School Choice or Best Systems_ What Improves Education_ - Margaret C. Wang [54]
Table 7-1
SUFFICIENCY OF THE EVIDENCE FOR POSITIVE SCHOOL CHOICE EFFECTS
• The conclusions in the table complement and reinforce one another. Other things being equal, traditional public schools, on average, appear to perform less effectively and efficiently than either charter or private schools. This conclusion accords well with research on the performance of public and private organizations and on privatization of public services.
In short, given these overall findings and the consistency of the evidence, it may be confidently concluded that school choice generally works better than public school monopolies. Similarly, in the manufacturing and service industries that have been analyzed, nearly all reviews of studies show that markets provide higher quality, more customer choice, greater customer satisfaction, and lower costs than government provisioning. Studies of newly privatized government services also generally show such effects. The intensity of competition within geopolitical areas, moreover, allows, even requires, greater effectiveness and cost-efficiency on the part of surviving providers, public and private. The findings in this book are consistent with these widely documented conclusions, which have led to and are leading to increasing privatization in many countries including the United States.
Though sometimes greeted with initial pubic confusion and skepticism, charter schools and vouchers are becoming increasingly well supported as citizens gain knowledge of how they work, the results they produce, and their popularity with the families who use them. American parents, moreover, have rights to make the important decisions regarding their children’s upbringing such as their names, where they live, and the people who treat them when they’re ill.
In 1925 the U.S. Supreme Court upheld their right to choose a public or private school for their children, and in 2002 it upheld their right to do so with the help of a school choice program. As the research reviewed in this book shows, it would be good public policy to give all families ready access to that choice. It is ironic that Americans who regard themselves as free—perhaps as having the freest country in the world—have so little choice when it comes to their children’s education. It is tragic that policy leaders, including governors, legislators, and school boards, have done so little to remedy that situation.
Notes
Chapter 1
1 Herbert J. Walberg, “Achievement in American Schools,” in A Primer on American Schools: An Assessment by the Koret Task Force on K-12 Education, ed. Terry M. Moe (Stanford, CA: Stanford University, Hoover Institution Press, 2001), pp. 43-68. On costs, see Eric A. Hanushek, “Spending on Schools,” in A Primer on American Schools, pp. 69-88.
2 Lynn Olson, “As AYP Bar Rises, More Schools Fail,” Education Week, September 20, 2006, pp. 1, 20.
3 For a news account, see Diana Jean Schemo, “Grades Rise, but Reading Skills Do Not,” New York Times, February 23, 2007, p. 3, http://www.nytimes.com/2007/02/22/education/22cnd-test.html?_r=1&hp&oref=slogin. For the full reports, see the National Assessment of Educational Progress, Results of the 2005 School Transcript Study and Results of 2005 Grade 12 Mathematics and Reading Assessment, http://nces.ed.gov/nationsreportcard/.
4 National Center for Public Policy and Higher Education, “The Need for State Leadership,” Cross Talk, Summer 2005.
5 American College Test, Reading between the Lines: What the ACT Reveals about College Readiness in Reading (Iowa City, IA: ACT, 2006).
6 Education Trust, College Results Online, 2006, http://www2.edtrust.org/EdTrust/Press+Room/college+results.htm.
7 Christopher Clausen, “The New Ivory Tower,” Wilson Quarterly, Autumn 2006, p. 32.
8 Public Agenda, “Are Parents and Students