Discontent with public education has been on the rise in recent
years, as parents complain that their children are not being taught
the basics, that they are not pushed to excel, and that their
classrooms are too chaotic to encourage any real learning. The
public has begun to reject school bond levies with regularity,
frustrated by what it perceives to be mounting education costs
unaccompanied by increased achievement or accountability. Coulson
explores the educational problems facing parents and shows how
these problems can best be addressed. He begins with a discussion
of what people want from their school systems, tracing their views
of the kinds of knowledge, skills, and values education should
impart, and their concerns over discipline, drugs, and violence in
public schools. Using this survey of goals and attitudes as a
guide, Coulson sets out to compare the school systems of
civilizations both ancient and modern, seeking to determine which
systems successfully educated generations past and which did not.
His historical study ranges from classical Greece and ancient Rome,
through the Islamic world of the Middle Ages, to nineteenth-century
England and modern America. Drawing on the historical evidence of
how these various systems operated, Coulson concludes that free
educational markets have consistently done a better job of serving
the public's needs than state-run school systems have. He sets out
a blueprint for competitive, free-market educational reform that
would make schools more flexible, more innovative, and more
responsive to the needs of parents and students. He describes how
education for low-income children might be funded under a market
system, and how the transition from monopolistic public education
to market education might be achieved. Coulson's Market Education
touches on a wide range of issues, including declines in academic
achievement, minority education, the role of public school
teachers, and mismanagement and corruption in educational
bureaucracies. Coulson examines alternative reform proposals from
vouchers and charter schools to national standards for school
curricula. This timely and engaging book will appeal to parents,
educators, and others concerned with the quality and cost of
schooling, and will serve as an excellent resource in college
courses on the economics and history of education.
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