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Diane Ravitch, a top public education advocate, reports via AlterNet:
This month, the Public Broadcasting System is broadcasting a "documentary" that tells a one-sided story, the story that [Trump's Secretary of Education] Betsy DeVos herself would tell, based on the work of free-market advocate Andrew Coulson. Author of "Market Education", Coulson narrates "School, Inc.", a three-hour program, which airs this month nationwide in three weekly broadcasts on PBS.
Uninformed viewers who see this slickly produced program will learn about the glories of unregulated schooling, for-profit schools, teachers selling their lessons to students on the Internet. They will learn about the "success" of the free market in schooling in Chile, Sweden, and New Orleans. They will hear about the miraculous charter schools across America, and how public school officials selfishly refuse to encourage the transfer of public funds to private institutions. They will see a glowing portrait of South Korea, where students compete to get the highest possible scores on a college entry test that will define the rest of their lives and where families gladly pay for after-school tutoring programs and online lessons to boost test scores. They will hear that the free market is more innovative than public schools.
What they will not see or hear is the other side of the story. They will not hear scholars discuss the high levels of social segregation in Chile, nor will they learn that the students protesting the free-market schools in the streets are not all "Communists", as Coulson suggests. They will not hear from scholars who blame Sweden's choice system for the collapse of its international test scores. They will not see any reference to Finland, which far outperforms any other European nation on international tests yet has neither vouchers nor charter schools. They may not notice the absence of any students in wheelchairs or any other evidence of students with disabilities in the highly regarded KIPP charter schools. They will not learn that the acclaimed American Indian Model Charter Schools in Oakland does not enroll any American Indians, but has a student body that is 60 percent Asian American in a city where that group is 12.8 percent of the student population. Nor will they see any evidence of greater innovation in voucher schools or charter schools than in properly funded public schools.
[...] This program is paid propaganda. It does not search for the truth. It does not present opposing points of view. It is an advertisement for the demolition of public education and for an unregulated free market in education. PBS might have aired a program that debates these issues, but "School Inc." does not.
It is puzzling that PBS would accept millions of dollars for this lavish and one-sided production from a group of foundations with a singular devotion to the privatization of public services. The decision to air this series is even stranger when you stop to consider that these kinds of anti-government political foundations are likely to advocate for the elimination of public funding for PBS. After all, in a free market of television, where there are so many choices available, why should the federal government pay for a television channel?
(Score: 2) by Joe Desertrat on Monday June 19 2017, @09:31PM (5 children)
Please. If you pretend that the drive towards private schools is anything other than an attempt to put that vast sum of education money into private hands where any sort of accountability is gone you are hopelessly naive. There is no interest in educating the public behind this effort.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday June 22 2017, @02:07PM (4 children)
What if members of the public want to avail themselves of private schools? Are they Bad People(tm) who must be Stopped(tm) before they Ruin Everything(tm) in their Headlong Rush(tm) to Utter Selfishness(tm)?
Just maybe this is all part of a big picture push of people away from public schools that, despite the biggest national torrent of money in the world, are obviously, pitifully terrible value? Just maybe the politicians are responding to people who've been screaming about it for decades, who are doing everything in their power to get a better outcome?
No, no, must be unaccountable corrupt elites extracting the precious vital fluids of hapless victims for the Illuminati.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday June 23 2017, @08:18AM (3 children)
Well, yes. If there is a problem with public schools in your area evading it is not a long term solution. If our public education system is falling behind the rest of the world, maybe we should be looking at what other nations are doing right and using what will work here to better our schools rather than racing to the bottom while profit whores feast on our education dollars.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday June 23 2017, @01:36PM (2 children)
Wow, OK. That's a pretty radical position: outlaw private schools.
I think you may find that this is not legally feasible in the USA, for pretty much the same reasons that homeschooling can't be banned (although it can be regulated).
In fact, the worse the public school system gets, the less people want to send their children there.
I propose the alternative analysis, that the success and popularity of alternative schooling solutions should be taken as a barometer of the perceived failures of the public school system, and thus as a spur to those bureaucrats who are concerned with its success.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday July 03 2017, @09:17PM (1 child)
Who said anything about outlawing private schools?
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday July 10 2017, @10:25PM
Good question. Let's see. Original question:
The response:
OK, so that was wordy, and you didn't want to read it all, so let's break it down.
Summarised original question:
Summarised response:
So the question now arises, how on earth that does not construe a public policy recommendation against public schools? Or are we into telling people that they are bad, bad, bad, wicked, NAUGHTY people for doing what they want to do, and they're feeding EVIL profit-whoring vampire squids, but it's really cool because we're not actually banning anything?
Explanations deserved.