We don't need a rocket scientist to see that something is deeply wrong with K-12 education in the U.S.

Mr. Epstein was right on when he said that "We don't need a rocket scientist to see that something is deeply wrong with K-12 education in the U.S." Until we acknowledge this and start calling even the good teachers out for allowing this to happen we will continue to see a decline in the public education system. Intent on the part of educrats may be good but even those with good intentions cause severe harm to children, family, taxpayers and the good of our Country in general.

Cathy

The following piece appeared on Forbes.com. Hat tip to Pete the finance guy for directing me to the following article.

Hayek, Not Gerstner
Richard A. Epstein 12.09.08, 12:01 AM ET
We don't need a rocket scientist to see that something is deeply wrong with K-12 education in the U.S. For the last 50 years, three facts dominate the landscape: Clever reform proposals are a dime a dozen; cost-per-pupil expenditures increase; and student performance continues to lag. It is as if our current policymakers felt duty-bound to wreck our educational system.

With the dawn of the Obama administration, hope springs eternal that the next round of educational reforms will be different. Yet the disinterested outsider should brace for more disappointment. Modern policy loses out to a three-part indictment. Count one: some proposals are bromides. Count two: other proposals are counterproductive. Count three: real structural reform is off the table. Guilty on all three counts is Louis V. Gerstner's heartfelt plea for educational reform.

Count one: blandness. Who can be against higher standards for education or better systems for measuring teacher and student performance? Yet by the same token, no one knows how to develop standards for education that match the precise ones in place for today's industrial products. President Bush's benighted "no child left behind" program flounders because it is hard to grade schools by testing their shifting, unstable student populations. Thus the political imperative for positive results drives public officials to define down success in the short term, only to create impossible demands in the long run--when someone else is on the hot seat.

Count two: monopoly. The modern trend is toward more centralization. Yet why continue our dreaded flirtation with national standards when there are few economies of scale in education? At root, educational success depends upon the distinctive interaction between a responsive student and a dedicated teacher. Unfortunately, increased federalization of education is high on the agenda of Republican and Democratic administrations alike.

Gerstner's proposal accelerates this process by urging the adoption of a standard national curriculum, to be implemented at the federal level by abolishing all but the largest educational school districts. The ambitious effort to impose curricular uniformity misses important differences among students on such key elements as ability, background and interest.

One-size-fits-all is yet another version of a state monopoly that will work no better in education than it does for telephones. No set of public officials, each with a separate private agenda, could hope to hit the curricular nail on the head. But this looming national presence will snuff out the niche entrepreneurs whose curricular innovations could well prove worthy of imitation.

The more sensible approach, therefore, is to follow economist Friedrich Hayek's lead: Push hard toward decentralization, so that different groups can take their crack at developing integrated K-12 educational programs that might work, precisely because they are fueled by competitive forces. Let's remove the fetters that local governments impose on charter schools. Let's expand the use of vouchers, without onerous government conditions. Let's encourage the formation of bottom-up education programs that build off a strong home-schooled base.

Count three: the union elephant in the closet. I save the most explosive question for last. One factor that is clearly correlated with the decline in public education is the rise of teacher unions. Oddly enough, the best case for teacher unions is as a counterweight to the omnipresent central administration that Gerstner and others defend. But no modern educational reform will get off the ground unless something is done to blunt union power, which does no better by education than by automobiles.

Tough steps are needed to counter the union monopoly. Schools Chancellor Michelle Rhee's spirited assault on teacher tenure in the woeful Washington, D.C., school district presents one key test of the reformist program. But even if she gets her way on merit pay, it will not be enough. We need to dismantle the system that requires school districts large or small to bargain with teachers' unions in the first place.

The bottom line: Education cannot survive Gerstner's corporatist model that necessarily combines state monopoly with union power and large public subsidies. This determined libertarian makes no apologies for championing decentralized power, voluntary association and market competition.

Richard A. Epstein is the James Parker Hall Distinguished Service Professor of Law at the University of Chicago; the Peter and Kirsten Bedford Senior Fellow at the Hoover Institution, and a visiting professor at New York University Law School. He writes a weekly column for Forbes.com.

Quote of the Day - " We need to dismantle the system that requires school districts large or small to bargain with teachers' unions in the first place."