that problem. To pick one issue near and dear to the heart of HN folks, access to capital is key for many entrepreneurial folks.

btilly 8y ago

Private schools also have the luxury of being able to reject expensive to teach students, and generally do. Of four children in my household, one costs over twice what any other does to teach. Guess which one stayed in public school?

chillaxtian 8y ago
Why do they cost twice as much to teach?
- btilly 8y ago
  The expensive one is on an IEP because of ADHD. The school the others go to passed because they weren't set up to accommodate. Public schools, by law, have to accommodate.
deleted 8y ago
[deleted]
tomohawk 8y ago
Yes, that is a good point. However, to balance it out, private schools generally do not take on children with IEPs because it subjects them to all kinds of overbearing regulation from the government. They don't have much freedom in acting differently than what the bureaucrats want. So, it is unlikely your child would be allowed to get a better education at the private school, as it would be dictated by the same people running the government schools. Source: my mother had a career as a teacher of learning disabled children
- btilly 8y ago
  Actually this year we're sending the last to http://cdc.uci.edu/ http://cdc.uci.edu/ specifically so that we can get his needs better looked to than the public school does. So yes, it is possible to find a private school. Even with an IEP. However it costs over twice as much as https://www.vandammeacademy.com/home https://www.vandammeacademy.com/home. And isn't as good academically.

wwweston 8y ago

Assuming your premise is correct (I don't know if it is or isn't), I'd guess that running a good private school is a pretty different prospect than successfully privatizing public education. Do private schools do better because The Problem With Education™ is essentially who is administering/teaching and private schools are more effective at that? Or do (some) private schools do better because they select a demographic of students (directly by admissions or indirectly via who applies for various reasons) that's effectively less expensive to bring to positive outcomes? From what I've heard about charters (which seems to be one good place to evaluate this) it seems that while some students who switch have better outcomes, as a whole, it's a wash at best, which suggests to me the problem is less a question of public vs private and more like student selection (maybe a question of scarcity of educator talent).

tomohawk 8y ago
If you think about it, all US universities are essentially competing with one another as charter schools. You have to wonder what would happen if college education was made mandatory and the Department of Education took over all of the universities and created a common university core curriculum.
- wwweston 8y ago
  I'd be more interested in that question if: (a) I'd ever encountered a credible case that common core is a driver of educational problems (most of what I've encountered seems like both sensible pedagogy and a convenient ad hoc test for big 5 traits like modest-to-low openness and high orderliness). (b) It seemed likely to create a significant difference in the status quo. From my experience examining curriculum over half a dozen majors and universities, common baselines are already pretty, well, common, and where there's variation it's more about how much any institution exceeds the baseline. And I expect this is a function of the facts that the conception of the academy extends beyond individual institutions combined with the fact that there are already accrediting bodies that higher education has to reckon with. So, I don't see much that suggests public initiatives for baseline standards or accountability are likely key problems for secondary ed.

notacoward 8y ago

> the answer should be instead to privatize all the schools. Do you mean "privatize" in the honest sense that would leave many people with no school at all, or in the other sense that would privatize only the profits while the funding still comes from taxpayer dollars? Usually when I hear about "privatizing" schools people mean the latter, with a side effect of shedding regulation and liability as well. > Most private schools have lower per pupil spending that government run schools. Citation needed, particularly a citation that accounts for factors like cherry-picking students, relying on a large private endowment from a more exclusive era, or failing to meet various standards - e.g. certification, curriculum, health and safety - that are applied to public schools.