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Five private schools spent as much on new facilities in one year as 3,000 Australian public schools
(www.theguardian.com)
this post was submitted on 25 Feb 2024
214 points (98.2% liked)
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Private schools are a disgrace to the country and should be banned entirely.
Access to education should not depend on the financial lottery of your family, nor should we be funding this inequality.
I would not be particularly disappointed if they were banned entirely—with exceptions made for things like international schools—but I'd never advocate for that myself. I'd advocate for removing every single cent of their public funding. Currently, out of federal funding, private schools actually receive more money than public schools do*. That is absolutely unconscionable to me. Diverting huge amounts of resources away from public schools into private schools is the epitome of upper-class welfare, especially when we see stories like this one, or stories about how much money it's currently costing parents to send their kids to public school (in high uniform costs, excursion costs, textbooks, computers, school contributions, etc.).
* This is made up for by the fact that states provide more funding for public schools, although this varies quite substantially by state in some problematic ways.
They should not be banned. However, they should not receive public funding.
No, they should be banned.
Education should not be divided by the haves and have nots.
I agree. Most of the stats and studies show that public schools.in wealthier areas do equivalent to private schools. The demographics seem to be more important than the school. I don't think you should tell parents how they educate their kids, or how they spend their money.
We shouldn't try to dismantle private education. We should elevate public education so that it's seen as a waste of time. We should also not be funding private schools.
To take your analogy further, should we ban supermarkets? Children should also not go hungry. Why not make it so everyone eats the same thing, from a coop shop, with no fees. Of course not.
I'm down for that, beats getting price-gouged by those fuckers and we don't need shelves with 20 different versions of lemonade, 16 different self-raising flours, etc.
As long as private education exists, it will be a threat to public education and cannot be allowed.
Private education is only a threat to public education when it's not as good. There is a finite supply of funding allocated to education. Spending less on students that pay their own way by choice and more on students that need it seems a better use of resources.
With that same analogy, we would have to ban tutors, online courses, extracurricular activities etc too, I assume?
Or in my equivalent analogy, restaurants, farmers markets, independent food shops, butchers, greengrocers, cafes etc.
No, we don't need 20 choices for every product, but the reason supermarkets price gouge is a lack of competition. You're calling for less competition, completely at odds with your stated goal.
But are we "spending less" on students that "pay their own way"? Private schools are getting massive amounts of taxpayer money, and can use their funds to pay better salaries (therefore drawing teachers out of the public system), build better facilities, and so on. Meanwhile they are academically selective and therefore don't act as a catchment for capacity that the public system can't handle. Public schools however have to scrounge for the essentials and can't compete when it comes to salaries and facilities. That's just not right.
Students going to private school are being subsidies by the government now. They pay less per student than the equivalent in public school, but it's still significant.
I'm saying that we shouldn't ban private school, just like we shouldn't ban hone schooling. We just shouldn't subsidise it.
Private education exists to be at odds with public education. As long as it is around, rich people will try to use it and when they are using it they will not have a reason for public education and dismiss it's importance. Not letting money be a factor in access to education at all seems the best outcome, and we have more than enough money for education if we actually wanted to use our national resources effectively instead of letting them be sold off for corporate profits.
I'm calling for no competition, access to education or food isn't a game where your goal is to get the most money out of people, it's about providing for citizens needs in life.
Private education does not exist to be at odds with public education. It sexist for either profit, push particular ideology, or give an advantage. That’s not at odds with public education.
If there is no advantage, the profit motive goes as there is no advantage. Then all we are left with is religious schools. Most people using religious schools are not religious, but expect a good education where the public school is lacking. Improve the public schools fixed the problems and helps children. Banning private schools requires more funding for wealthier kids, so reduces funding for others, worsening education. Youre hoping that pressure from wealthy people would improve education funding. A wealthy vote and a poor vote are the same. So it is no more likely to be improved, while needing more funding to stay at parity of where we are now. You’re letting your ideology cloud the reality and outcomes.
With how much the government loves animal agriculture and my ARFID, I expect it would be nigh impossible for me to eat vegan if I relied on the government to determine the available selection of foods.
They should be banned. You want rich kids going to school with poor kids.
Rick kids going to school with poor kids does not fix education. Already public schools in wealthier areas score equivalent to private schools with the same demographics. Banning private schools will mean more kids get a worse education. Instead we should focus on improving public schools where they are lacking. The problem is going to get worse as teachers are priced out of home ownership in cities.
Id prefer university to be free for all rather than wasting money paying for more public schools education of those who can afford to pay for it, and wish to.
In Finland, 99% of education on all levels (primary through university) is public. Private schools only exist to serve very special needs, and are not allowed to charge exorbitant fees.
Finland has got some of the best academic outcomes in the world. It goes to show what you can do when you invest in public education instead of starving it of the necessities.
Yes, and this is why in the UK, house values are related to those scores. So it leads to even more disparity and keeps richer and poorer kids apart as all the poorer kids are pushed out of the better, wealthier schools over time by nature of housing.costs.
People shouldn't be allowed to choose a better education for their children? Private schools aren't hurting anybody.
They should not, all children should have equal opportunities.
And they are, they take away from the public education in funding, in staffing, and in voter support.
Our society should not exist to cater to and benefit the wealthy.
Our society doesn't cater to them. They decided that public schools weren't good enough so they went and made their own. I completely agree with them, public schools do suck.
Our society entirely caters to the wealthy, that isn’t even up for debate.
And right, by them fucking off and using their wealth to create a counter-system they take away from the public system, and because the people with money (and actual influence) don’t use it, we don’t have the drive to fund it properly leading to it being shit.
Instead of wanting to leave the public system, you should be wanting the public system to be better.