Since I wrote on eliminating public libraries, I suppose it is now time to write about education in general. I expect that I will get more disagreement on this than on anything else, as my ideas differ a great deal fromt he norm. Still, I have to say what I think is true, whether or not anyone agrees.

That public education is broken, no one can argue. We spend more on students in public schools than many private schools do, yet we get much worse results. Many public schools produce illiterate children, and event he best of public schools rarely do as well as private schools. Public schools are permeated with violence, with drugs, and all the other ills of society at large. And on top of all that, the public schools have become a battle ground of ideologies. Evolution versus Intelligent Design. Various views of sex education. Indoctrination on a number of topics. School prayer. All of these have become prizes in a continuing tug of war over who will control our public schools.

After saying that, most essays would launch into a list of all the causes. The teachers' unions, the excessive bureaucracy, the lack of ability to select students, the inability to expel troublesome student, the inability to fire bad teachers, lack of accountability, spending more time on social experiments than education, and on and on. They would then follow with a list of solutions. Vouchers, magnet schools, school choice, testing, accountability, and so on. But such lists are worthless. The real problem is not any of these things. They are only symptoms. The real answer is right before our eyes, but we have been looking in the wrong place.

The solution to failing public schools is to eliminate public education.

The reasons for this are very simple. Private schools have always out performed public schools. You can choose a private school which shares your values. You have a greater say in what a private school teaches. If you don't like your private school, you can go to another. All the ills of public schools are  solved quite simply by moving to an entirely private educational system.

Now, having said that, I will move to the much harder part of my argument, dismissing all of those arguments that will be raised against my plan.

First, the most obvious argument is that if we eliminate public schools, many students will receive no education. But that is simply absurd. Private education is not as expensive per student as public, so all those whoa re taxed to pay for public education would end up with enough money to educated their child with some left over.

But, then we are left with the poor. Which is the reason conservatives have traditional sponsored various "voucher" schemes. It is a backdoor way to move to all private schools while not seeming "insensitive". On the other hand, I am not a politician, so I can say it is not the government's job. If enough people want poor kids to go to school, then they can fund scholarships. Why do they need to be compelled by the state to do good? And if no one wants to fund scholarships, then why should the state be able to make them pay for scholarships they would not otherwise fund?

Of course, the truth of the matter is, even with our confiscatory taxation, many poor children get scholarships to Catholic and other schools, so without that taxation even more money would be available. I am sure many other scholarships would be available. In addition, with such a demand for private schools, price competition would force tuitions downward, making existing scholarships go farther. It is possible some might not get an education, but, then again, even though they are in school today, many still are not getting an education.

Another objection is that, without state oversight, schools would not teach children "properly".

This is just absurd. It assumes that there is "a proper education", which in itself is just wrong. There are many ways to educate children, and only a government bureaucrat would think there is one right way. Education is intended to prepare students for certain futures, but there is no one right future. If some parents think bible study is more important than calculus, who are we to tell them they are wrong? If ISKCON* wants to emphasize meditation and scriptures over other topics, that is their right. Likewise, if another parent wants to emphasize Spanish over English, that too is his right. It is the choice of the parents, not of the state, what their children should learn. So the fear over not "being taught right" is invalid, as it assumes there is a proper measure of education outside of the desires of the parents.

Then there is the fear that parents might not educate their children at all. But that is happening now, so I don't see how my change really makes this any worse. Yes, there are coercive truancy laws, but in many cities they are barely enforced. And, in all honesty, if parents do not care whether their kids attend school, even if those children are kept trapped in a classroom, I doubt they will learn much. If your home environment tells you education is useless, whether you are forced into school or not, you just won't learn. All the laws in the world will not change that.

I am sure there are other objections, but I will deal with those as they are raised in comments. For now let me close with a theoretical and a pragmatic argument.

Theoretically, as I will show in an essay I am finishing this weekend, the state simply has no place in education. The state exists to protect us from force, fraud and theft, and to provide civil courts to settle disputes. Education is a private enterprise, which is outside of the state's scope. Using the state to educate is simply an inefficient way to approach the problem.

Which leads to my pragmatic argument. The state is simply too inefficient. Because of the bureaucratic structure, required of non-profit organizations, the state piles huge layers of administration on top of everything. This leads to massive overhead, which private schools manage to avoid. It is why superior private education still costs much less per pupil than inferior public education.

In addition, by requiring that education be universal, we make sure that students with no interest in learning are still kept in class. Worse still, since they are "troubled" they end up stuck in class with others who simply have trouble learning, who are hurt most by their disruptions. If they could be expelled until they learned the value of education (if they ever do) and returned, other students would benefit. But public education makes that impossible. Private education does not.

Finally, and most importantly, private education removes all those nasty debates that arise over education. If you favor intelligent design, find a school teaching ID. If you want no sex education, find a school without it. But if you favor evolution and sex ed, you can find those too. Once we remove public education, there is no more reason to fight. Those with a set of beliefs they want taught can find a school teaching those beliefs, or even start their own. Without public money involved, the reason for fighting is over. As with all other matters where the state has involved itself in issues it should leave alone, it is only the intrusion of the state and public money which make public education such a contentious issue. Once we remove the state and its money from the equation, there is no reason to argue.

And as an added benefit, our children will be much better educated as well.

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* International Society for Krishna Consciousness aka the Hare Krishnas. In reality my description is a bit of an exaggeration. My wife attended an ISKCON school to observe for a college course, so they always come to mind as a good example of a non-traditional educational establishment.

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DISCLOSURE

I attended private school form first through tenth grades, and public school in kindergarten and for half of eleventh grade before I dropped out.  I am not wealthy, my parents worked a bit extra to afford my education.

My mother also currently teaches at a private school. She has taught at both private and public schools (mostly private in recent years) for over forty years.