<p>Since you liked that so much, I thought I would reprint Friedman’s BIO from the link in post 119 here. I hope this puts an even bigger smile on your face:</p>
<p>*Nobel Prize for Economic Science
*Senior Research Fellow at the Hoover Institution, Stanford University
*Paul Snowden Russell Distinguished Service Professor Emeritus of Economics at the University of Chicago
*National Bureau of Economic Research
*Presidential Medal of Freedom
*National Medal of Science
*President’s Commission on an All-Volunteer Armed Force
*President’s Commission on White House Fellows
*President Reagan’s Economic Policy Advisory Board
*Past president of the American Economic Association, the Western Economic Association, and the Mont Pelerin Society
*Member of the American Philosophical Society and of the National Academy of Sciences.
*Honorary degrees by universities in the United States, Japan, Israel, and Guatemala</p>
<p>"Author of various books(with Rose D. Friedman) Capitalism and Freedom (University of Chicago Press, 1962); Bright Promises, Dismal Performance (Thomas Horton and Daughters, 1983), which consists mostly of reprints of tri-weekly columns that he wrote for Newsweek from 1966 to 1983; and (with Rose Friedman) Free to Choose (Harcourt Brace Jovanovich, 1980), which complements a ten-part TV series of the same name, shown over PBS in early 1980, and (with Rose D. Friedman) Tyranny of the Status Quo (Harcourt Brace Jovanovich, 1984), which complements a three-part TV series of the same name, shown over PBS in early 1984.
A Theory of the Consumption Function (University of Chicago Press, 1957), The Optimum Quantity of Money and Other Essays (Aldine, 1969), and (with A. J. Schwartz) A Monetary History of the United States (Princeton University Press, 1963), Monetary Statistics of the United States (Columbia University Press, 1970), and Monetary Trends in the United States and the United Kingdom (University of Chicago Press, 1982).</p>
<p>He and his wife established the Milton and Rose D. Friedman Foundation, for the purpose of promoting parental choice of the schools their children attend."</p>
<p>Should we have public education in this country? Also it seems many believe that while teachers are at the bottom rung of the education scale their compensation package is excessive . It makes me wonder why those at the higher end of the education spectrum do not enter the field -is there some law that outlaws their entry? If the compensation is better than they could earn elsewhere why don’t the go into teaching? </p>
<p>zooser- I believe the economy may have more people enter teaching but they public discussion of overcompensation of teachers may also keep many away.</p>
<p>I think that public education is a good thing, and that good teachers are not paid excessively. The problem is that pay is based on the number of years you have been working, or the number of added education years you possess. Pay should be based on talent or merit. Parents should be able to get a voucher to access a private education if their school is performing poorly. The worst thing is that it is difficult to fire ineffective teachers, or to replace even average ones when there is an opportunity to score an exceptional replacement. Job guarantees are unAmerican, especially when the burden falls on to the backs of children. Collective bargaining is also a very bad thing. The problem is not public education, it is the the stuff that comes along with it.</p>
<p>“Parents should be able to get a voucher to access a private education if their school is performing poorly.”</p>
<p>What exactly does this mean? The school district pays the private bill? Most families will have a hard time coming up with a significant portion of the private school fee. How do existing voucher programs work?</p>
<p>I believe for vouchers the money comes from the govt instead of going to the district so the district wouldn’t actually have to be handling the money.</p>
<p>Who decides which teachers get the merit increases- the department head, the school administrators, the school superintendent, the members of the board of education or the parents of the students in the class? What is the merit increase based on? Can I see an example of the merit pay system at a private school to see how they do it- does anyone have a transparent example? How do we handle the teacher that is also a local politician? Or the teacher whose spouse is a BOE member?
While I am not against merit pay on its face I have worked in government long enough to realize merit pay is a euphemism to mean we can reward those political connected while at the same time denying everyone who is not a union member a raise.</p>
<p>“I believe for vouchers the money comes from the govt instead of going to the district so the district wouldn’t actually have to be handling the money.”</p>
<p>Same question: The government pays the private bill? What percentage?</p>
<p>We always hear the politicians saying that we need more qualified teachers, but they don’t mention how many great teachers we already have who drop out of the profession.</p>
<p>My ex wife and I have 7 college degrees between us. Thus, my son is highly teachable.</p>
<p>There is discipline in the household, and school work is considered important.</p>
<p>So you can teach him, for example, American History.</p>
<p>Now try and teach the War of 1812 to with inner city kids where there is no father, and whether the mother is almost a child herself. Or kids from other types of disfunctional families. Or as your post indicates, even in schools that until recently did not have disfunctional parents.</p>
<p>That being said, watch the movie, Waiting for Superman, and you will see the almost laughable management that was taking place at the Washington, DC schools. I watched as special on Fox News by Stoessel, and the former head of the DC schools tells the story how she visited a school to inspect it, and many classrooms at no teachers, and many classrooms where they had teachers had few students, and when she asked what was going on, the principal, with no embarrassment whatsover, told her “well, its Friday”.</p>
<p>But one kindergartner floored his teacher and local law enforcement officers when police say he pulled his mother’s crack pipe and an ounce of drugs from his backpack.</p>
<p>For show and tell- I can not imagine that anyone could argue that what goes on in that home would not effect the students education.</p>
<p>When I read “watch waiting for Superman” I see it more as a failure of the administration. I always wonder why we blame unions and allow administrators and managers get away with that nonsense. I manage 250 employees all covered by a powerful union. The union has never and I mean never stopped me from doing my job. Tenure is a process. Failure to remove someone is a failure of the manager. Yes I have terminated employees.</p>
<p>*“I believe for vouchers the money comes from the govt instead of going to the district so the district wouldn’t actually have to be handling the money.”</p>
<p>Same question: The government pays the private bill? What percentage?*</p>
<p>It would make sense that the local state and federal money that formerly was directed towards the school district, would instead be routed to the students new school.( or to the parents who could use the voucher to pay school or homeschooling expenses)
Of course, logic doesn’t necessarily come first when the govt. is concerned.</p>
<p>I don’t have first hand knowledge of vouchers- our state doesn’t even allow for charters.</p>
<p>What I have heard is that the voucher is accepted for tuition. 100%.
This generally limits them to relatively inexpensive schools or schools where they are willing to make up the difference.
As vouchers are given to students who qualify for FRL, this would also generally qualify them for financial aid at schools which offer it- although the voucher may permit the private school to enroll a higher % of low income students than they would otherwise.</p>
<p>A common argument is that the voucher amount would not allow families to access private schools. I wonder if people against school choice are typically upper middle class, and that they are thinking about places like Dalton or Exeter when they scoff at the voucher idea. There are certainly numerous lower cost alternatives in every metro area, and schools often offer scholarships. Many families may also be able to contribute to tuition. With more families getting access to vouchers, more people will open private schools.</p>
<p>An interesting study showed that cost per pupil numbers published by school districts are significantly lower than actual figures. There is a transparency problem, and it may be that voucher numbers are much higher when real figures are uncovered: </p>
<p>Will schools accepting vouchers be required to follow the same rules as the public schools? Will they be required to keep disruptive non-caring students or will they be allowed to send those back to public school in order to show everyone that they provide a superior education for less money?</p>
<p>tom, that’s the rub. My kids were in a private school during a trial voucher program a bunch of years ago (I’m too lazy to count). It was a very high-performing school in a diverse area with a diverse student body. It was chosen to receive voucher students because it was thought that such diverse and successful school would be the perfect destination. It turned out to be a disaster. I’m not sure if it was the manner in which the voucher students were chosen or some other reason (I really don’t know, call me ignorant), but the students and especially the voucher parents never quite fit, there was a huge conflict of expectations, a failure to understand that private school was different in every possible way, even down to micromanaging things that would never have been noticed in public school or expecting a lot of parental involvement, and it eventually tore the school apart. This spring it graduated its last class after almost a hundred years and closed its doors.</p>
<p>So to answer your question, sometimes when public money is accepted, there are strings attached that tie the destination school in knots.</p>
<p>Market forces were not allowed to operate freely and do what they do best. Whenever government gets involved and tries to pick winners and losers, disasters happen.</p>