But it doesn’t have to be an either/or choice between improving the existing system and creating alternatives to the existing system. In fact, creating alternatives is the most promising strategy for improving the existing system! As has already been noted above, the empirical evidence shows that where students are offered a choice, the public schools respond by improving. Having seen so many other policies fail to produce sustained improvements, I’m convinced that if your goal is to improve public schools, creating school choice is by far your best bet.

Two years ago I had the opportunity to leave the “system” to open a new K-3 inner city charter school, serving mostly second language students. We adopted and implemented Direct Instruction (Reading Mastery and Language for Learning). We maintained detailed records throughout the year regarding our students’ academic progress. The results were amazing! All of our kindergarteners were reading 5 months into the school year, and by the end of the year the kinders were reading to parents, visiting college professors and local public school administrators. Due to our documented first year success, we were invited to move our program to a failing public school in the same community. We thought this would be something wonderful. To our surprise, we were not welcomed at the public school, even though we relinquished our charter status to allow us to make the move. It became a them against us. In fact, the district superintendent who facilitated our move to the school was verbally attacked by the teachers’ union and my administrative job was eliminated three months into the school year. The program has survived on a wing and a prayer, along with the effort, determination and dedication of our teachers.

I am happy to report that the kinders who transferred with us to the public school, are all reading on or above grade level as we near the end of their first grade year. This achievement is even more important since approximately 80% of 3rd students at the school do not meet grade level reading standards! Unfortunately, even with pleas from our parents, the program most likely will not be continued. We have been told that our prevention model is too expensive to continue ( we requested a one hour aide for each classroom for the reading and language instructional time).

My question to the district administration is, how can we not afford this prevention program? The cost of placing students in special education and remedial classes is far more expensive.

As much as I want to see needed change come to the public school system, my experience has lead me to believe that the current system is too large and inflexible. I believe that charter schools will continue to grow and gain strength because they are better able to meet the needs of the students and parents they serve. I am so sad for all of our “little diamonds in the rough” who are relagated to failing inner city schools; they deserve better!

Regarding dead horses, the stream is usually full of them in the education business.

Some people argue that education is “too important to leave to the market.” I’m arguing the opposite: by divorcing public schooling from the driving force for improvement, we endured a great stagnation. I think there is a widespread consensus that the American public school model is unjust to the poor and tragically ineffective for many students.

The limited embrace of some quasi-market mechanisms have produced some extremely positive results. KIPP never ever happens without charter school laws, for example. I for one love a school remediates inner city kids many grade levels behind and gets them to college on scholarship.

We are still in the early stages of a great debate on how to incorporate market mechanisms into schooling for the benefit of students, and our steps in this direction have to date been very limited.

Also, you do not address the many issues I brought up that face a voucher/private school solution. Nor do you take into account other facts: the so-called “golden age” of education I referred to had a roughly 50% graduation rate for HS seniors - nowadays it is close to 85%; the actual number of public school students to private school students is closer to a 9:1 ratio than 3:1 according to government statistics; and, since 1990 there has been a staggering increase in students due to immigration which you do not put that into your calculations or considerations. You must be reminded again that your statement regarding technology in the public school was misleading; and, there is no comment on the selection criteria and exclusionary problems.

I appreciate your acknowledging your solution is not a magic wand even if you contradict yourself in the following statements regarding the market mechanism. What we strongly have in common is your last statement: we should depart from failed practices. That is how we fix public schools (or private schools, for that matter). It is one thng to support changes within a public school and to lobby for better practices there; it is another to advocate a position that has at its heart the abandonment of public schools as its chief tool.

It is my belief that real change occurs because of intrinsic shifts in attitudes and not solely from extrinsic pressure. The real success stories are based on committed teachers and parents coming together to form a plan and work together to make change happen. This has happened numerous times, usually without competition as a spur. Even you and Forster both noted that there were times in which competition did not work as you suggested.

So, in keeping with Moynihan’s view, I just needed to submit some facts that you overlooked. I think we both are looking for the same end but are at cross purposes regarding the means. I appreciate your honesty and time and certainly have enjoyed looking into your research and that of others who’ve written on this opic. I’ve been enlightened and wish to thank you for broadening my understanding of vouchers, private schools, public schools, and the educational needs of our country.

One of my wife’s pet peeves is that when I get together with fellow educators, we seem to go off into a pitched discussion of practices, policies, and philosophies. Today, while she is at work, she’d much rather I clean up my room. So, if you’ll pardon me….I must take my imaginary backhoe into the “hovel” (as she lovingly calls my chamber) and continue to bring a sense of order to the chaos there.

Once again, thanks to you Mr Ladner and also to Mr Forster.

I’m afraid that you have misunderstood my point. I never claimed that the market is a magic wand. What is demonstrably obvious however is that the lack of a market mechanism has been the path to stagnation, which is the crisis we find our public school students in today. This comes despite levels of spending beyond the dreams of avarice for a school administrator in previous decades.

Daniel Patrick Moynihan said that people are entitled to their own opinions, but not to their own facts. These are facts: real spending per pupil substantially increased over the previous few decades, NAEP scores have been relatively flat. In my opinion, this is a record that will be substantially improved upon in future decades, but only in so much as we depart from the failed practices which led us here.

(1) Give Kids Good Schools – offers many positive suggestions about public schools.
http://www.givekidsgoodschools.org/main/learn.cfm?Category=A_Case&Section=Main

(2) National Center for Education Statistics – a gold mine of data.

(3) Christian Science Monitor did an excellent piece on the progress or lack of such during the 20 years since the report “A Nation at Risk.”

http://www.csmonitor.com/2003/0422/p13s02-lepr.html

(4) Edutopia, The George Lucas Foundation, takes a more critical look at “A Nation at Risk” and offers a warning that the “landmark document that still shapes our national debate on education was misquoted, misinterpreted, and often dead wrong.”

http://www.edutopia.org/landmark-education-report-nation-risk