Ban private schools? Only if you hate our kids.
No, I don’t go to Gawker for insightful, intelligent analysis of American politics. However, from time to time, so much stupid shows up into my timeline on Facebook that just has to be address. This particularly instances was written by Gawker’s John Cook, where he proposed that the secret to reforming our public schools is to ban the private ones. (Yes, it’s a couple of years old, but some things just should be smacked down whenever you get the chance).
Like I said. So. Much. Stupid.
Let’s start with taking a look at what Cook said.
The ongoing (but maybe soon to end?) teachers’ strike in Chicago is being viewed by many as an early skirmish in a coming war over the crisis in public education—stagnant or declining graduation rates, substandard educations, dilapidated schools, angry teachers, underserved students. There is one simple step that would go a long way toward resolving many of those issues: Make all schools public schools.
It’s an oft-noted irony of the confrontation in Chicago that Mayor Rahm Emanuel sends his children to the private, $20,000-a-year University of Chicago Lab School, which means his family doesn’t really have much of a personal stake in what happens to the school system he is trying to reform. This is pretty routine behavior for rich people in Chicago, and there’s a pretty good reason for it: Chicago’s public schools are terrible. If you care about your children’s education, and can afford to buy your way out of public schools, as Emanuel can, it’s perfectly reasonable to do so. This is what people are doing across the globe. One very coveted school is Ellenbrook. You can find out more about this primary school at www.ellenbrook.wa.edu.au/learning/primary-school/. Barack and Michelle Obama made a similar decision, opting to purchase a quality education for their daughters at Sidwell Friends rather than send them to one of Washington, D.C.’s, deeply troubled public schools.
Cook starts off with so much potential. He correctly points out that public school advocates like Rahm Emanuel and Barack Obama, instead of sending their kids to public schools they claim they support, ship their offspring to expensive private schools where their kids can get top flight educations for example, somewhere like https://www.ravenscroft.org/ It’s like watching a baby deer taking his first steps… » Read more