One other problem of allocating school funds to paying private tuition is that the choice of how to best use the funds becomes a Sophie's choice of resource allocation.

In other words, this year the school system budgets $300 to send 3 kids to private school. That $300 was not spent on public education - it was withheld from the public school system to "right a wrong." Next year, there is a budget surplus of $1,000. So, do we hire an extra teacher for public school X (which would be a huge help to all 500 students there) or do we send 10 kids to private school?

Going to a bad school will hurt the kid in more areas than just an SAT score. He/she will probably take a lot of crap from the other kids which will hurt his or her self esteem and motivation. Just a different set of friends or just a group of friends in general can work miracles with both getting someone ahead and pushing them down.

If you want to fix inner city schools you have to:
Get more after school activities
Get rid of the idea that they are second rate to white suburban kids
Get good influences in the building (teachers)
Reward good grades
Pound in the idea that they need an education to get anywhere
Get rid of the idea that a 'gansta' life is glorious

If you look at them, a majority of those are mindsets, inner city kids are screwed before they even start. Giving the school more money will help a little bit but won't solve anything.

When considering the problems in education, if you had to choose, would you say this is a social issue or an economic issue?

Actually, that is not true here. In California, the schools are given money based on the head count. If a school has a high drop-out or truant rate, the funding is cut according to the population change. At this time, many schools have flat-out lied on their reporting in order to avoid having their funding cut to the point that they would not even be able to continue operating.

When I was a kid in North Carolina many years ago, the schools were funded by property taxes collected in the districts they served. As a result, the more wealthy suburbs had fantastic schools, the urban areas had strong support, and the rural areas (of which there were a lot more in those days) did not have good facilities and children often had to be on a school bus for an hour coming and going. Not to mention that until the mid-1960s we were segregated. In my time, the education system of North Carolina was considered one of the best in the nation, now it is considered at the very bottom of the list. What happened? The Feds took over, to make everything fair and legal. Before, some areas had considerably better advantages. Now, everybody has equally crappy facilities and not enough funding no matter where you live. It is hard to imagine how the situation could be made worse, but the Republican brainstorm to use tax credits for the rich to send their kids to private schools, further reducing the inadequate funding to public schools, would definitely do it.

Where did anyone first learn the numbers? An assumption without first learning facts: private schools must be better education. An assumption based in business school logic: because the education is more expensive, then it must be better. Folks - this thread is chock full of assumptions better described as lies. No wonder George Jr thinks we are all so dumb as to believe his lies about an Iraq Surge.

From the NY Times of 14 July 2006: Remember the point I have been making for years. The mental midget president is such a scumbag as to even have Cellar dwellers promoting his politically inspired speculation and lies into facts. Meanwhile, Ameican soldiers are being wasted to maintain the glory and legacy of that same liar. To adult Americans, it should be THE MOST IMPORTANT FACT ON THEIR MINDS. The scumbag mental midget lies routinely even to massacre American soldiers to protect his legacy. He even has some in the Cellar promoting his education lies. Why do you think I saw throught the scumbag mental midgets lies in 2002. I came from the public schools. My most accomplished friends - and everyone in the list I believe to be millionaire? All product of public schools. All came from families of moderate means.

I would say social, it isn't that we don’t' have the money to fund the inner city schools it is just that we don't know what to do with the money. If you send more money to them it will most likely be wasted, if you don't send money it only makes things worse.

In Wisconsin, there is a nation wide test and the schools that get a higher score will get more funding while the schools that get lower scores get less. I don't get the point of this except to make the rich richer and the poor poorer.

I don't know what public school you are talking about. I am talking about inner city schools not suburban schools, where you have a good point. Suburban schools are very good and are arguably better than private but inner city schools? I would like to see statistics saying that those are better than private.

tw brings up a good point nevertheless. I still think we should get some inner city kids out of those public schools and move them to better public schools. It won't cost any more money to taxpayers and give some kids a better opportunity to succeed.

Send more teachers not more money. Smaller class sizes means better outcomes for everyone. From the literature I've read, that is one of the biggest challenges faced by inner urban schools in large cities in the US. Of course, that's once they actually get the kids to go to school. Poor attendance is another huge issue which is again a social one.

Even that class size assumption has been proven, in studies, to only be a myth. Somehow assumptions again promoted as fact.

I'd love to see some research which supports your statement TW. Having done a fairly large portion of a degree in secondary education, I've read a lot of research to the contrary.

The results in Newark NJ were famous. Did you read it? Annoying. Yes - because reality is that blunt. State of NJ took control of the Newark Education system. They threw so much money into it that students in Newark had more money per student than any other state public school. And still the school system was not performing.

Money does not solve problems. If it did, then GM cars would be the world's best. Instead, GM cars are among the world's worst. When money is a solution, then we have communism or graduates of the business schools.

It is a well proven fact even in schools. 85% of all problems are directly traceable to top management. No way around god's 1st commandment. Without first learning concepts of quality, then a solution is not possible. What is the enemy of business school propaganda? Concepts even taught by William Edward Deming. Another cited an example previously: 'The Goal' by Goldratt and Cox. Different description. Same concept. Too touchy-feely for some because it also requires another important principle - coming from where the work gets done.

Throwing money at a problem is what Ross Perot described as GM's problem. Roger Smith - classic MBA - would throw money at problems as if money were a grenade. Want to see which schools have better top management? Look at the parking lot on Parents-Teacher night. 85% of all problems are directly traceable to who?

One of the biggest problems in education is poorly managed devolution. That is, giving management of schools to people like headmasters etc. On the one hand, they have student skills (presumably) but on the other, often little or no business management knowledge.

In Australia, education is becoming a huge industry. Schools are responsible for themselves and have to apply for funding grants. Get this! In Qld, private schools recieve more government funding than public! Families who can afford it send their kids to private schools, and poorer families have to put up with what they can get. It's a shameful situation.

Parents and teachers have a big impact but the whole social situation will weigh more. I gaurantee there is the same amount of corruption in suburban schools as in inner city schools yet one outperforms the other by a huge margin. Social forces outweighs this example and there is no way around it.

tw, are you arguing my point or backing it up? We were saying the same thing.

Well explain why those private schools with smaller class sizes underperform public schools? There are studies that claim smaller class size causes improvement. And studies that show just the opposite. IOW it is a wash. There is no difference correlated to class size. But it does hype more money for schools.

A correlation between percentage of staff that actually teaches verses improvement has been demonstrated. When the principle even teaches at least one class, then the school tends to perform better. But there is nothing concrete that relates class size (ie class of 30 verses a class of 15) to better performance. Just many contradictory conclusions.

Apparently, when class sizes exceed 30, then some negative trends have been observed. But that is not being discussed here since industry controversy was about classes of 30 verses classes of 20 or 15.

Again, back to the point. Private schools do not outperform public schools - once we eliminate hype and myth from religious schools and from the lying president. Which are the worst performers in math? Conservative religious schools. So we should give them tax dollars?

Hmmm...I think you could be talking out of your arse TW.

We conflict on details. But the problems in education are the same as in GM. 85% of all problems are directly traceable to top management. Any solution that ignores that 1st commandment is suspect.

Like any business, education has plenty of room for innovation. And innovation does not come from business school 'experts'. Fundamental to all innovation - management must come from where the work gets done. "No child left behind" is so often cited by my education friends as how to destroy education. I am not familiar with the details. But their animosity to business school expert rationalization - including this so called superiority of private schools - is rather attention grabbing. It amazes me how a mental midget will somehow know what education needs when this same president has no qualms about killing American soldiers to protect his legacy; will destroy science to promote his man to Mars nonsense.

“Stupid is as stupid does". So where does this myth about private schools being better come from? Look at the intelligence of its promoter: George Jr proverbial liar.