SCHOOL FOR THOUGHT

Compulsory education: how is it working for you?

Things have been a bit quiet around here lately, and so I thought I’d throw a provocative idea into the pot. This article takes educational freedom to the next level: giving parents not just the ability to spend their educational dollars freely, but also giving them the ability to decide whether or not to even send their kids to a school period.

We all take the necessity for and benefits of compulsory schooling laws for granted, without really thinking about it but, as the author points out, there are a number of downsides to compulsory schooling - not least of which is the reality of hundreds of thousands of kids who are inexorably forced to return, day after day, year after year, to continue the torture visited upon them by their failing schools. There are some other issues around compulsory schooling as well, and readers with an open mind are invited to read the whole article.

I am not necessarily convinced by these arguments, but they are ideas worth thinking about - not least the question of the extent to which the state should be allowed to dictate its citizens’ private actions.