kitchen table math, the sequel: Competition Turns Out To Be Good For Schools

Wednesday, May 9, 2007

Competition Turns Out To Be Good For Schools

The May 3rd issue of The Economist ran an interesting article on the effects of voucher programs on public schools. (Free to Choose, and Learn)

The article looks at a number of voucher programs around the world, with a particular focus on those systems where students are picked on a lottery system.

The lottery is preferred (by economists) as it randomizes kids in the program and those left behind.

Students in the voucher programs do much better than those not in.

This seems to conflict with what the Freakonomics guys report in their book, where they found vouchers seem to have no impact on student performance.

At the end, there is this:
"More evidence that choice can raise standards for all comes from Caroline Hoxby, an economist at Harvard University, who has shown that when American public schools must compete for their students with schools that accept vouchers, their performance improves. Swedish researchers say the same. It seems that those who work in state schools are just like everybody else: they do better when confronted by a bit of competition."
What was Caroline Hoxby's study? Does anyone have a link?

I find myself leaning more and more toward introducing competition in American public schools.
The Swedish reference is intriguing. The article says that in 1999 Sweden gave parents the right to choose any school -- public, private, religious, etc. The only restriction was a "first-come-first-serve" admission criteria. This would certain limit the ability of a school to "cherry-pick" only the best students.

Does anyone have more information on how the Swedish school choice system is working out? It sounds really too good to be true. But maybe improving schools is really much simpler than educrats believe. Less money, better performance, let the market work.

Could it really be that easy?

6 comments:

Catherine Johnson said...

So glad you got this up - I was planning to get to it SOMETIME.

TurbineGuy said...

The problem with using the Swedish school system as a benchmark for our system is that their population is pretty homogeneous. They also have a lot less economic disparity... less rich, less poor, a lot more middle class.

Catherine Johnson said...

Sixteen years in the public schools has led me to support:

* charters
* vouchers
* homeschooling

I'll probably be writing posts about unschooling any minute now.

SteveH said...

"Could it really be that easy?"

Yes. Let the market work.

Some say that supply won't meet demand. I don't believe it for one minute unless they put severe restrictions on the market.


Some say that schools would skim the cream off of the top. This argument is a variation of supply not meeting demand. Then again, some prefer the mediocraty of equality. The poor, urban child won't get into a better school because some think that a choice system should allow her to get into the most exclusive school.

Another argument is that parents are not knowledgable (they are stupid) or that they will make choices based on the wrong reasons (like elitism). Well, the decision (and onus) should be theirs. Actually, the affluent get this choice right now, but there are those who want to "protect" the poor.


Some say that there will be a mass exodus from the public schools. Well, duh, what does that imply. In most cases, it will force the public schools to pay attention and compete. That is happening now in some states.

However, choice is not a solution or a guarantee. It is a process. We don't have a process now. Well, we have NCLB, but that's only a process for slow improvement towards a minimal goal. If schools meet the 2014 goals, educators will be happy, but many kids will still be left far behind.

Many of those against full school choice somehow want a perfect solution that is equal and fair for all. However, fair doesn't mean equal education, it means equal opportunity.

LynnG said...

We should make up a long list of things we supported before we had kids in public schools -- like character ed, drug & alcohol ed, technology, etc.,

and stuff we support now that we have kids in the schools --
merit pay
choice

SteveH said...

There is nothing like direct experience and years of study to focus your opinion.

I used to be against school choice and vouchers (I'm still against partial vouchers), but now I know what we are up against. I also used to think that I could work within the system. I tried. The system doesn't want input.