It's Time to End Public School
"Free" government provided education is one of the most sacred cows of today's society. The notion of ending it is so radical that few can even analyze the issue rationally.
According to the popular mythos, Public Schools are absolutely essential to modern industrial society. Without them, we would be little more than illiterate peasants. A handful of rich children would receive a good education, and no one else could compete against them.
So, why am I opposed to the whole notion?
There is a laundry list of reasons. First, I will discuss the practical reasons why public education is grossly sub-optima, afterwards I will discuss why it is morally revolting.
Let's look at the teaching efficacy of public vs. private school with a particular focus on results compared to costs. The National Center for Education Statistics reveals, "In grades 4 and 8 for both reading and mathematics, students in private schools achieved at higher levels than students in public schools. The average difference in school means ranged from almost 8 points for grade 4 mathematics, to about 18 points for grade 8 reading."
The Council for American Private education published a report showing the myriad number of ways that private schools outperform public ones. Their study shows private schools consistently outperforming the "free" public alternative by double digit percentages.
Time magazine reports, "While controlling for SES eliminated most public school/private-school differences in achievement test scores, it did not eliminate differences in the most widely used test of developed abilities, the SAT." Time goes on to add, "Combined with high-school grades, SAT scores are the best predictor of how kids will do in their freshman year of college. And the data in the new study shows that private-school students outperform public-school students on the SAT."
This chart, prepared by CollegeBoard.com, shows that non-religious private school students beat government run schools by 12%. Even religious schools (who public school advocates claim are all backwards institutions that do little other than teach opposition to evolution between Christian apologetics classes) manage to beat public schools by 6.5%
12% is a pretty substantial difference in my opinion. Nonetheless, the statistics are biased against the private schools. Take the Dallas school district as an example. The most current figures show that an incredible 59% of students drop out before graduating. A large portion of them (and they are presumably the weaker students) never take the SAT because they drop out before it is given, and are certainly not trying to get into college.
It's not hard to see the effect this has on the statistics. The national statistics are better, but still scary. Nationwide 1 in 4 Freshmen never graduate. Of course, those are the official government figures. The Manhattan Institute's estimates are somewhat lower. Effectively the SAT figures are more or less comparing the top 70% of public school students with a much broader portion of private school students who are far more likely to reach graduation and complete the SATs.
The analysis needs to go deeper, because I can already hear the objections. Private schools are just for rich kids! Poor parents could never send their children to a private school! Well, let's look at how much private schools cost. Private High Schools cost an average of $10,549 annually. In contrast, public schools reportedly spend $11,000/student annually. I'm skeptical of that figure, because I'm skeptical of most government accounting, but I'll take it at face value for the purpose of this article.
What we see when all is said and done (even ignoring the bias against private schools caused by high dropout rates) is that private non-religious education is 12% more effective and 4% cheaper. Even before I consider arguments about the morality of being forced to pay for other parent's to educate their children, we can see that eliminating public education, and providing school vouchers would be a more practical choice. It plainly would raise our educational performance and cut costs at the same time.
It's a no brainer.
Now, let's look at the morality of the situation. It's plainly not just to tax people, and then spend the money on public education. We factually know that private educators do a better job for less money. At a minimum, we should strive to use tax dollars as efficiently as possible. That means eliminating government owned schools and using school vouchers.
However, this situation is better but still unjust. Fundamentally, rational morality depends on people using persuasion instead of force on others. If we accept the idea that force is a proper way to handle disagreement (between people who haven't violated the rights of others) tyranny results by definition. Such a society is one where might makes right, and where the ruling class (whether it be a single dictator or a democratic majority of 51%) can abuse unpopular minorities at whim is absolutely evil.
When viewed through this lens, we are forced to conclude that the involuntary taking of money from one man to pay for the choices of another is flatly immoral. having children is a choice. Simply choosing to have children in no way obligates that others pay for them. As Ayn Rand eloquently said, "Poverty is not a mortgage on the labor of others - misfortune is not a mortgage on achievement - failure is not a mortgage on success - suffering is not a claim check, and its relief is not the goal of existence - man is not a sacrificial animal on anyone's altar nor for anyone's cause"
You can argue that is in the common interest (whatever that means) that we pay for the education of all of our nation's children. That would be a great argument for a charity to make. It's an utterly vile one for a government to make. Such a statement necessarily means you want to send armed thieves to the houses of innocent people to steal their money. No end, no matter how allegedly noble, can justify that mean. Civil society depends on persuading others that you are right, not sending armed troops to those that disagree with you.
Rational Public Radio is an Objectivist podcast and blog, a.k.a., the rallying center for reasoned warriors in the fight to gain and keep individual freedom.
Comments
Regarding this neologism, I note that in order to achieve equality resources are transferred disproportionat ely to the disabled and unable as an end itself without regard to actual education outcomes.
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