Steve Jobs will probably be remembered by most as the greatest entrepreneur of our time. The top banana behind Apple had some insightful comments about the whole subject of the status of American education. Keep in mind that Mr. Jobs was no die-hard right-wing conservative; far from it. He was a new age leftie techie. Also keep in mind that what he says he says as an astute businessman, not as an inside educational bureaucrat whose primary focus is to make sure the status quo stays just that.
"I'm a very big believer in equal opportunity as opposed to equal outcome. I don't believe in equal outcome because unfortunately life's not like that. It would be a pretty boring place if it was. But I really believe in equal opportunity. Equal opportunity to me more than anything else means a great education. . .It pains me because we do not know to provide a great education. . .We could make sure that every young child in this country got a great education. We fall far short of that. . .The problem there of course is the unions. The unions are the worst thing that ever happened to education because it's not a meritocracy. It turns into a bureaucracy, which is exactly what has happened. The teachers can't teach and administrators run the place and nobody can be fired. It's terrible. . .
But in schools people don't feel that they're spending their own money. They feel like it's free, right? No one does any comparison shopping. A matter of fact if you want to put your kid in a private school, you can't take the forty-four hundred dollars a year out of the public school and use it, you have to come up with five or six thousand of your own money. I believe very strongly that if the country gave each parent a voucher for forty-four hundred dollars that they could only spend at any accredited school several things would happen.
Number one, schools would start marketing themselves like crazy to get students. Secondly, I think you'd see a lot of new schools starting. I've suggested as an example, if you to to Stanford Business School, they have a public policy track; they could start a school administrator track. You could get a bunch of people coming out of college tying up with someone out of the business school, they could be starting their own school. You could have twenty-five year old students out of college, very idealistic, full of energy instead of starting a Silicon Valley company, they'd start a school. I believe that they would do far better than any of our public schools would.
The third thing you'd see is I believe, is the quality of schools again, just in a competitive marketplace, start to rise. Some of the schools would go broke. A lot of the public schools would go broke. There's no question about it. It would be rather painful for the first several years. . .But far less painful I think than the kids going through the system as it is right now."
Since Mr. Jobs brought up the subject of school vouchers, here is an interesting test we can take on the subject. Since America is #21 among 21 developed countries in educational ranking, this test can be open internet for all of us.
1. When did the school vouchers movement get started?
(a) 1955
(b) 1975
(c) 1985
(d) 1995
2. Who is credited with starting the modern-day school vouchers movement in America?
(a) parochial schools
(b) Ronald Reagan
(c) a PTA in the Deep South
(d) none of the above
3. What large city in America has the longest-running school voucher system in place?
(a) Atlanta, Georgia
(b) Milwaukee, Wisconsin
(c) Birmingham, Alabama
(d) Austin, Texas
For extra credit, who said the following?
"The education of all children, from the moment that they can get along without a mother's care, shall be in state institutions."
I loved the old commercial that said "a mind is a terrible thing to waste." It's a compounded waste when we waste millions of dollars on a status quo that fails to educate young minds.
Big Oil has been grilled before Congress; Big Pharmaceuticals have been hauled before congressional hearings; Big Automakers have been taken to the woodshed as well by our nation's legislators. When will, if ever, Big Education ever have to make an appearance before our elected representatives? Maybe they get an excused absence due to sickness.
