Milton Friedman makes several valid points in his breakdown of the role of the government in education. I especially liked the argument that competition would arise with an increase in attendance in private schools. The idea of competition is pivotal to success whether it be in business, on the playing fields, or in the classroom. Most people respond to challenges and elevate their efforts to embrace what lies ahead. We, as students, do this every day and every semester. We are able to assess our situation and increase our efforts to achieve a desired result. Whatever it takes, we do it. Why should teaching or education be any different?
Many public schools have the opportunity be great. There is no denying that but what determines their efforts-taxpayers, school boards, teachers, students? Some private schools, both parochial and non-subsidized schools, are able to offer more opportunities that impact the lives of their students than are publicly-supported schools. They can offer highly-competitive environments for their students to thrive in. With increased budgetary freedom, they can recruit and retain more dynamic teachers. They are more able to provide equal access to a challenging curriculum without the same bureaucratic emphasis present in the public schools. There are some school districts that are also able to provide some of these same opportunities but much of that depends on the budget. Richer districts offer more opportunities and many of the brighter students are still unable to participate in demanding programs because of class sizes or availability. In a monopolistic system, who challenges these public schools to improve?
What if you could challenge public schools to compete with private schools in providing the “best” education possible? Amazing teachers could be recruited based on their abilities and not necessarily their seniority. Schools would have to evaluate their current practices, opportunities, and processes. They would resort to make improvements in attracting some of the best and brightest students, teachers, and administrators. Oh, and the last thing, who would benefit from the increased efforts of the schools?
That’s right, the students. Students would benefit from the increased efforts at both public and private institutions. Maybe competition isn’t a bad idea?
1 comment:
Competition is not a bad idea to a certain extent, but I do not think there is a need for it between public and private schooling. People have an overall general opinion that private schools are better than public. At my last job, several customers had children who were in private schools in Charlotte, NC. I have also recently encountered parents from my hometown of Lancaster, SC who have children in private school. I like to provoke questions and answers. When doing so on this topic, I have only heard two arguments on why these parents sent their children to private school: 1) they have smaller classes 2) where applicable, religious studies are implemented into the curriculum. Obviously, the later argument cannot be placed in a public institution, but the first could be a start. The problem is now we have job and general funding cuts in education so smaller classes may also be hard to put into place. I just do not think that competition is the issue. It is more so that one type of school needs to adopt the strategies of the other. A quality education should be free and not have to require an individual to pay double (school tuition and general taxes) for their children to benefit from it.
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