All Posts Tagged With: "public schools"
Growing Government Ensures “National Greatness”?
There is widespread belief among politicians, public officials, and pundits that if government doesn’t give us the seeds, nothing will grow. A friend of mine served on our city’s legislative council for eight years. During that time he often heard—in defense of tax-funded business incentives—“If we don’t do something, nothing will happen.” The same belief [...]
21Sep2011 | Arthur E. Foulkes | 6 comments | ContinuedFree the Children, Cut the Budget
Education is important – far too important to leave to politicians and bureaucrats.
4Mar2011 | Sheldon Richman | 29 comments | ContinuedWhat Education Needs
As an antidote to the blather masquerading on MSNBC as serious discussion of education, I prescribe the wisdom of Joseph Priestley (1733-1804).
1Oct2010 | Sheldon Richman | 18 comments | ContinuedMore Hand-Wringing over Education
MSNBC is devoting this week to the education crisis. Every ten years or so, the media, politicians, and intelligentsia remember how bad the government schools are. They then go into overdrive discussing what’s wrong and what to do about it. Funny thing is, they never look back to the last time they went through this [...]
30Sep2010 | Sheldon Richman | 7 comments | ContinuedWeapons of Mass Instruction: A Schoolteacher’s Journey Through the Dark World of Compulsory Schooling
An annoying bumper sticker I have seen on occasion reads, “If you think education is costly, try ignorance.” That trope is meant to break down resistance to the education establishment’s desire to shop-vac in as much taxpayer money as possible. The trickery is subtle—deceive people into equating schooling with education. What the education establishment does [...]
22Sep2010 | George C. Leef | 15 comments | ContinuedPublic Schools through the Public Choice Lens
Regarding the state of government (“public”) schooling in the United States today, two facts stand out. The first is that the average amount of money spent per pupil has dramatically increased during the past 35 years and is now one of the highest in the world, and the second is that student achievement, by both [...]
22Sep2010 | Michael Bors | 7 comments | ContinuedThe Joy of Freedom: An Economist’s Odyssey
Growing up in a fairly poor family in rural Manitoba, David Henderson would have seemed an unlikely candidate for the authorship of one of the most resounding libertarian books to come along in years. But an innate sense that there was something valuable in having the freedom to live one’s life according to one’s own [...]
30Jun2010 | George C. Leef | 0 comments | ContinuedR. C. Hoiles and Public Schooling
In a letter dated May 23, 1946, the libertarian publisher R. C. Hoiles wrote to Leonard E. Read, who would establish the Foundation for Economic Education later that same year. Hoiles advised Read on what he believed was the underlying cause of America’s alarming shift from individual liberty toward socialism: I am inclined to think [...]
20May2010 | Wendy McElroy | 2 comments | ContinuedThe Harsh Truth About Public Schools
Prepare for a mind-altering experience as you take a scary but empowering read through Bruce Shortt’s book The Harsh Truth About Public Schools. The reader should not be deceived by what seems an overwhelmingly sectarian starting point in this well-organized, reader-friendly book. Shortt’s style is highly effective in convincing readers that the “public school” system [...]
18May2010 | David L. Littmann | 2 comments | ContinuedThe Beautiful Tree
In the poorest parts of the world you’ll find private education. From Ghana to India to China, private schools are sprouting up everywhere. There are new schools opening where none were before. There are also new schools where government “free” schools already exist but languish. Why? Simple: Parents want the best for their children. They [...]
24Mar2010 | Max Borders | 1 comment | ContinuedWe Don’t Need No State Education
Finally ending the State’s monopoly — which means taking away the money — will let us bring education back to human scale, with all the respect for individuality that this implies.
19Feb2010 | Sheldon Richman | 17 comments | ContinuedGovernment Education Is Broken?
Alan Schaeffer is the president of the Alliance for the Separation of School and State. The late Marshall Fritz was the Alliance’s founder and board chairman. New York Times op-ed columnist Bob Herbert is rightfully worried about American education. He’s bothered that no one else seems worried. In his article “Clueless in America” (April 22), [...]
1Nov2008 | and Alan Schaeffer | 5 comments | ContinuedLanguage, Loyalty, and Liberty
The equanimity with which Americans have watched their freedoms flee puzzles many of us, but perhaps I’ve solved the mystery: they’re too busy worrying about the English language instead. They fear its imminent expiration, however exaggerated reports of that death may be. Some blame rap music, text-messaging, or state-enforced “education” for English’s demise; many fault [...]
1Oct2008 | Becky Akers | 0 comments | ContinuedCourt Holds California’s Homeschoolers in Suspense
Anyone interested in the nearly criminal mismanagement of the nation’s government-run schools need only do research on the acronym LAUSD. In March 2006 Los Angeles Mayor Antonio Villaraiogosa gave a speech blasting the LAUSD—Los Angeles Unified School District—for its “culture of complacency” and described the dropout problem in the district as “the new civil rights [...]
1May2008 | Steven Greenhut | 0 comments | ContinuedThe End Run to Freedom
What does the future hold for economic life in the United States? Will we move toward greater freedom or less? What role will ideas and rhetoric play, if any, in making sure that the direction is one that lovers of freedom prefer?
1Jun2006 | Russell Roberts | 0 comments | ContinuedThe Effrontery of the "Open Space" Movement
New Hampshire is called the “Live Free or Die”
state. It has garnered such a reputation as a bastion
of freedom that the Porcupine members
of the Free State Project selected it as the place to which
they would like to relocate in order to live more independently
and more productively.
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