Education needs to be in the public domain, and citizens need to fight to make sure that the slow creep of privatization does not turn into an avalanche. The democratic values that are the centerpiece of our society have been under assault, especially with the rise of the extreme conservative movement that began with Barry Goldwater, and continues today with the take over of the Republican party by extreme right-wing ideologues.

However, the ideologues, who won’t go away, were dealt a blow by the “47%” who wouldn’t go away either. Although the election might mean an opening for progressives to move their agenda, and hold firm against on issues such as health care, social security, and education, there is the need to be vigilant, as well as activist.

Why education should be public and not privatized.

But there is a conundrum about the nature of education, and the ideas that are flowing out of Washington about the future course of public education. Both major political parties show little difference in how they approach education, including standards, testing, teacher evaluation, and funding. Neither party seems to understand why education needs to stay public, and should not be privatized, or sold off piece meal to the point that all of education is in the hands of corporate education wanna bees. George Lakoff and Elizabeth Wehling are helpful in making clear why education must stay in the public domain. They write

American democracy is built on the ethic of citizens caring about other citizens— empathizing with each other, taking responsibility, both individual and social, for our citizenry as a whole, and creating a public government through democratic participation. Democracy’s sacred mission is to protect and empower everyone equally by the provision of public resources, what we call the Public.

There are two views of education that are helpful in understanding the nature of what public education should be, and not be. We’ll analyze the conservative (in this post) and the progressive (in the next post) views of education and find out that the conservatives have used the language that enables them to dominate schooling today. Progressives have good ideas but they have been too reactionary to the conservative education agenda. They have not made convincing arguments. Progressive educators have a long history of accomplishments and the theory to support their views.  Now is the time for progressives to not only make their case, but figure out how to get seated at the policy tables.

Conservative View of Public Education: Business as Usual

I’ll start with the conservative view of education.  It dominates education today.  We need to know why, and how to change this.

In schools today, the most important result or outcome is the achievement level (test scores) of students and schools. Higher scores are better, of course. But a further inspection of using test scores as the measure of success for students (and teachers) and schools leads us to the conclusion that eduction is a business. George Lakoff and Elisabeth Wehling have looked into this and here is what they have to say:

The conservative view of education can be thought of as the application of the laissez-faire free market. Good grades are profits; bad grades are losses. Greed is good. Classmates are competitors, not cooperators. Grade inflation is a metaphorical version of economic inflation. The more good grades there are, the less valuable they are. Innate talent that makes school easy is like being born wealthy, but for most students it is assumed that success is a direct consequence of discipline. The lack of natural talent is like being born poor; the only way to succeed is through discipline, by pulling yourself up by your bootstraps.

When we begin to think of schools as business, then test scores are a measure of profitability.  Indeed, students of teachers who get high achievement scores are rewarded in the same way that employees earn bonuses.  But when scores are low, it is analogous to an unprrofitable business, which might mean layoffs, store closings, and fired staff. Lakoff and Wehling put it this way:

Schools whose students regularly get bad test scores are unprofitable and considered failing schools. Like divisions of companies that lose money, they can be closed down, and just as managers whose divisions regularly lose money stand to get fired, so do teachers whose students don’t get high test scores.

The No Child Left Behind Act of the Bush administration, and the Race to the Top Fundof the Obama administration are based on the conservative world view of public education.  In each of these programs it is only natural to think of education as a business.  The mandate (NCLB) to test students annually and to insist that the scores increase each year is analogous to many businesses that base their success on increasing  profitability each year.

There is nothing wrong with making a profit.  But in education, we have to ask, “In whose interest is it to insist that students reach a minimum score on an achievement test?”  Is measuring achievement a convenience that allows the authorities to use test scores the way CEOs using numbers to  measure company growth?

A common core of standards is the centerpiece of the conservative view of school.  With corporations, non-profits,  and billionaire individuals financing and lobbying policy makers, the standard’s movement defines curriculum and evaluation.  With single sets of content standards (in mathematics and English/Language Art, and in a short time, science) and computer based testing soon to put in place, school managers will have spreadsheets on their computer screens to reward and punish schools, teachers, and students. Private companies quickly realized that they could design schools that taught to the test, claiming that their schools could out do regular public schools.  The original  idea of a charter school as a teacher led innovation was corrupted by national charter management companies.

Do you think the trend of privatization is good thing for education?