tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6534665086749553287.post5463702468773097581..comments2024-03-28T11:57:21.902-04:00Comments on CURMUDGUCATION: Why School Choice Is Not A ThingPeter Greenehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16511193640285760299noreply@blogger.comBlogger1125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6534665086749553287.post-43454593244498469662017-03-10T13:45:39.271-05:002017-03-10T13:45:39.271-05:00This "choice" rhetoric - it's a clas...This "choice" rhetoric - it's a classic bit of equivocation, isn't it? <br /><br />Rich people get to choose from the best alternatives. So when advocates say, "Don't you folks want choice?" it sounds like they're saying, "Don't you folks want the same options?"<br /><br />We will get the choice, perhaps (though not inevitably). But not the options. Cut-price private schools may flourish, but we know what they'll be like because we've been here before: the 19th century was full of half-assed amateur schools - Miss Plumpworthy's Academy For Young Gentlemen, kind of thing - some of which were probably OK, some awful, some downright evil, but none of whose graduates were ever accorded the status of graduates from Philips Exeter or Eton. <br /><br />I would have more use for vouchers if<br />(a) they represented something like the cost of a private school ($20-30k);<br />(b) the ed biz were regulated by district, so that a particular population (ESL, learning-disabled, etc.) couldn't be neglected; ALSO if the ed biz were regulated generally, so that the bar for operating a school was as high as (say) that of practice medicine, to screen out fraudsters and harmful amateurs;<br />(c) we could find some way to ensure that parents weren't just blowing off their kids' education, or making terrible choices, because lots of them would;<br />(d) Social welfare was a thing, so that teachers weren't held back by children not having shoes. Or breakfast.<br /><br />Come to think of it, it would probably be easier to just have a DECENT PUBLIC SCHOOL. Madeleinehttps://www.blogger.com/profile/16055922376249533020noreply@blogger.com