History of private education

[SPC]

Sometimes I think what libertarians want is a world of 6,000,000,000+ nations, which would be hell imo.

More or less, yes, or at least the radical anarcho-capitalists such as myself. However, we believe that law enforcement should be traded on the free market, along with everything else. All contracts would be voluntary in the society I advocate.

So, in other words, there wouldn't be any law enforcement. Or, at least, there would be no laws, although I imagine there'd be plenty of enforcement.

No, law enforcement would be done by private defense agencies. Laws would basically be that you could not endanger anyone else's life, liberty, or property.

[minionofmidas]

1. Schooling expenditure in Britain represented about the same fraction of national income prior to government intervention and compulsory schooling laws as it did after both were introduced.

It doesn't exactly take a lot of expertise to notice how weasel-worded and misleading this statement is - notice that it refers to two wholly separate points in time, 1833 and 1890. Btw, knowing what I know about the development of the British school system, I have not a flicker of doubt that the statement is *true*.

You must be logged in to read this quote.

So it's ok to have gone to school for just two or three years? This is supposed to demonstrate what, exactly?

A particularly striking example of this fallacy was an unfavorable comparison of the British private system to the Prussian state system, made by the Manchester Statistical Society in 1834. The authors assumed that British students attended school for ten years, used that assumption to calculate that just under two thirds of the children in Manchester attended school, and contrasted that to the (claimed) hundred percent attendance rate of the Prussian system. The Prussian system, however, provided for only seven years of schooling-so even if the claim that every child got the full seven years was true [/quote]Whaddaya mean "even if"? The plebes attended school for seven years - really did. This is easily demonstrable. The ruling class for much longer. The average, of course, was then well over seven years.

You must be logged in to read this quote.

So people are sufficiently educated when they are literate?
Indian government agencies have been making the same argument for a while, btw.

You must be logged in to read this quote.

True at least from the 1920s on. And rightly so. Good private schools survived, bad ones went out of business - especially when the government schools started providing a path to the universities, and especially from after 1945 when people's knowledge at school-leaving age was compulsorily tested by comparable yardsticks. What had been evident to experts for 20 years - that the cheaper class of private schools, attended by the upper lower middle classes, charged for  noticeably worse service than the working class and lower lower middle classes got for free from the state.

[Ban my account ffs!]

I guess the main question is this:

If private schools are so much better than public schools, then why haven't they supplanted public schools?

I mean, when you have a public school system, of course they will garner the most students, but why hasn't the proportion of private school students increased as public schools have allegedly been in decline, quality-wise?

The Catholic and other private schools in my area had an enrollment of 400 in 1985 compared to a public school enrollment of 4600.  By 1997, public enrollment had increased to 5700 but private enrollment stood at 360.  Currently public enrollment is at 5100 but private enrollment has fallen to 320.

The number of children that live in our district but attend neighboring public districts is about 600.  District residents attending public schools is higher today than it has been since the 1960s.

Why?

The private schools do tend to have better test scores.  But you can't compare because the private school population is not representative of the population as a whole.

By and large, people simply cannot afford private school.  Reducing taxes and doing away with public schools would not save people here enough money to warrant sending children to schools of equal quality.

Quality would decline as teacher salaries and subsidization from richer areas in the state went away.  My district already pays higher school property taxes than many areas of the state to maintain like school facilities and that includes quite a bit of "equalization" funding.

You would see good teachers flock to the suburban schools.  This already happens with the public system and pay is more equal.

Eventually, the disparity between rural and suburban schools would grow even larger.  Rural students would be stuck in rural areas because suburban jobs would be out of reach, and you would have a permanently stratified society except in rare cases.

The public school system is in place not to provide the most efficient education to students, but to provide a uniform, quality education, to all students funded by the public at large.

This way, a student in rural North Dakota can expect a quality education just as his counterpart in suburban Minneapolis can.  That way, the student is prepared to compete for good jobs in prosperous areas rather than being stuck where he is without the opportunity to succeed.

When you open a market on a street, you don't say "oh, you're old.. you go sell your stuff with the old people... oh, you're brown.. you go sell your wares with the other brown people... oh, you're stupid.. go sell your products with the other dumbs."

You want everybody, young, old, black, white to have the same ground to spring from.  Then, whoever is truly brilliant is rewarded.

[Gustaf]

I guess the main question is this:

If private schools are so much better than public schools, then why haven't they supplanted public schools?

I mean, when you have a public school system, of course they will garner the most students, but why hasn't the proportion of private school students increased as public schools have allegedly been in decline, quality-wise?

The Catholic and other private schools in my area had an enrollment of 400 in 1985 compared to a public school enrollment of 4600.  By 1997, public enrollment had increased to 5700 but private enrollment stood at 360.  Currently public enrollment is at 5100 but private enrollment has fallen to 320.

The number of children that live in our district but attend neighboring public districts is about 600.  District residents attending public schools is higher today than it has been since the 1960s.

Why?

The private schools do tend to have better test scores.  But you can't compare because the private school population is not representative of the population as a whole.

By and large, people simply cannot afford private school.  Reducing taxes and doing away with public schools would not save people here enough money to warrant sending children to schools of equal quality.

Quality would decline as teacher salaries and subsidization from richer areas in the state went away.  My district already pays higher school property taxes than many areas of the state to maintain like school facilities and that includes quite a bit of "equalization" funding.

You would see good teachers flock to the suburban schools.  This already happens with the public system and pay is more equal.

Eventually, the disparity between rural and suburban schools would grow even larger.  Rural students would be stuck in rural areas because suburban jobs would be out of reach, and you would have a permanently stratified society except in rare cases.

The public school system is in place not to provide the most efficient education to students, but to provide a uniform, quality education, to all students funded by the public at large.

This way, a student in rural North Dakota can expect a quality education just as his counterpart in suburban Minneapolis can.  That way, the student is prepared to compete for good jobs in prosperous areas rather than being stuck where he is without the opportunity to succeed.

When you open a market on a street, you don't say "oh, you're old.. you go sell your stuff with the old people... oh, you're brown.. you go sell your wares with the other brown people... oh, you're stupid.. go sell your products with the other dumbs."

You want everybody, young, old, black, white to have the same ground to spring from.  Then, whoever is truly brilliant is rewarded.

Values aside, this seems largely accurate. I think you're over-looking one crucial point, however, and that is the value of competition. Competition tends to have a positive effect on overall quality through simple market mechanisms. That is why I like the voucher system. It retains all the positive effects of equal opportunity that you're talking about (and in fact I think it can enhance those effects) while at the same time benefiting from the competitive element.

[dead0man]

Competition tends to have a positive effect on overall quality through simple market mechanisms.

beautiful

[Storebought]

I think it makes little sense to blame the presence of private or parochial schools for the educational differences seen among public school districts, since the parents of private school students (many of whom are public school teachers -- why is that?) pay property taxes for public school upkeep even when their child doesn't attend them.

Not to mention, even at the outrageous prices private schools demand for tuition (or room-and-board, at the most exclusive ones), private schools still see demand, both in actual enrollment and in those looking for assistantship/scholarship entry. That implies, strongly, that some parents recognize the deficiencies of public education  -- intellectual or moral opposition to the curriculum, institutionalized learning paced for the slowest member of the classroom, safety and discipline issues in urban districts -- and are willing to pay a premium for the privilege of avoiding it.

[Fmr. Pres. Duke]

As never having attended public school, I would never consider sending my kids there. For the most part, they are inferior to what many private schools offer. There are some that are solid, but the majority, especially in this area of the country, are just terrible.

[Хahar 🤔]

As never having attended public school, I would never consider sending my kids there. For the most part, they are inferior to what many private schools offer. There are some that are solid, but the majority, especially in this area of the country, are just terrible.

Ah, see, that's just a perception. My public school is much better (and far mor expensive) than most private schools.

[Fmr. Pres. Duke]

As never having attended public school, I would never consider sending my kids there. For the most part, they are inferior to what many private schools offer. There are some that are solid, but the majority, especially in this area of the country, are just terrible.

Ah, see, that's just a perception. My public school is much better (and far mor expensive) than most private schools.

If you pay to go to school, it can't be public. I guess you go to a private school if you are paying more than I did for high school.

[7,052,770]

As never having attended public school, I would never consider sending my kids there. For the most part, they are inferior to what many private schools offer. There are some that are solid, but the majority, especially in this area of the country, are just terrible.

I would rather go to a substandard public school than a racist private school, as virtually all private schools in our area of the country were founded during Integration as a way to keep out the blacks.

[Хahar 🤔]

As never having attended public school, I would never consider sending my kids there. For the most part, they are inferior to what many private schools offer. There are some that are solid, but the majority, especially in this area of the country, are just terrible.

Ah, see, that's just a perception. My public school is much better (and far mor expensive) than most private schools.

If you pay to go to school, it can't be public. I guess you go to a private school if you are paying more than I did for high school.

Indirect costs. To get a house in this school district, you have to shell out half a million extra than for a comparable house half a mile away.

[Fmr. Pres. Duke]

As never having attended public school, I would never consider sending my kids there. For the most part, they are inferior to what many private schools offer. There are some that are solid, but the majority, especially in this area of the country, are just terrible.

Ah, see, that's just a perception. My public school is much better (and far mor expensive) than most private schools.

If you pay to go to school, it can't be public. I guess you go to a private school if you are paying more than I did for high school.

Indirect costs. To get a house in this school district, you have to shell out half a million extra than for a comparable house half a mile away.

If you can afford that, why are you a socialist? Why don't you join the Republican party? If you had your way, you wouldn't be able to afford such luxuries!

As never having attended public school, I would never consider sending my kids there. For the most part, they are inferior to what many private schools offer. There are some that are solid, but the majority, especially in this area of the country, are just terrible.

I would rather go to a substandard public school than a racist private school, as virtually all private schools in our area of the country were founded during Integration as a way to keep out the blacks.

My prestigious private school is not racist! We had one Asian in my graduating class, and the class below us had three African Americans! We also produced Stephen Colbert.

[DanielX]

Harry, below is my rant/monologue on private and home schooling. I have come to conclusions rather extremely opposed to yours, and I think I - or possibly another member - have debated this with you in the past. As a note, perhaps things in Mississippi are different; but where I have lived, I do not think racism is a major factor in private education where I have grown up, and I see no reason why the existence of SOME racism would be sufficient to ban ALL alternative forms of education; that's the equivalent of banning all buses because some of them had signs that said "whites sit in front" back during Segregation.

One of my former college roommates went to a Catholic school in Maryland. He wasn't terribly impressed by it, in part because it was an all-boy's school... but he's Filipino, and the school had a substantial number of African-American and other minority students. Perhaps less than the neighborhood, but then the vast majority of African-Americans are Protestant.

Most religious schools, in particular, were founded to teach the values of a particular religious tradition. Mostly, if there is a lack of particular ethnic groups, this means that the ethnic group in question has few members of that religion. You won't find very many Irish-American students at an Islamic school, for example. Even most parents who send their kids to secular private schools tend to do so because they think that's the best chance their kid will have for education. Racism? Perhaps in some cases, though I'd argue its more class-oriented than race-oriented in any case (a lot of people with any sort of money - even members of minorities - send their kids on to private schools in places with bad public schools, like DC or Baltimore).

As for home schooling, a lot of that has to do with religious beliefs, or concern about the quality of education in general (my mother, who does not belong to any religious organizations and has only a rather general faith in God, seriously considered both home and private school for me, but decided that we couldn't afford the cost of a secular private school - which vouchers or lower taxes could have alleviated,  didn't think any I was terribly interested in attending a religious school, and that she couldn't really teach certain subjects alone - and most home schooling leagues are religious-oriented).

I went to public school for my entire education - an experience which has solidified my views in favor of the existence and sustenance of alternative forms of education. I went to fairly "good" public schools, for the most part, and did okay academically (arguably I did better in the 'advanced' courses than the easy ones ), but large classes full of misbehaving kids, rowdy hallways, and the dog-eat-dog crowd of the jerkasses caused me no end of trouble and misery. I just didn't fit the public school environment well - the times I was happiest were when I was involved in an extracurricular activity or two that suited my interests - together with a handful of others with similar interests. When I didn't have that, things were pretty bad... I don't think that public school fit me well, and there are others who had an even worse time of it. Introverts and those with special needs tend to do very poorly with the whole style of public schools, at least as presently organized. I might not have fit well with private schools, but at least classes would have been smaller and had few/any disturbances (as private schools are far more willing to suspend/expel assholes, for obvious reasons).

It doesn't hurt that I believe that the qualities that make a good parent also make a good teacher for small children; I see no reason why a good stay-at-home parent with a good base of knowledge and is willing to learn more as time goes by cannot at least teach elementary-level subjects to children. Home-schooling leagues, though I would prefer that more secular ones came into being, are an excellent idea. My mother, for example, has an MS in English and a BA in Sociology; I don't think I need to mention that I think she was also a good parent (my father was as well, but he worked long hours, while my mother went between stay-at-home and working relatively short hours). She would have been a good teacher of English and Social Studies... but not Science or Computers, both of which she knows relatively little about. Had she partnered up with another home-schooling parent with knowledge in those areas, and perhaps a third who was fluent in a foreign language... 

Beyond all that, I believe that parents have a right to seek out what they believe to be the best mode of education for their child (on the assumption that they do not neglect the child's education outright, which can justifiably be considered abuse). To forbid alternatives to public schooling is, in my view, tantamount to fascism - no, cancel that, it IS fascist (or perhaps communist; they're different in theory but in practice largely the same) to require that everyone receives a state education with no recourse to alternatives. Heck, I believe any government which bans private and home schooling should be overthrown and its leaders summarily executed for violation of civil liberties, much as a government that bans freedom of speech or the right to bear firearms. Similarly, I do not have a high regard of taking children away from competent parents - unless the parents are abusing children, and I don't see how home schooling alone could possibly be construed as "abuse" if done by good or at least competent parents, while truly bad parents generally have other reasons to be concerned about.

EDIT: Come to think of it, I don't think I actually debated this with you, Harry, but with someone on another site with a similar opinion to yours (who, incidentally, also came from the deep South)... unless you and he are one/the same.... you wouldn't happen to have an account at Alternate-History.com, would you?