An accessible guide to the major issues and arguments surrounding
school choice.
The issues and arguments surrounding school choice are sometimes
hijacked to make political points about government control, democratic
ideals, the public good, and privatization. In this volume in the MIT
Press Essential Knowledge series, David Garcia avoids partisan arguments
to offer an accessible, objective, and comprehensive guide to school
choice. He first outlines the different types of school choice,
including home schooling, private schools, freedom-of-choice plans,
magnet schools, charter schools, vouchers, and education savings
accounts. Two themes emerge as particularly resonant in the American
school choice debate: the long history of school desegregation, and
debates over the roles and responsibilities of government. Is education
a public good, for the collective benefit of society, or a private good,
to benefit the individual?
Garcia describes and evaluates the major arguments supporting school
choice policies: the elimination of government bureaucracies, the
introduction of competition into education through market forces, the
promotion of parental choice, and the casting of school choice as a
civil right. He examines the research on the effects of school choice
and summarizes general trends. Finally, he considers how school choice
policies are likely to evolve. He notes that the Trump administration's
Secretary of Education, Betsy DeVos, is an advocate for school choice,
and that the administration's budget allocations signal a deliberate
shift from long-standing federal policies that provide supplemental
funding for low-income schools. Instead, new policies provide incentives
for low-income families to leave public schools altogether through
choice. This book will be an essential resource for participating in the
debates that are sure to follow.
