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Choice in Education: Choice Is Key to Better Schools
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20484 |
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Section : |
CURRENT ISSUES
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| Issue
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5 / 1992 |
2,332 Words |
| Author
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Jeanne Allen
Jeanne Allen is president of the Washington, D.C.-based
Center for Education Reform, a national clearinghouse
dedicated to improving schools. |
As America's public schools remain in deep trouble, more Americans are coming to a simple conclusion: unless there is a fundamental restructuring of public schools, the nation cannot remain competitive, nor ensure that students obtain even the basic skills necessary to earn a sound livelihood.
Polls indicate that most Americans see giving parents a choice of schools reform. Making parents education consumers forces schools to improve instruction and toughen standards if they want to retain students and the funding that goes with them. It also unleashes the pent-up creativity of educators in response to consumer demand. In fact, more than 55 percent of public school teachers surveyed support school choice even as their unions spend millions to battle it around the country. Educators are becoming increasingly open to the possibility that the monopoly they work for may soon be broken--to their benefit and that of the children.
School choice, whether confined to public schools or expanded to include private and parochial schools, is emerging as the centerpiece in meeting the challenge of failing schools across America. This is due to the simple fact that choice has proven to be the only reform that has brought improvement, while the tinkering of the last 15 years--raising graduation requirements, lowering class sizes, hiking school spending to unprecedented levels--has failed. In fact, while educational spending has risen, student performance continues to go down by every statistical measure.
Last year, for the fourth consecutive year, the Scholastic Aptitude Test (SAT) scores dropped. According to the "Report Card" issued last September by the National Education Goals panel, only 14 percent of American eighth graders can "figure the cost of a meal from a menu" and only a third of eleventh graders can write "a coherent paragraph about themselves."
Irony For Liberals
Such dismal statistics have triggered calls for school choice from parents, business leaders, teachers, and public officials. But most smartingly to liberal observers, the strongest backers of choice, for both public and private schools, are minorities and urban residents, by 57 percent. Yet, among public officials, it the liberals, the professed "best friends" of the urban poor, who are most opposed to choice.
This irony has caused a stir among liberals themselves.
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