Which is better - public schooling or private?

JGXdebatePRO

I believe Private schools are superior as they have more resources at their disposal and base their teaching on their knowledge of the students, not what the government imposes upon them. A teacher obviously knows more about his/her students than BOJO does.

Plaffelvohfen

There is no intrinsic difference... Being "private" doesn't imply being "better"...

JGXdebatePRO

Plaffelvohfen said:

There is no intrinsic difference... Being "private" doesn't imply being "better"...

I did not say that, i simply advocated that private schools tend to have more resources at their disposal.

xlJ_dolphin_473

JGXdebatePRO said:

I believe Private schools are superior as they have more resources at their disposal and base their teaching on their knowledge of the students, not what the government imposes upon them. A teacher obviously knows more about his/her students than BOJO does.

You seem to be very anti-Boris Johnson. Maybe we could have a debate about whether he is doing a good job as prime minister?

MayCaesar

Public schools have no incentives to improve the quality of education, as their funding is only very loosely connected to their performance - and that performance, in turn, is based on subjective rules issued by bureaucrats, and not based on the real life performance of the graduates.

Private schools, on the other hand, have a very strong incentive to teach students as well as they can, as nobody is going to invest serious money in them otherwise, when there are taxpayer-funded alternatives out there.

As always, the market demands excellence of private entities, while public entities fall apart. Private schools are certainly better overall, and the existence of a small minority of excellent public schools does not change the trend - and, for that matter, really excellent public schools also get a lot of private donations (for example, my cousin's high school in Toronto, one of the top schools in the city, while being public, received heavy investments from some of its rich graduates and, at large, operated as a private entity as a result).

AlofRI

Private schools are too open to "controlled teaching". Without public control of curriculum students can be "guided" to the thinking of those who control (pay for), the school. Independent thinking, as shown several times in schools and universities controlled by the Koch Bros, must be along the lines of the Koch Bros. thoughts. (Just using them as one example, of course). They would have loved to "nudged U.S." toward Libertarianism and away from democracy. Capitalism unchained! 

No, we need independent thinking, we need "public" control BACKED by the government, not controlled by it ….. or controlled by capitalists that would eventually control the thought ….. and eventually the government also.

MayCaesar

@AlofRI

So when the government pays for schools, does it mean that students will be guided to the thinking of the government? Or is the government magically not a subject to corruption (he-he) and will be absolutely impartial here?

I have never understood this idea that private companies are selfish entities caring only about profit, while the government consists of noble impartial angels, when the history shows that the exact opposite is much closer to the reality.

I feel like this narrative is the exact result of education being controlled by the government. It is telling that there has been a very strong correlation observed between how much high school education is controlled by the government and how much people trust the governmental institutions.

AlofRI

@MayCaesar ;
No. The democratic way is to appoint a Secretary of Education, who conferences with teachers and state education people, gets their take on what is right or wrong with education and moves on from there. NO GOVERNMENT DIRECTIVES without agreement with educators. (Of course, that's not what we have today, that's how it USED to be. Still should be!

Apparently you didn't see the articles about the Kochs  and universities that refused to "direct" the studies in the way requested and, some at least, lost large donations. 
I'm not for "government schools" OR corporate schools. I'm for free education "regulated" by a national standard designed by those who educate. If a state wants to RAISE those standards, so be it, as long as they are kept away from "propagandizing" and other dangerous practices. (Such as forced religious studies).

MayCaesar

@AlofRI

But given that the consulted people get paid for their services, they have the incentive to approve a program favorable to the government. Imagine that, as a result of these consultations, say, a history program featuring strong criticism of the US Department of Education results - how likely is it to actually be implemented, and the same education authorities to be consulted in the future? Sorry, but the government, just like any other entity, strives to empower itself, and it has pretty strong tools at its disposal to do so.

Same goes for private entities, obviously, but those entities' actions are constrained by the requirements to win the market competition. They do not have to be impartial, but they do have to provide the type of education parents want for their kids, otherwise they will not get many customers and will go bankrupt.
If the government goes bankrupt, it can always just default with no serious repercussions - not that it will any time soon, given that the taxpayers will have to fund it regardless of how unhappy they may be with its performance.
If a private school goes bankrupt, then it is over, and the buildings will be sold to the highest bidder; there are no bailouts there.

I do not understand why any national standard has to exist for education. There are no real national standards when it comes to university education, for example, and, as a result, the US universities are by far the strongest in the world. Why would it be different for lower education levels?
It is okay to have public schools, but I fail to see a reason to deny all statistics showing that private schools provide kids with much better education. Almost any family rich enough will send its kids to a good private school, despite decent public school alternatives available, and for very good reasons.

Practice speaks volumes, even if theory is not convincing enough (and in this case, in my opinion, it is). You do not have to believe me; just look at hard statistics (the latest government-funded research on topic I found is from 1997):

https://nces.ed.gov/pubs97/97983.pdf

Take a look at tables on the 6th, 9th, 18th, 19th, 21st and 25th pages that show a whooping statistical advantage of private schools over public schools in virtually all relevant aspects. This is a US study, but I can find similar studies for countless other countries; here is a study on public vs private schools in Philippines, for example, reaching very similar consclusions:

https://eric.ed.gov/?id=EJ1180735

I can find virtually no studies showing any advantage to public schools, other than lower price, and only a few studies that claim that public and private schools perform similarly. The evidence is clear, and while the reasons behind the difference can be debated, the takeaway is that if you have some extra money, then you should send your kids to a good private school and ignore the public sector. Even if you assume that private and public schools perform similarly (and there is little evidence supporting that), you still have to acknowledge that private schools generally have some other advantages, such as lower crime rates, better educational and social students' and teachers' backgrounds, etc.