Growing awareness that the current US K-12 education system is producing dismal results and that incremental strategies to reform it (smaller class sizes, additional graduation requirements, etc.) have not made much of a difference. Bolder alternatives, including ones that overturn yesterday’s axioms and power relations, are now conceivable. The growing recognition that “one size fits all” education does not work very well in our pluralistic democracy. As people demanded additional options, new types of schools emerged along with new ways to allow families to choose between them. Some of these innovative schools are not only better suited to America’s varied educational needs, but the market of parental choice also helps hold parents accountable for student achievement. This reasoning, of course, is familiar from the old voucher debate, but it is no longer just a matter of discussion.
People who want to leave the decaying and overcrowded mainland of public schools to improve their lives and the prospects of children on the newer islands are less likely to be told they must stay. Polls show growing support for school choice. More Americans are now for than against allowing parents to send their school-age children to any public, private, or church-related school of their choice at government expense. As many as three-fifths of public school parents say they would change their child’s school if they could afford it. With some 56 million youth currently enrolled in US public schools, that means tens of millions of families are potential candidates for choice programs.
Seismic changes can be seen in the organizational arrangements of public and private companies of all kinds, changes designed to make them more productive and efficient. On the public side, this is sometimes called “reinventing government.” It includes outsourcing, decentralization, and new incentives and accountability mechanisms. In both industries, the goal is to achieve better results (satisfied customers, higher production, higher achievement, etc.) with fewer wasted resources. Although this organizational revolution is slowly penetrating K-12 education, it is clearly beginning to do so. These developments create a healthy environment for different types of schools to emerge and for people to demand the freedom, and the means, to take advantage of new educational opportunities for their children. By our count, the current educational map contains, in addition to traditional public and private institutions, a dozen other forms of schools and schooling.
1. Specialized schools. Usually district-based, these are specialized schools created on purpose with particular themes or emphases: music and art, science and technology, Hispanic cultures, etc. The first imams were primarily intended to integrate schools by attracting young people to distant classrooms without compulsory transportation. But magnets now serve multiple purposes. In fact, some communities have converted all of their schools to magnet schools, thereby supporting comprehensive public school choice programs.
2. Alternative Schools: Developed primarily for difficult-to-educate and misbehaving youth, these are not so much schools that parents select as schools that the district selects for children who are having trouble in “regular” classrooms. Most often they are high schools with low student-teacher ratios, modified curricula, and flexible schedules.
3. Charter Schools: From back to basics to Montessori methods to schools for children with disabilities, with a hundred other models in between, charter schools are a fascinating hybrid: public schools with some features of private schools. As public institutions, they are open to all who wish to attend, are paid for with tax dollars, and are accountable to public authorities for their performance (especially student performance) and decent behavior (eg, non-discrimination) . Today, charter schools straddle the line between being a fringe option for a relative handful of disaffected families and becoming a major source of educational alternatives for millions of children.
4. Homeschooling. Historically, homeschoolers were religious families dissatisfied with the public school curriculum and uncomfortable with (or unable to afford) private schools. Lately, more parents are citing reasons like mediocrity in the public school system. An intriguing variant involves young people who attend school part-time and are home-schooled part-time.
5. Schools within schools: There is no reason why a single school building should contain a single educational program. By including more than one program in the same building, it is easier to offer instructional alternatives without worrying about bricks and mortar. It also reduces risk; if the new program doesn’t work, students can be reabsorbed into regular classrooms.
6. Mini-schools. Schools with some of the freedoms of charter schools but also distinctive curricular themes and the intimate scale so absent from the city’s regular public high schools.
7. Technical preparation schools. The concept is especially suitable for young people more interested in jobs than academics.
8. After-school schools: Partly due to changes in family patterns and work schedules, and partly due to dissatisfaction with regular schools, more and more families (and churches, community organizations, etc.) They complement children’s education with a wide range of programs. and offerings. Some resemble the “juku” (cram schools) in Japan. Many are nonprofits, but some of the fastest growing are owned by commercial companies.
9. Own schools. Today, we are seeing the rise of entire for-profit school chains, with corporate shareholders and managers.
10. Design-Based Schools: Alternatives to the 19th century family school model are emerging. Bridging the gap between an R&D project and systemic reform, they have created and are now marketing distinctive designs for innovative schools.
11. Virtual schools. Using the Internet and email, they can interact with their teachers (and with lesson plans, homework assignments, etc.) without leaving home. In the old days, families living in the mountains or sent to distant lands could get résumés in the mail for their children. Today, technology makes possible 24-hour “classrooms” and online access to teachers.
12. Privately Run Public Schools: About a dozen companies are in the “school management” business in the United States, committing, through management contracts or district management contracts, to run public schools and make profits along the way. Although it remains to be seen whether investor gains will follow, it is clear that public education in the United States is becoming susceptible to “outsourcing.”
It’s no longer unusual to send your child to a school of your choice instead of one assigned by the superintendent’s office. Many avoid political controversies because they are the result of the state or district deciding for itself that they cannot serve certain children in their public schools, but must ensure that they get an education. This practice is well established in the world of “special education,” where youth with severe or esoteric disabilities (or litigious parents) can invoke federal and state laws and district policies to gain access to publicly funded private schools. . But disability is no longer the only reason for such arrangements.
Districts also contract with private providers for specialized educational services, such as supplemental instruction for disadvantaged youth provided under the federal Title I program. Although many districts have long outsourced bus transportation, building maintenance, and school operations the cafeteria (and they buy everything from chalk to computers from private vendors), what’s new is allowing private companies to provide actual instruction and operate entire schools.
The political heat and noise levels are starting to rise as we move from private education selected by the state to that chosen by parents. However, several jurisdictions routinely subsidize the peripheral costs of private education. Instead of directly funding private schools, some jurisdictions implement their tax codes to help parents with tuition, fees, and other out-of-pocket costs. In several famous and controversial cases, the state or district actually pays the private school tuition.
