<p>Do we know the numbers of functionally illiterate or ignorant graduating from private schools nationwide?</p>
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<p>Please explain why knowing this number might be important or relevant, safe and except for sheer curiosity? Do we attempt to measure, for instance, the number of illiterate or ignorant athletes who graduate from college, and then compare the performance of private versus public universities. </p>
<p>And, fwiw, even if the numbers were available, what might the conclusion “teach” us. If the number is 20 to 1, most --and especially here-- would say that it is normal considering the usual lines of defense that include … we accept everyone, we do not pick our students, we deal with all the problem kids, and more simllar platitudes. </p>
<p>The reality is quite different. We do NOT need to evaluate the performance of a private system of education. That issue is between the service provider and their paying client. On the other hand, since our public system of education bargained for (and is fighting to preserve) a monopoly on the funding of education, this system is entirely accountable for its success, failure, spending, and most importantly for its equitable distribution of resources. </p>
<p>And, it is in this last part that the “system” is failing the most. For every beautiful school that is erected in the suburbs and successfully segregates the cream from the rest by abandoning many in the urban deserts and then satisfy the parents with more inner segregation through AP and IB and other programs, you have the vivid examples of school districts in Detroit or Washington, DC. Please, please, tell me how anyone would call a district that effectively graduates 20 percent of its entering class not a failure? Please!</p>
<p>In the meantime, for all the ones who are tired of the bashing of public servants, teachers, and the public education in general, would you mind considering the outcome of having all private schools erased from the map. Would the education system be better off after destroying that pesky remnant of yesterday’s society? Is the private educational sector responsible for the current abysmal state? </p>
<p>And, if the answer is no, why is there such a drive and desire to curb and force a very small element of the entire system into oblivion?</p>
<p>tom: No, but we should. I can tell you there were many at my small, private, religious high school.</p>
<p>As for how we all “coexist,” the answer is–we all don’t. Or we do in very small ways as we cross paths in our day-to-day lives. If we are truly concerned about literacy in this country, we need to focus on creating jobs that require it and quit sending the good ones overseas.</p>
<p>But if we move to a voucher system the government becomes the paying client.</p>
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<p>xiggi, how can you say this when the idea behind vouchers is for families to take a leap of faith that leaving a poor-performing public school for a private one will help their kids achieve better academic success? And, of course, when we as taxpayers are footing the bill? Going to LESS accountability seems counterproductive to the goal of improving education for all. Unless I am misunderstanding what you are saying…</p>
<p>Is that the idea behind a voucher system? </p>
<p>The question that is raised (about performance) might become relevant in a world where the funding of the education follows the student. That has, however, not been the case, safe and except for a handful of poorly designed programs that were set to fail from the onset. The current voucher system in the US has never been introduced on a level playing field, and this by a fair margin.</p>
<p>Fwiw, my answer about having to track the performance of private schools did not address the very few schools that have been part of a voucher system.</p>
<p>No leap of faith here. We looked into what the publics would and could offer and how, with what very functional challenges. Then the same for the privates. None of it was blind or based on assumptions.</p>
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<p>Is the assumption that having a voucher means the student gets admitted to the private schools? As xiggi indicates, how many privates have agreed to that?</p>
<p>Xiggi, why? Because many people are idealogues, drones, useful idiots, or in the case of sectarian schools, Christophobes?</p>
<p>Or they are sucking off the system and want to maintain the franchise.</p>
<p>We really do not know if privates could solve the problem facing public education if they do not have to accept someone leaving a failing school. That is why I like my model where a kid from a failing public school could enroll in successful public school with the State paying the receiving school for taking that child.</p>
<p>One problem with this discussion is that there is wide variation among private schools. They can be anything from fundamentalist Christian schools teaching intelligent design and bible studies as literal history, to LD schools teaching kids with severe dyslexia to read, to elite boarding schools like St. Paul’s or Andover where there are kids studying linear algebra and classical Greek as sophomores. It’s very hard to generalize about private schools in general.</p>
<p>Almost as difficult as generalizing about public schools</p>
<p>Which is why, earlier, there was the comment that we only know what we know. If we even know that. Generalizations are tough. Wherher they are about schools or what (we think) other posters think.</p>