Open debate: what do you think would happen if all (US) education was privatized?

[SamanthaCarter]

That wasn't my impression, but I could have been wrong.

Or maybe I just love talking about where I live, lol.

I'm that poster and I was talking about inner city only. From what I understand those are the kiddos who could benefit most (generational poverty issues) and where it would be somewhat feasible (population density).

 

 

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[Bluegoat]

 I thought the poster was only talking about inner city school districts when she suggested the small size school though.

 

 

Yeah, those kinds of policies aren't going to be practical in more rural locations.

 

I do think they could work in non-inner city areas - other parts of cities, well-designed suburbs, towns, even some villages I have lived in, they'd work pretty well, maybe better than what they do now.

 

But once you have housing that is too far apart, you have to look at a slightly different metric.  Though, there really isn't any reason it still couldn't be fairly small.  But, you would be less able t have separate institutions for ids with unusual needs.

[Carrie12345]

So it's a lot like a wee little municipality.

 

I guess if the state or school district wanted to set up a system where there were more schools, either, like you ay, they could set one up just for your area and perhaps pay some costs associated, or you could decide to agree, or you could not agree, and perhaps that might change transport arrangements somehow, or not.

 

But it's probably not a very typical situation where they set up a general idea about how to distribute schools.

 

In my province, the principle they work on now is the opposite - its consolidation, on a basis determined by costs.  But even then, sometimes they have to navigate special situations where the usual practice doesn't make sense - there's a school with about 20 kids, because even the school board bean-counters could see that sending elementary school kids on a boat trip every day, where they sometimes get stuck on the mainland, was a bad idea.

 

For the most part though they've been closing places like that and building big consolidated schools.

 

Well, yes, it's sort of like a little municipality, except we pay our regular taxes to our public entities AND the bills for maintaining our own little municipality.  I can tell you it's probably not feasible and definitely not desired to set up a school for our area, because our district has already closed multiple schools.

[regentrude]

I think it's kind of elitist to assume that people who are capable of acquiring /accessing a home, job, vehicle and/or spouse, and daily food, clothes, and medical care to keep their kids alive until school age, are helpless when it comes to making educational decisions.  If they are indeed helpless, it is learned helplessness.

 

For those really incapable of doing right by their children, i.e. neglectors, they should be receiving services anyway, and thus they should have help understanding school choice and making attendance happen.

 

Sadly, I am currently dealing with several cases around me where caring, functional parents lacked the insight to make schooling choices that best served their children. These are people who have house and job and lead functional lives, but the educational choices they made for their children, driven by different motivations, produced young adults who have received an education that is behind what public school would have taught a student with their their intellectual abilities, and does not prepare the young people to progress towards their goals.

I am stressing that these are functional caring parents. There is no mental illness, addiction, abuse, neglect. I don't want to think what happens to kids where the latter aspects enter the picture.

Edited September 9, 2017 by regentrude

[Carrie12345]

I'm that poster and I was talking about inner city only. From what I understand those are the kiddos who could benefit most (generational poverty issues) and where it would be somewhat feasible (population density).

 

 

Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

 

Thank you for clarifying!

 

I do realize I'm probably beating multiple terminal horses, lol, but I still think it demonstrates that *some degree* of government involvement (beyond cutting checks) at all the levels is necessary, or giant swaths of the country's students would be in even more jeopardy.

[regentrude]

But once you have housing that is too far apart, you have to look at a slightly different metric.  Though, there really isn't any reason it still couldn't be fairly small.  But, you would be less able t have separate institutions for ids with unusual needs.

 

Schools in the rural areas in  my state are already tiny, and students are bussed for long distances. The schools cannot afford qualified teachers for many subjects, because they are too small and it is not cost effective.

 

No charter or private school will ever operate in these areas, because it would not be economically sensible.

Edited September 9, 2017 by regentrude

[regentrude]

This is gonna shock some people, but my high school dropout poor young urban parents made school choice decisions.  When I went to KG, their 3 then-elementary-age kids went to 3 different schools - one private, two public - based on what they felt we needed.  Eventually we were all moved to the private school.  The kids on my short low-income city street went to at least 7 different schools based on our different needs.

 

who paid for all those private schools?

[Bluegoat]

Schools in the rural areas in  my state are already tiny, and students are bussed for long distances. The schools cannot afford qualified teachers for many subjects, because they are too small and it is not cost effective.

 

No charter or private school will ever operate in these areas, because it would not be economically sensible.

 

I'm sure.

 

But I wasn't talking about charter or private schools.

 

"Not cost effective" in these kinds of problems is, I think, often the real problem, not that the school size.  And by problem, I mean that it is a problem we make the decisions on the basis of an often inadequate budget.  

[Bluegoat]

Schools in the rural areas in  my state are already tiny, and students are bussed for long distances. The schools cannot afford qualified teachers for many subjects, because they are too small and it is not cost effective.

 

No charter or private school will ever operate in these areas, because it would not be economically sensible.

 

The other side too, I think, is that a charter or private school might open in a place like that if the funding they were offered by the state was adequate.  

[regentrude]

The other side too, I think, is that a charter or private school might open in a place like that if the funding they were offered by the state was adequate.  

 

But it's not really a "private" school if the state, i.e. taxpayer, pays for it.

[Bluegoat]

But it's not really a "private" school if the state, i.e. taxpayer, pays for it.

 

Sure, you put out a contract for someone to run the service.  

[Bluegoat]

You could also give vouchers to the kids but make them worth more $$ in some cases.

[SKL]

But it's not really a "private" school if the state, i.e. taxpayer, pays for it.

 

Is a doctor a private business if Medicare pays the bills?

 

Is a building contractor a private business if the government is buying the building?

 

Is a textbook company a private business if the books are sold for public school use?

 

[Frances]

Well this is way off topic, but it's one thing to use the bags and a completely different thing to let them fly up into a tree etc.

 

Personally I don't always remember the cloth bags or I didn't know I was going to be shopping at that moment. But FTR I reuse and recycle the plastic bags I do buy. I think it's over-thinking and unhelpful to make assumptions about the people you see carrying those plastic bags. I don't think it makes the world a better place.

 

And back to the topic, I see a similar mental inflexibility. I notice that we still can't seem to mentally separate the sources from the uses when it comes to school funding.

 

Poor people have access to whatever we transfer to them, be it health care, food, housing, or education. If we set up the finances so that appropriate funding follows the child to whatever school provides the services that child needs, public or private, then the argument that poor people or SN kids will lose because of access does not work.

 

I don't think we can even discuss an all-private system in this country without including a guarantee that every child has access to the education he/she needs, at least to the extent children have access under a public school system.

 

The argument that there is no motivation for people to address special needs also does not work for reasons already discussed above. When there is funding connected to a need, the market will meet it. Our economy is full of businesses that do difficult and often unglamorous work, without any mandates from the government. At least working with special needs kids is often intrinsically rewarding.

 

Since we can't seem to ever see this aspect of the discussion the same way, maybe it would be more helpful to assume the government directly educates children in those categories alleged to be too undesirable for private schools to accept. Then could a private school arrangement for the remaining kids work? What about letting individual states or counties or districts decide the matter, or select some moderate-income districts to test the idea before rolling it out to larger populations?

Did you read the NYT times article linked earlier about charter schools in Detroit? The money does follow the child and the schools compete fiercely for them. There are more open spots than there are students to fill them. But many poor students are still getting a terrible education at these schools.

[regentrude]

Is a doctor a private business if Medicare pays the bills?

 

The doctor is actually a very interesting example. If a doctor has only medicare patients, he will not really be able to really operate as a private business because he is not allowed to "run" his business at all. He cannot operate on basic economic principles because the reimbursement rates are capped (or even fixed, not sure about the details) and do not take his actual cost into account. he will be forced to waste enormous amounts of time on paperwork. He cannot freely choose how to treat his patients, because medicare has lots of stipulations. He may be a private entity in theory, but for practical purposes cannot conduct his business like an independent business owner.

It is not surprising that a number of doctors choose not to get involved with medicare at all.

Edited September 9, 2017 by regentrude

[hepatica]

But the whole concept of having a public good is based on generalized religious charity in this country.  That's where it comes from in the first place.

 

I don't understand this. The concept of the common or public good has a long trajectory in political philosophy. In the western tradition alone, it runs from Aristotle to Cicero and ancient Roman republicanism, to Machiavelli and the Enlightenment thinkers of Hobbes and Locke and Rousseau who were a pivotal influence on the American founders. The whole idea of a 'republic' as discussed by James Madison and Thomas Paine is a direct derivation from the ancient Roman idea of res-publica (the public good). This tradition continues up through contemporary social and democratic theorists like Rawls and Arendt and Habermas. In economic theory, the idea of public goods has a long history as well, including Hobbes and Adam Smith. The concept of public good is not dependent on religious doctrine.

[Bluegoat]

The doctor is actually a very interesting example. If a doctor has only medicare patients, he will not really be able to really operate as a private business because he is not allowed to "run" his business at all. He cannot operate on basic economic principles because the reimbursement rates are capped (or even fixed, not sure about the details) and do not take his actual cost into account. he will be forced to waste enormous amounts of time on paperwork. He cannot freely choose how to treat his patients, because medicare has lots of stipulations. He may be a private entity in theory, but for practical purposes cannot conduct his business like an independent business owner.

It is not surprising that a number of doctors choose not to get involved with medicare at all.

 

Doctors here are almost exclusively private, and run themselves as such.  They also all get the same fee for service given out by the provincial insurance that all people belong to.

[Frances]

This is gonna shock some people, but my high school dropout poor young urban parents made school choice decisions. When I went to KG, their 3 then-elementary-age kids went to 3 different schools - one private, two public - based on what they felt we needed. Eventually we were all moved to the private school. The kids on my short low-income city street went to at least 7 different schools based on our different needs.

 

Many of my parents' friends put their kids in public school (of course, since funding did not follow the child), but I have no doubt they would have sent their kids to some school if public was not an option, even if they started out with the closest neighborhood school and went from there.

 

I think it's kind of elitist to assume that people who are capable of acquiring /accessing a home, job, vehicle and/or spouse, and daily food, clothes, and medical care to keep their kids alive until school age, are helpless when it comes to making educational decisions. If they are indeed helpless, it is learned helplessness.

 

For those really incapable of doing right by their children, i.e. neglectors, they should be receiving services anyway, and thus they should have help understanding school choice and making attendance happen.

Just like almost everything else in life, I think most people have varying degrees of competency in different areas. Of course there are poor, relatively uneducated people who do a great job of navigating school choices for their children. Just as I'm sure there are rich, educated people who do a bad job. But if $$ are following children and there is money to be made, there are going to be a whole lot of unscrupulous people out there trying to get parents to choose their school, regardless of the quality of education. The NYT article someone linked earlier about charter schools in Detroit gives a glimpse of what can happen when there are lots of schools competing for $.

 

I still shudder when I think that I almost ended up at Devry after high school, instead of a great LAC that led to an Ivy grad degree. My parents cared greatly about my education, but they didn't know any better and my high school counselor, like many, was no help. Edited to add that after we all finished public school, my dad ended up as president of the local school board. So my parents not only cared deeply about education, they were also very knowledgeable about many aspects of it. But they knew very little about higher education (my mom was an RN and my dad had some votech education), so they trusted what unqualified (school counselor) and untrustworthy, but very convincing (Devry rep) people said.

Edited September 10, 2017 by Frances

[regentrude]

Doctors here are almost exclusively private, and run themselves as such.  They also all get the same fee for service given out by the provincial insurance that all people belong to.

 

Can a business be considered truly private if there is governmental price control? Or are we using this term solely to characterize the ownership of the premises and instruments?

 

(Rigid governmental price control was a big economic obstacle that prevented private businesses from flourishing in the communist country I grew up in.)

Edited September 9, 2017 by regentrude

[Bluegoat]

I don't understand this. The concept of the common or public good has a long trajectory in political philosophy. In the western tradition alone, it runs from Aristotle to Cicero and ancient Roman republicanism, to Machiavelli and the Enlightenment thinkers of Hobbes and Locke and Rousseau who were a pivotal influence on the American founders. The whole idea of a 'republic' as discussed by James Madison and Thomas Paine is a direct derivation from the ancient Roman idea of res-publica (the public good). This tradition continues up through contemporary social and democratic theorists like Rawls and Arendt and Habermas. In economic theory, the idea of public goods has a long history as well, including Hobbes and Adam Smith. The concept of public good is not dependent on religious doctrine.

 

I wonder if what Carol is saying is that, in fact, in many places the motivation for people developing these institutions was their religious belief.

 

For example, here in Canada, the father of our public medical system was a Christian socialist from a line of such people who were in politics - it was a common situation when a lot of those kinds of public institutions were being built here that the Christian socialists were involved in developing and advocating for them.

 

And they certainly saw that as the expression of their religious convictions.

 

I wouldn't be surprised if public education in many places had a similar situation.

[SKL]

Did you read the NYT times article linked earlier about charter schools in Detroit? The money does follow the child and the schools compete fiercely for them. There are more open spots than there are students to fill them. But many poor students are still getting a terrible education at these schools.

 

No, I did not read the article, because my time is limited and because it's just as easy to spin a story negative as positive depending on bias.

 

I do know that Detroit may not be a good baseline example in any case.  Besides having notoriously bad public schools, they have many other problems.  I have personally seen community development projects rise and fall purely based on Detroit politics, with millions of $ wasted an nothing to show for it.

 

I also don't know that the Detroit funding system is comparable to what is being proposed / envisioned when people talk about privatizing school systems.

 

I also feel that any change needs time for the results to show.  You also can't judge educational changes in a vacuum.  The kids who do very poorly in any school system have problems other than how their school operates. 

 

As for Detroit, kudos to those who bothered to try something - you can't get much worse than worst.

 

[Bluegoat]

Can a business be considered truly private if there is governmental price control? Or are we using this term solely to characterize the ownership of the premises and instruments?

 

(Rigid governmental price control was a big economic obstacle that prevented private businesses from flourishing in the communist country I grew up in.)

 

Well, it isn't considered public.  No one has defined it for the purposes of this discussion.

 

It's fairly common in some sectors for their to be some kinds of price controls - things like power, water, maybe public transit.  

 

Here, the provinces and doctors group negotiates the fees for a contract period.  That kind of approach seems common in other industries too - there is some way to negotiate based on the needs of the industry and what is fair for all.

 

ETA - in the case of doctors they abide by all the tax and other regs for small business.

Edited September 9, 2017 by Bluegoat

[creekland]

So - say a group like this has some land, somewhere, that essentially they've bought and built roads and houses and such, and are responsible for sanitation and water  - are they then also responsible for building some kind of school?

 

No.  They are zoned for a public school district.  As far as I know, every address in the US is.  One pays taxes for that district whether one chooses to use it or not (and regardless of whether one even has kids).

 

This is gonna shock some people, but my high school dropout poor young urban parents made school choice decisions.  When I went to KG, their 3 then-elementary-age kids went to 3 different schools - one private, two public - based on what they felt we needed.  Eventually we were all moved to the private school.  The kids on my short low-income city street went to at least 7 different schools based on our different needs.

 

Many of my parents' friends put their kids in public school (of course, since funding did not follow the child), but I have no doubt they would have sent their kids to some school if public was not an option, even if they started out with the closest neighborhood school and went from there.

 

I think it's kind of elitist to assume that people who are capable of acquiring /accessing a home, job, vehicle and/or spouse, and daily food, clothes, and medical care to keep their kids alive until school age, are helpless when it comes to making educational decisions.  If they are indeed helpless, it is learned helplessness.

 

For those really incapable of doing right by their children, i.e. neglectors, they should be receiving services anyway, and thus they should have help understanding school choice and making attendance happen.

 

(Demographic as it relates to education - nothing else.)

 

I recopied the above from my post you quoted because you evidently missed it in your skimming.  My experience is a bit like Regentrude's.  How much one knows and cares about educating their youngsters isn't terribly related to socio or economic class demographics.

[SKL]

I wonder if what Carol is saying is that, in fact, in many places the motivation for people developing these institutions was their religious belief.

 

For example, here in Canada, the father of our public medical system was a Christian socialist from a line of such people who were in politics - it was a common situation when a lot of those kinds of public institutions were being built here that the Christian socialists were involved in developing and advocating for them.

 

And they certainly saw that as the expression of their religious convictions.

 

I wouldn't be surprised if public education in many places had a similar situation.

 

This is what some of the tour guides said in the European countries I recently toured in.  They prefaced it with we are a Christian country and as Christians we believe _____.

 

[hepatica]

I wonder if what Carol is saying is that, in fact, in many places the motivation for people developing these institutions was their religious belief.

 

For example, here in Canada, the father of our public medical system was a Christian socialist from a line of such people who were in politics - it was a common situation when a lot of those kinds of public institutions were being built here that the Christian socialists were involved in developing and advocating for them.

 

And they certainly saw that as the expression of their religious convictions.

 

I wouldn't be surprised if public education in many places had a similar situation.

 

In the US, Horace Mann is typically credited with popularizing the idea of universal, non sectarian public education. He is considered the "father" of American public education. Mann's idea of public schools was based on the Prussian ideal of common schools, and he specifically wanted schools to educate citizens in civic virtue (again, the ancient Roman ideal) and to help equalize social disadvantages. Interestingly, his ideas were opposed by religious groups because he insisted that public education be non-sectarian.

[Carol in Cal.]

I wonder if what Carol is saying is that, in fact, in many places the motivation for people developing these institutions was their religious belief.

 

For example, here in Canada, the father of our public medical system was a Christian socialist from a line of such people who were in politics - it was a common situation when a lot of those kinds of public institutions were being built here that the Christian socialists were involved in developing and advocating for them.

 

And they certainly saw that as the expression of their religious convictions.

 

I wouldn't be surprised if public education in many places had a similar situation.

Actually no, it's not that, although that is true of many of our oldest, most venerable private universities.

 

It's like it's an echo of a time when Christianity was commonplace, just about assumed.

 

Have you ever noticed how books written before about 1950 in the US sort of assume a knowledge of Christianity?  It was such common parlance.  It wasn't always held to or followed or believed in, but it created a moral influence that was much more pervasive than actual belief.  And a big part of that was generosity and caring for the poor, as an ideal.

 

Now, of course, this wasn't followed particularly well, but it was everyone's ideal, long after the assumption that everyone was Christian became false.  

 

It's like in that book "The Prime of Miss Jean Brodie" where it mentions how even though Scottish Calvinism is neither taught nor believed, the ethos of it echoes throughout the school.

 

Please note that I am not in any way saying that one has to be Christian to be generous, just that in the US the idea that everyone should be provided for and educated is rooted in classical Christian beliefs that are no longer commonly held.

Edited September 9, 2017 by Carol in Cal.

[Bluegoat]

Actually no, it's not that, although that is true of many of our oldest, most venerable private universities.

 

It's like it's an echo of a time when Christianity was commonplace, just about assumed.

 

Have you ever noticed how books written before about 1950 in the US sort of assume a knowledge of Christianity?  It was such common parlance.  It wasn't always held to or followed or believed in, but it created a moral influence that was much more pervasive than actual belief.  And a big part of that was generosity and caring for the poor, as an ideal.

 

Now, of course, this wasn't followed particularly well, but it was everyone's ideal, long after the assumption that everyone was Christian became false.  

 

It's like in that book "The Prime of Miss Jean Brodie" where it mentions how even though Scottish Calvinism is neither taught nor believed, the ethos of it echoes throughout the school.

 

Please note that I am not in any way saying that one has to be Christian to be generous, just that in the US the idea that everyone should be provided for and educated is rooted in classical Christian beliefs that are no longer commonly held.

 

I see what you are saying.

 

Yes, there are lots of things people kind of take for granted because they come out of the spiritual beliefs of the culture in some way.  They are just underlying assumptions, or sometimes more like habits.

 

I mean, it would be pretty weird if that didn't happen. 

[Guest]

Well this is way off topic, but it's one thing to use the bags and a completely different thing to let them fly up into a tree etc.

 

Personally I don't always remember the cloth bags or I didn't know I was going to be shopping at that moment. But FTR I reuse and recycle the plastic bags I do buy. I think it's over-thinking and unhelpful to make assumptions about the people you see carrying those plastic bags. I don't think it makes the world a better place.

And yeah, it's OT, but I feel I must defend what you are calling assumptions. The things I said in my post re: how people react to charges for bags is not an assumption. It is something I witness from my DH and others. I have heard the complaints; I have heard my own family members say, "I will NOT shop in Montgomery County because they charge you for every damn bag!" and then I have to say, "They don't if you just bring you own damn bag."

 

I have been mocked repeatedly by sneering people, some who are bone of my bone, because I'm "gonna save the environment all by yourself, eh?" I have been dissed by cashiers who said, "You know we actually give you bags for free here."

 

This is one of my passionate soapboxes (don't get me going on plastic water bottles...) and no, I do not see what is so hard about bringing some bags along so you have them when needed. Of course, it is easy to forget before it is a habit; I forget sometimes, too, but I forgot more when I first started. So in that case, I would buy a few bags as a sort of negative reinforcement of my own. Now it is almost as improbable for me to forget as to forget my wallet; I'm going shopping, I need my bags. Reusing and recycling is certainly better than not, but it's not nearly as good as just using one's own bags. I don't think anyone intends for their plastic bags to end up in the treetops, yet there they are. Yet this has never happened to a single reusable bag I ever dropped or accidentally had blown from my cart.

 

The point of the thing is that this is perfect proof of how high percentage of compliance in things that are a public good do not occur until the governments (local or fed) force compliance in a mandatory way. The link that luuknam gave about countries where bags are banned or some other discouragement is used is such a perfect example. Where is there over 90% compliance with no plastic bags? Places where it is either totally unavailable or the penalty is a big deterrant.

[SKL]

Actually no, it's not that, although that is true of many of our oldest, most venerable private universities.

 

It's like it's an echo of a time when Christianity was commonplace, just about assumed.

 

Have you ever noticed how books written before about 1950 in the US sort of assume a knowledge of Christianity?  It was such common parlance.  It wasn't always held to or followed or believed in, but it created a moral influence that was much more pervasive than actual belief.  And a big part of that was generosity and caring for the poor, as an ideal.

 

Now, of course, this wasn't followed particularly well, but it was everyone's ideal, long after the assumption that everyone was Christian became false.  

 

It's like in that book "The Prime of Miss Jean Brodie" where it mentions how even though Scottish Calvinism is neither taught nor believed, the ethos of it echoes throughout the school.

 

Please note that I am not in any way saying that one has to be Christian to be generous, just that in the US the idea that everyone should be provided for and educated is rooted in classical Christian beliefs that are no longer commonly held.

 

Jewish beliefs also.

 

[SKL]

And yeah, it's OT, but I feel I must defend what you are calling assumptions. The things I said in my post re: how people react to charges for bags is not an assumption. It is something I witness from my DH and others. I have heard the complaints; I have heard my own family members say, "I will NOT shop in Montgomery County because they charge you for every damn bag!" and then I have to say, "They don't if you just bring you own damn bag."

 

I have been mocked repeatedly by sneering people, some who are bone of my bone, because I'm "gonna save the environment all by yourself, eh?" I have been dissed by cashiers who said, "You know we actually give you bags for free here."

 

This is one of my passionate soapboxes (don't get me going on plastic water bottles...) and no, I do not see what is so hard about bringing some bags along so you have them when needed. Of course, it is easy to forget before it is a habit; I forget sometimes, too, but I forgot more when I first started. So in that case, I would buy a few bags as a sort of negative reinforcement of my own. Now it is almost as improbable for me to forget as to forget my wallet; I'm going shopping, I need my bags. Reusing and recycling is certainly better than not, but it's not nearly as good as just using one's own bags. I don't think anyone intends for their plastic bags to end up in the treetops, yet there they are. Yet this has never happened to a single reusable bag I ever dropped or accidentally had blown from my cart.

 

The point of the thing is that this is perfect proof of how high percentage of compliance in things that are a public good do not occur until the governments (local or fed) force compliance in a mandatory way. The link that luuknam gave about countries where bags are banned or some other discouragement is used is such a perfect example. Where is there over 90% compliance with no plastic bags? Places where it is either totally unavailable or the penalty is a big deterrant.

 

Well I don't see a lot of bags in treetops around here, so we must have figured out other ways to prevent that.

 

We don't have all that negativity over bags here, but lots of people bring their own bags (some of them re-used plastic ones).

 

 

I guess we'll have to agree to disagree about whether this is a big enough deal to (a) ban bags or (b) hate on people.

[Reefgazer]

Ditto here - my dad never even completed high school, but made plenty of well-thought-out decisions. about my education and a whole lot else.

This is gonna shock some people, but my high school dropout poor young urban parents made school choice decisions.  When I went to KG, their 3 then-elementary-age kids went to 3 different schools - one private, two public - based on what they felt we needed.  Eventually we were all moved to the private school.  The kids on my short low-income city street went to at least 7 different schools based on our different needs.

 

Many of my parents' friends put their kids in public school (of course, since funding did not follow the child), but I have no doubt they would have sent their kids to some school if public was not an option, even if they started out with the closest neighborhood school and went from there.

 

I think it's kind of elitist to assume that people who are capable of acquiring /accessing a home, job, vehicle and/or spouse, and daily food, clothes, and medical care to keep their kids alive until school age, are helpless when it comes to making educational decisions.  If they are indeed helpless, it is learned helplessness.

 

For those really incapable of doing right by their children, i.e. neglectors, they should be receiving services anyway, and thus they should have help understanding school choice and making attendance happen.