<p>class size is overrated. </p>
<p>In Singapore I was in a class of 41 students in primary school. But because the teacher was brilliant, it felt more tight-knit than the Cape Elizabeth Elementary spoilt, rich, children-of-yuppies class of 22.</p>
<p>My mother’s bill? 30 Singapore dollars every 3 months for excellent education.</p>
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<p>public education is capable of this, but Americans for some reason feel that protecting Confederate-era “states’ rights” is more important than good public education.</p>
<p>Also the American private-public distinction is silly. The government should encourage and support passionate school builders rather than appoint careerist administrators to important positions. Education schools should be abolished and replaced by national teacher training institutes. </p>
<p>Then we wouldn’t need silly standards testing because all fifty states would be following the same national syllabus, with permitted modifications. Administrators and teachers in well-performing schools would be permitted greater autonomy and intellectual freedom over what they teach. Independent and private schools are given government aid in exchange for subsidising the tuition of low-income students. This is how public education works in Singapore and the rest of the world. </p>
<p>But of course American educators prefer to remain in the Confederacy because they believe the right of some backwater school board in Kansas to enforce the teaching of creationism (“states’ rights”!) should be paramount.</p>