The Public Education System is detrimental

When we hear politicians talk, some proclaim radical reforms, or rather perceived radicalism, to the whole system. But, through everything, when it comes to education, reforms are rather mild or not spoken of. By ignoring such a vital issue, we destroy the country. Period. Today's students are tomorrow politicians. Yet, the current educational system is failing. The American school system is on par with Mexico. The real solution is to eliminate the public school system and replace it with a better, voluntary system.

The current American school system requires the acceptance of two facts: 1) deny that autocratic conditions exist and 2) insist that the victims of this system require such treatment. For those that do not believe this, just look at one simple law under the threat of violence, school is mandatory, in all 50 states. In other words, if a person does not go to school, they go to jail or juvenile detention facilities. Of course, the system is justified by asserting that students would lack the intellectual (or moral) fiber for freedom and would thus spend their time playing video  games or something else equally wasteful. People present the thousands of students who come home and sit in front of the television.  When parents see their child, drained by an endless stream of assignments, glued to a television screen, they assume that this behavior is common for kids. They assume that if kids were free they would spend all their days passively in front of a computer screen. Yet, nobody ever considers the context of their child's actions nor do they ever think of reviewing all of the evidence to the contrary: students want to learn, but public schools do not provide the place to learn.

As the effectiveness of a school is evaluated, we must remember that as Marshall McLuhan asserted, "the medium is the message." When looking at schools, it is immediately obvious that the methods make no sense. People do not respond to repressive environments well. Let us put it this way, a prisoner of war (POW) could learn calculus under duress, but is it reasonable to assume 1) they will associate calculus with incarceration; 2) despise fellow POWs who learn since they seem complicit with their captors and 3) try to forget the information when they are freed? All three of those statements are easily accepted as true simply through common sense. How are public schools any different? Students are like the POW in that they are forced to attend school. Students associate the material with the school environment itself. Many students despise those who learn creating problems such as bullying. Finally, students may either 1) choose to not learn or 2) forget the materials during the summer time or at the end of the day by refusing to do homework. As the government pours billions of dollars and hires thousands of experts, it would be wise to remember that the system cannot be reformed. It is quite literally impossible to eliminate bullying and illiteracy because it is the nature of forced public schools that cause the problems in the first place.

Still, nobody really questions public schools and nobody says "perhaps this is not the best system, perhaps getting rid of the system would be better." Two words: learned helplessness. This condition takes place at an early age when children find they will not be able to follow their passions because of the rigid curriculum, structure, and overall design. Every single aspect of a student's life, down the last millisecond is controlled all the way down to their surroundings, what they are permitted to do and how they are permitted to do it what they may think and how they are permitted to think it. Students are under constant surveillance, in many schools, there are cameras monitoring the hallways. The student must obtain permission from the teacher to leave the classroom, to speak, and even to use the bathroom. The students' personal effects are searched routinely and in some cases, police patrol the schools (and 95% of the police carry firearms.) Ironically, prisoners of war are required, under the Third Geneva Convention, to receive better treatment then our students. Public schools consistently violate Articles 17, 18, 22, 25, 26, 38, 51, 52, 53 and 99 of the Third Geneva Convention. (The articles in question govern labor, discipline, personal effects, well being and health, diet, and exposure to humiliation.) Yet, students, on a daily basis, are subjected to conditions which would be considered war crimes had they been prisoners of war and parents allow it to happen.

In many cases, students attempt to resist in the classroom. Sadly the efforts are futile. In 2008, 223,190 students were beaten for tardiness, talking back to teachers, dress, and language. As incomprehensible the number is, it still only represents reported incidents. In many states, punishments such as solitary confinement are preferred (http://www.cnn.com/2008/US/12/17/seclusion.rooms/index.html). Solitary confinement is a punishment widely used to keep violent criminals away from the general population of prisons. Then there are the millions of students who are drugged for conditions which seem like Drapetomania (it is widely seen as pseudoscience). For those not familiar, Drapetomania was discovered in 1851 and impelled slaves to attempt to escape captivity. Still people wonder why so many students rebel outside the classroom.

Throughout all of the abuses presented above, people still support the system because they feel learning civil rights is usurped by learning. Now fear, humiliation and degradation are all seen as educational tools (http://blogs.wsj.com/wsjam/2010/09/17/when-teachers-discipline-students/) since teaching so many students at a time requires conformity and submission. Social efficiency dictates and is the final arbiter in all matters. As such, fear and obedience to authority remains in a student. That is most evident when we see how the schools which maintain order are revered and those which do not are seen as failures. Many people insist that it is through this environment that students learn to be citizens. But, as Simone Weil observed in her book Waiting for God, "a slave does not become like his master by obeying him." So why do people assume that a student becomes like the teacher by obeying the teacher? Success is determined not by mastery of the subject but rather by how well they meet the expectations of the teacher. Students are told to "play the game," not to make the game themselves.

Okay, it is time to take a step back and recognize that the above conditions all occur in varying degrees across all public schools. Educators are generally not sadistic and usually are well-meaning. But, they still must exist in a state of denial or acknowledge they are complicit in the endless cycle. Each school exists on the notion that students are forced to be there as such, public schools largely do not have to worry about the environment they are placed in. Students who succeed or adapted better normally do not recognize their success is based upon the misfortune of others. Anybody can win the lottery, but not everybody does. Failure is essential to the public school system to sort students based on their performance.

Even the worst alternative that could possible be presented is better then the current system. It is very difficult to create a system worse then the present one. Let's say that public schools are abolished in a town. Many students would have no place to go to school, some people, to solve that problem, move away. Other families enroll their child in private schools. Then we run into another problem, the private schools become filled and there is a need for other schools. Whenever there is a demand, there will be a supply, so entrepreneurs would come into the area and provide schools on a competitive basis. At the same time, churches and other groups would gather money to provide education of their own.

Slowly, alternatives to the public school system would appear. Schools for half-day classes, large, medium and small schools. Some schools could have 40 kids to a class, other schools would have 4 kids to a class. Micro-schools would open where students could study niche interests such as science, classics, music, computers, etc. There would be single-sex schools and whether or not sports are part of schools would be dependent upon the market. At the same time, the "elementary, middle school, high school" model would not exist alone. Many classes would not be grouped by age, but rather also by ability and by level of advancement.The point is, the customer would be in charge of their education, not the government. At the end of the day, whatever happens to the school system would be what the public wants to happen. This idea sounds shockingly similar. Universities operate on many of the principles pointed out above, schools other than universities operate on many of the those principles. 

Many may object since there are those who perhaps could not afford the free market prices. Assuming that the schools above are unobtainable for the poor (something that should not be immediately assumed), grammar schools would develop. A grammar school teaches grammar and basic business topics giving a student the ability to start businesses in order to make money. It also gives them the skills needed to continue their education from books. While admittedly, they would not have the same choices wealthier people have, they would still have a better choice and a better schooling when compared to the current system. The system proposed for these students would be the one advocated by Joseph Lancaster and Andrew Bell. They developed the monitorial system. It basically works by having more-advanced students teach less advanced-students. This is common practice in many universities today and can be extremely effective. The system also had an internal economic system. A form of money was developed within the schools was created at a fixed exchange rate from a students tuition. Each and every job in the school was bided on by students, the largest bid won. In other words, tutoring could be bided on, the largest bid got the tutelage. Besides tutoring, the currency could be used to buy food, school supplies, books and other small luxuries from a school store. As an added benefit, students learn about saving and spending money. The price: about $56 per year in 2013 dollars. At this price, even the poorest street-children can afford an education.

The current school system needs to change, that much is evident. The privatization of the school system will guarantee human rights and will guarantee that everybody receives an education. Admittedly, in a private school system, it could possibly be difficult for the poor to receive the same education as somebody who is richer, but even now that is the case. In a private system, the poor will still receive a quality education while at the same time learning skills which could enable them to rise out of poverty. In the current system, it is evident that people are not learning the skills necessary to rise from poverty. For those who are not impoverished, a free market school system would allow students to flourish in an environment suited to their needs, something the current system does not provide. At the end of the day, there will always be rich and poor. But, we should enable the poor through quality schooling and not hinder them both through substandard schooling.

Marc Connuck

Libertarian Party of Bucks County