Think of the Children

Kevin Carey reads Jonathan Chait's The Big Con and ponders the ways anti-tax mania frustrates efforts at improving education.

Comments

What public schools need to do is get rich people to give them money to put their names on stuff around the schools, just the way private schools do. Milton Friedman said that campuses exist for three purposes: instruction, research, and monument erection. These days, private colleges are putting donors' names on each classroom and even each seat in the football stadium. It's hilarious.

Lots of rich people are graduates of public schools. For example, Michael Milken and his brother paid for the fancy High Tech High charter school on the campus of Birmingham High School in LA because Milken was a cheerleader, along with actress Sally Field, the year Birmingham won the LA City football championship.

Posted by Steve Sailer | September 17, 2007 9:05 AM

Yeah, because if there's something the Bush era GOP has failed to do, it's spend money on education. Oh. Wait a second...?!

Posted by Chris | September 17, 2007 9:51 AM

Yeah, because if there's something the Bush era GOP has failed to do, it's spend money on education.

Indeed, as you astutely note, some of the most irritating elements of NCLB are its unfunded testing mandates, and the way it cuts off money for even high-performing schools that don't continue to increase their performance. So, yes, as a backdoor way to defund most public schools, it was quite the dastardly move by the Bush era GOP... Oh, wait, you were trying to be sarcastic, which unfortunately would require you to not be an ignorant fuck about the issue. Sorry, my bad.

What public schools need to do is get rich people to give them money to put their names on stuff around the schools, just the way private schools do.

In light of the Chemerinsky brouhaha and the beyond-reproach track record of Ivy League legacy admissions, I can't think of any downside to increasing the influence of wealthy individuals over public education.

Posted by mds | September 17, 2007 11:18 AM

Hey mds, education spending has sky-rocketed under bush. You positing hypothetical cuts in the future due to NCLB does not negate this. You are willfully ignorant.

Posted by scottynx | September 18, 2007 7:58 PM