Education Reform and the Battle Over Privatization
In the case of education, we are confronting an immense prejudice, inculcated by the education system itself. There is a long history of political intervention in schools in North America, and an even longer ideological history from the Reformation; the Scottish one, especially. Books could be written, and have been: But, in a single phrase, the notion that "education is too important to be left to chance" is so universally accepted, that the public at large is capable of overlooking universal failure. Our state schools, which were (contrary to myth) never all that good, have degenerated into dysfunctional propaganda mills.
We easily accept the associated notion that "in a democracy, public schooling is necessary to assure minimum standards for citizenship." That schools should provide the machinery for the indoctrination of the masses follows naturally from this. Think it through. The proposition actually reverses the first principle of democracy: that government should answer to citizens, and not citizens to government. And remember, that all "progressive" educational proposals require political compulsion.
The question is, "how do we get there?" Most conservatives favor privatization of education on some level, but have different opinions on how we achieve that goal. On one side, you have charter school advocates who believe that public schools are so engrained in the American psyche, we need charters as a middle step. The argument is that the public will be reluctant to go from completely public education to completely private education in one step. Authorizing charter schools will, theoretically, demonstrate to the public that privatization can improve the quality of education, and make them more willing to do away with public education all together.
On the other side, you have those that argue that because charter schools are still public schools, you will have the same indoctrination of students, and same bureaucratic nightmares in a charter. They believe we must take the big step to complete privatization in one fell swoop. The time wasted on the middle step with charters comes at the expense of the children who could be getting a better education. They also point out that charters don't give much more control to parents and students than the public school system.
Despite the differences, we all agree that education reform is necessary. I'm glad that movies like The Lottery and Waiting For Superman have opened the debate, and brought the issue to the attention of many Americans who weren't engaged.