Ed Policy - School Choice

In his interview with Professor Peterson, John Kirtley talks about the blurring that is starting to occur

between private and public delivery of education as customized choice options continue to grow in the U.S. Do

you approve of this development? What should be the next phase of this type of education reform?

In the video, John Kirtley spoke about how he views the definition of public education is changing, to a system where parents are allowed to direct the dollars to different providers using different delivery methods.  He also talks about how this blurring is already happening between public & private education - some public schools are run by private school management companies, some private schools are using voucher or other public funding.  His main point about choice was less so about getting rid of failing schools, and more so about meeting the needs of each child.  John Kirtley views school choice as a driver for customization, for students to be able to go to a school that works well for them.  An underlying belief in that view is that different students learn differently and that different schools could be better for different students.  This customization theory around choice is different from the the market theory reasoning often given for school choice (where schools compete for students to raise the bar for everyone).  It's also different from the political theory (public education is often burdened with too many rules and regulations and can't focus on the mission of teaching) and the social capital theory (private schools are better able to build community and socialization for students and families).

I share John Kirtley's underlying belief about different learning methods being better for different students.  While I am all about using evidence and research in education, I also know that just because one curriculum method works well for the majority of students doesn't mean that it's going to work well for me or my child.  With choice in educational options, parents and students can (ideally) find the best environment where they can learn well and feel safe and comfortable.  When I helped to start a charter school in San Diego, this was the main tenet underwhich we worked - our goal was to offer a different type of education with less typical classroom learning and more project-based learning, which may work better for some learners, but not all.

Unfortunately too much choice does have its limitations.  As a general psychological limitation, choice can be overwhelming and perhaps anxiety-producing (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Paradox_of_Choice).  Also whether families are choosing the 'best' schools overall or the 'best' school for them, there are the same issues of building awareness about how a school is doing.  And with the customization theory, parents also need to know how a school does what it does, and to have enough self-knowledge to be able to make the decision about whether that's a good fit. 

John Kirtley mentioned in the video that in Florida, they found that it was mostly the low-income, low-performing students who used the vouchers to leave an environment which presumably wasn't working for them - but how much investigation did they do about their new environment?  Were they actively trying to choose something better for them educationally, or were they just looking for something different?  Based on some of our previous readings about how many low-income (or any type of income) parents chose schools based on convenience or social characteristics, rather than educational characteristics, I would guess that many families just chose the next school over. The statistics that John cited seem to indicate that the difference did work better for them educationally (regression to the mean?  if you're in a bad place, then most anything else will be better?), but I wonder how much better it could have been if there was very active trying to align student learning differences with a specific school environment.  (If someone knows of research showing how parents are making the decisions in using vouchers, please share!)

One aspect about this customization theory of choice is whether the choice has to happen at the school level.  What if instead more choice & customization could happen at the classroom or even the student level?  Some aspects of learning may be related to the total school environment (safety, overall culture, resources available, etc), but many may be more related to classroom environment (teacher interactions, etc).  What if different classrooms taught in different ways?  We may need to start thinking of them less as 'classrooms' and more like 'learning hubs'.  What if some teachers helped to guide students in technology based learning interactions?  What if some teachers guided students in real-world projects?  And maybe some teachers keep lecturing - because it does work well for some students.  And children could switch between different delivery methods and learning styles based on what they need for the subject/topic they're studying then.  I see a future where teachers are less about 'teaching' and more about guiding students to find the best learning for them.