Doug Henwood sez:
>In the case of public employee unions, bourgeois
>politicians have made sure that no alliance develops between the
>producers and consumers of public services (see Marc Maier's City
>Unions for the NYC story). The fight should be to create that alliance.
Thanks for the referrence to Maier's book. I agree that that alliance should be created.
>As for the rest of the post, it shows an odd faith in the beauties of
>market choice. For vouchers to work as Perez wants them to work would
>require well-informed parents with plenty of time on their hands to
>investigate school options and perfect mobility for students to get
>from their poor neighborhood to a posh suburb. If we're talking about
>how schools might work in a socialist utopia, then maybe choice
>schemes might be a good idea. If we're talking about how they'd work
>in actually existing American capitalism, then they'd do little to
>equalizing educational quality.
If, as Perez claims is the case in Atlanta, the state monopoly is the only existing "choice" and is providing a bad system then trying a "market" alternative strikes me as being reasonable in "actually existing American capitalism." It seems unlikely that the Atlanta school authorities are going to be changing their ways anytime soon and certainly have no motivation to help the very families who need it most, especially those who lack mobility. A voucher system could possibly motivate such parents to investigate the options available to them. And why do we have to wait for a socialist utopia to try to improve schooling a bit?
W. Kiernan sez:
>My older daughter attends a "magnet school" in Tampa which, I think,
>qualifies as an "inner-city" school. I went to Florida public schools
>thirty years ago, and they were a bad joke. But in her "magnet school,"
>the curriculum is astoundingly rigorous; she's getting a education I
>would never have dreamt you could get from a Florida public school.
(snip)
>I have two younger children, and I was hoping that when they get old
>enough, they too would enjoy the first-rate public school programs my
>older daughter currently participates in, but thanks to Jeb! and his
>vouchers scheme, I suppose that's not going to happen. Divide and
>conquer, the rich bastards win again.
The U.S. public school scene is still sufficiently varied that some cities or states may be providing a reasonable level of service even while others are running part-time prisons in the guise of schools. This does make it hard to prescribe a "one size fits all" voucher system for the whole country and, without knowing any of the details of Jeb's vouchers scheme, I'm sure it is unlikely to be satisfactory. (And I agree that Perez is way out line calling all opponents of vouchers "hypocrites.")
Wojtek Sokolowski sez:
>I can say the same thing about public school system in Baltimore - which is
>a bad joke, except for t emagnet schools.
(snip)
>I know, know, standardized testing sucks - the only point I'm trying
>to make is that public schools can do a very job in preparing kids for
>anything, even standardized tests
It seems that magnet schools are making a hit with folks.
>Of course, private schools can be much more easily transformed into
>corporate propaganda outfits than public schools, hence the drive toward
>privatisation. There is only one drawback - money. Low income people -
>the main target of that propaganda effort - can seldom afford sending their
>kids to a private school. Vouchers effectively "solve" that problem. In a
>way, they are a way of corporate bosses saying to the public sector "pay up
>and fuck off of our schools."
What? When did US public schools stop being corporate proganda outfits? Have they been turning our youth against consumerism, competitiveness, increasing shareholder value, or other mainstays of corporate America without the rest of us noticing?
or, as Max Sawicky (who also likes his kid's magnet school) sez:
>Finally, re commercialization in schools, it is
>not at all obvious that private schools are or
>will be more commercialized. See Alex Molnar's book
>"Giving Kids the Business." A broad assortment
>of corporate vendors are deluging public schools
>with commercialization options. The reason should
>be obvious: public schools need the money. So
>they let vendors sell junk food to students, put
>up advertisements, pipe in "Channel One" rubbish,
>etc. Parents with a choice of schools could prove
>less amenable to a commercialized environment.
Exactly so.
>The biggest thing in school privatization
>right now is not vouchers. It is charter
>schools. These are schools which are
>constructed from scratch by non-governmental
>organizations, both for-profit and non-profit.
>There are many more students in these than in
>voucher systems or in privately-managed public
>schools. There are hundreds of charter schools,
>some operated by NEA members. (The NEA is on
>record in favor of charters.)
Are charter schools and vouchers mutually exclusive? Can't vouchers, under most proposals, be used to pay the charter schools as well as other kinds of schools, including magnet schools and regular public schools?
Kelley Colleen sez:
>in my view, privitization of schools or anything
>resembling it will quickly lead to the McDonaldization of Schooling.
As Max pointed out, this has already happened. Literally, in fact, McDonalds has replaced the old cafeterias in a number of schools.
>the process is already clear in the textbook industry under the guise of
>standardized curriculum [which is really about the deprofessionalization of
>teacher and resisting pay raises, indeed reducing pay]. it is evident in
>the increasing reliance on pre-digested curriculum materials, videos, just
>plain crap that teachers rely on. and, as i argue below, i don't think it
>will "equalize" funding be/c well-to-do parents simply won't stand for it.
>they will seek to sort their children out into the few under any
>circumstances.
All true. All happening in the public schools right now. How would vouchers make this worse?
>excuse my pricklyness on the topic. i used to teach this debate with
>_savage inequalities_ (which mike mentioned) and with chubb and moe. bleh
>bleh bleh. as moved as students were by _savage inequalities_ for it
>revealed a world they never even knew, let alone imagined existed, they
>still rejected equalization or even vouchers on the grounds that "they
>*deserved* better schooling coz their parents worked hard to provide them
>that, so there. and we feel bad an' all but it's just not "natural" to have
>everything equal and it won't work. it goes against human nature"
Well, yeah, students like that would make a person prickly. But if they rejected even vouchers as unfair to their hardworking parents mighn't that indicate that vouchers have some progressive potential?
K.M.