Sweden is not typically associated with laissez-faire capitalism. Just sayin’.

If you were also listening you would have observed that the Swedish system is far from laissez-faire; the requirement not to charge additional fees is a powerful control of the market.

In Australia the private schools are non-profit, so even if fees are increased the extra funds are only going to go to capital investment (no capital funding from governments for private schools), salaries (not a bad thing!), spent directly on the students, or saved for future use (ie it will be spent on students eventually).

Adrien - with respect to the parents being able to make good decisions - I disagree with you - I think there are many people out there who argue against vouchers because they believe that parents would not make good decisions - eg very vulnerable to marketing etc.

And it’s certainly something to consider when advocating vouchers; there are obviously plenty of other examples where a government grant to individuals has not worked - eg, the effect the first home owners grant has had on house prices (which has worked pretty much in the way you’ve described here, I understand.

That’s not an apt comparison imho. The housing grant was a subsidy is aid of artificially furthering a boom. A voucher system is a system of public education where parents make choices and not the government.

Chris, I don’t know whether there’d be anybody who doubts that it’s parents who are in the vast majority of cases the best equipped to make decisions about their child’s future insofar as they have the most knowledge about the personality, ability, and inclinations of their own children. If there are people who would seriously deny this, I can only think that would be because they stand to benefit from membership of a teachers union, or similar. However, that may be because I see one of the most important aspects of any education system being a variety of courses/schools/teaching methods on offer, and the choice that that entails.

I hadn’t thought about this point Helen -

Voucher systems don’t work, because the providers simply say, “great, we’ll charge whatever the market will bear and factor in the voucher money as well

And it’s certainly something to consider when advocating vouchers; there are obviously plenty of other examples where a government grant to individuals has not worked - eg, the effect the first home owners grant has had on house prices (which has worked pretty much in the way you’ve described here, I understand.) Not sure how this is handled in Sweden. I do wonder if this problem would be encountered in a voucher system, seeing as the grant is to parents rather than providers, and so the onus is on the providers to be competitive and emphasise their educational advantages and their cost effectiveness. But it’s certainly a serious argument to consider, and possibly a deal breaker.

On a slightly separate tangent, Andrew Norton recently did an interesting and mischevious post about science education here. He argues:

But how much does it really matter what ordinary people think about where humans came from? Even most of us who would say we subscribe to Darwin’s theories would not be able to correctly answer even quite basic questions about the evolutionary sequence and how many years ago the the various stages of evolution occurred. I wandered through an exhibition on Darwin only a few weeks ago in Toronto, but I have forgotten already most of what I learnt there.

Yes, knowledge is better than falsehood. Creationists are legitimate targets of scientific scorn and ridicule. But among the many wrong things people believe, that man was created by God does not seem to be exceptionally harmful.

The schools that currently have a lot of disadvantaged students will end up with significantly more funding. The elite private and public schools that have very few students from disadvantaged students will end up with less funding.

Margo - the margins on commodity PC hardware are so low that I don’t think you’d gain anything. Setup (think hundreds of millions if not more) and local labour costs would result in the computers costing significantly more.

That’s why I’d support direct investment in a genuinely public system, rather than vouchers. We’ve seen this syndrome at work with child care, for which the Child care Rebate is like “vouchers lite” - the providers just see it as a green light to charge more.

But should those parents who do have a clue have their choices restricted which would otherwise lead to a better result for their child because others are unable?

Those parents already have a choice (at least in metro areas). The best voucher system the advocates have dug up is basically a system that merely allows the parents to outsource the management of their school. Not the curriculum to any large extent, not the social or religious content, none of the usual suspects that libertarians usually use to suck social conservatives into supporting “school choice”. If the management of schools sucks, change the government. It’s that easy.

But seriously, most parents wouldn’t have a clue.

I don’t agree that most wouldn’t have a clue, but there may well be a significant number who don’t which is why its important that the default choice of the nearest school is still reasonable. But should those parents who do have a clue have their choices restricted which would otherwise lead to a better result for their child because others are unable?

You mean you were havin’ a larf.

Difficult to know where these sort of things begin and end sometimes.

But seriously, most parents wouldn’t have a clue.

But seriously, the people with the best knowledge of the special needs of the individual children would be the parents, so if a voucher system would equip them with greater and better choices, it has a big thumbs up from me.

Whether parents are capable of making appropriate choices is at the core of the dispute though isn’t it? One side claims that the government knows better, the other that the parents know better. Personally I think it depends on the individual parents, but I don’t think you’re going to get overall consensus on this.

The kids (who are surely the most important part of the equation) cannot exercise choice. The voucher should be aimed at them, but is aimed at the prejudice of their parents. That’s not choice, it adds nothing to the childrens welfare and potentially worsens it if they end up in some rubbish, underfunded evangelical crud factory where evolution is seen as some kind of atheist plot. Those kids are getting damaged. Vouchers will exacerbate it.

Trouble is if parents don’t exercise the choice, someone will have to. Choice won’t necessarily be better coming from the P & C, or the relevant unions, or the relevant state or federal governments. If kids were handed the choice over what they got to learn, chances are it would be “How Many Chocolates You Could Eat In One Go (with a heavy Practical component)”, or “All About Snot: What to do with it, and when”. I’m not entirely sure if this wouldn’t be a better choice than what the politicians or committees or ‘interest’ groups would have in mind, sometimes.

But seriously, the people with the best knowledge of the special needs of the individual children would be the parents, so if a voucher system would equip them with greater and better choices, it has a big thumbs up from me.

I’m not sure why people keep insiting the education system is hunky-dory. Every time I challenge this I’m asked to provide empirical data. I do so. And then I’m ignored

It wasn’t a direct attack Adrien, but equally tiresome is the chicken little cry of “crisis in education” that I was referring to. Sure it’s not perfect, but the kids not being served particularly well tend to be at the extreme ends of the spectrum. My question is largely whether vouchers will make that problem better, or make it worse.

The problem with vouchers that I see is that they tend to foster a kind of bogus “choice” much like the old catholic schooling system pre-1966. That is, little enclaves of exclusion where parents are doing their best to hide their precious offspring from nastiness like (say) science. The kids (who are surely the most important part of the equation) cannot exercise choice. The voucher should be aimed at them, but is aimed at the prejudice of their parents. That’s not choice, it adds nothing to the childrens welfare and potentially worsens it if they end up in some rubbish, underfunded evangelical crud factory where evolution is seen as some kind of atheist plot. Those kids are getting damaged. Vouchers will exacerbate it.

We can’t afford those kinds of experiments when the system we have largely works effectively enough.

David first I don’t propose to emulate America. The basic idea is just that - a basic idea. It can be utilized in many ways. I just think one should start with the goal in mind and work to solve it. And use anything that might. Ideas like a voucher system are pre-emptively rejected for their ‘neoliberal’ associations. If they leed to perdition by all means let’s can ‘em but only on the basis that this destination is based on rational consideration and not the pre-sets of secular theology.
.
Sweden is not typically associated with laissez-faire capitalism. Just sayin’.
.
I’m not sure why people keep insiting the education system is hunky-dory. Every time I challenge this I’m asked to provide empirical data. I do so. And then I’m ignored and when the topic comes up again people spout this mantra: tout va bien.
.
Tout va bien? Non! Merde!

And there is a ton apparently of weekly/daily ’student progress’ monitoring for today’s neurotic parent. And I would assume this is the main selling point. Would love to see the marketing.

I didn’t pay too much attention to it, but my niece who goes to a state school in SA had something which looked pretty similar to what they’re describing. It was book/paper based, but recorded what they had been up to and also served as a way for parents to communicate with their children’s teacher. A web based system in a society that has good internet access seems like an pretty decent alternative that can’t be lost in transit.

I don’t agree with some of the things they talk about but do think that there are some good things described there - eg encouraging parental involvement and having a culture of goal setting.

I don’t think there’s any benefit to having one type of private system anymore than I think its good to have only a public system which is identical across the board. As others have mentioned the long term choices for education techniques may take a long time to appear and so I think its good for us to have a diversity of education systems - both public and private.

I ended up in the private school system because for various reasons the kindergarten said I was ready to leave and would get bored if I stayed around, but the state school system said I was too young to start school. The private school agreed to take me on the proviso that they’d discuss holding me back a year if I ended up struggling with the work.

Instead, elite private schools in Australia make money not by providing innovative education, but by offering non-educational extras (facilities, social capital) to the subset of parents who have the money to pay for them.

Yes, jo, markets are great if you want to buy a commodity, but education should be something else entirely.