Wednesday, September 23, 2020

Private Education?

If you wonder why so many Americans appear to know nothing, look to the failure of the nation's public education system. Jason Kunin writes that Ontario is headed in the same direction -- with help from the pandemic:

In the spring of last year, Premier Doug Ford launched a surprise attack on public education by announcing a series of cuts, disguised as an increase in class sizes, that over a four-year period would have eliminated thousands of teaching positions, decimated programming at schools across the province, and forced students into e-learning courses that no one had asked for or wanted.

But the pandemic has allowed Ford to accomplish what he couldn't accomplish earlier:

A year and a half later, likely thousands of teachers have been pulled from brick and mortar schools, in-school programming has been slashed, and virtual schools are not only set up in boards across the province, but teachers, once and still vociferously opposed to e-learning, are lining up to teach online.

For the Ford government, it's mission accomplished. The pandemic has been a gift.

In a matter of months, COVID-19 has undermined trust in the public school system, created mass incentive for private school and homeschooling options, and achieved a grudging level of public acceptance for e-learning. The ground has now been cleared for the introduction of U.S.-style privatization reforms, such as vouchers and charter schools. The coming months will tell if this is, in fact, where the government is going.

And Ford's education minister has proven to be just the man for the job:

Ford and his smooth-talking Education Minister Stephen Lecce accomplished all this by never wavering in their goals and by implementing a back-to-school plan so inadequately funded and haphazardly planned that almost a third of Toronto parents felt compelled to protect their kids by pulling them out of in-school learning. Applications to private schools have soared.

By taking only half measures to protect students and school staff, the Ford government let the pandemic do its work for them. Class sizes for elementary grades were kept large, masks for Grades 3 and under were made optional, few additional caretaking staff were hired, minimal funding for PPE or ventilation upgrades was provided, and back-to-school plans were unfurled so late into the summer that boards were left scrambling, and the system was thrown into chaos.

For political game-players hell bent on pushing ahead with a privatization agenda that the public doesn't want, in disaster there is opportunity, and in crisis situations the public can be sufficiently beaten down to accept what it doesn't want. This is how disaster capitalism operates.

And make no mistake: When education fails, democracy eventually fails.

Image: The Village Voice

 

8 comments:

Danneau said...

The proof is in the pudding: we can see that education is broken by the intellectual laxity it takes to throw up like Ford, as well as most of the louts that inhabit government houses all around the world. The odd Mujica will crop up, but usually gets shown the door in a coup of one form or another, thereby ensuring that education will continue to dine on thin gruel, except in cases where people like DJT plan to make it GI.

Owen Gray said...

We used to assume that knowledge was necessary for public service, Danneau. Obviously, that requirement has gone by the board.

Anonymous said...

Owen:
You're obviously in a unique position to see things as a public educator.
What we've experienced in the past few years with our son in high school has us alarmed, but at the same time, crossing our fingers that we would have emerged from the system relatively unscathed.

Unfortunately, every successive Conservative government has done 'their thing' to erode the quality and viability of public education. The introduciton of separate system under Bill Davis, to the attack on structure with Harris and now, with Ford, the elimination of actual physical institutions.

I can't begin to understand the Conservative loathing of public education. D2L, the backbone of the online platform for education in Ontario, is a mess, mainly because they too are lacking adequate resources to help students, parents and teachers get through different programs.

The soul-crushing experience for many local boards of having to dodge around constantly changing rules and requirements, followed by the perceived notion that they have to implement their own wasteful online resources is just a complete throwaway of public money.

You're right: Covid did to public education more than Dough Ford even could, but ultimately, it's Ford that's driving this whole thing over the cliff. I'm sure many other jurisdictions are grappling with the same challenges as the pandemic progresses to punish the public.

Next stop: Milton Friedman-esque school vouchers if we don't put an end to this pathology against the public.

Owen Gray said...

I agree, Anon. The Friedmanesque answer is that the public sector cannot do what the private sector can do better. But the fallacy is that the private sector only works for the best-resourced among us.

By the way, I ask that anonymous commenters initial their comments. But, in this case, I've made an exception -- because of your son's experience. It simply is unfair. Not everyone emerges unscathed.

zoombats said...

Sorry for my eleventh hour comments Owen. It never ceases to amaze me whenever we talk about public education and the Conservatives. Why must they always erode a once highly regarded system? they are never the smartest person in the room to begin with. Having said that I guess we really only have ourselves to blame.

Owen Gray said...

Democracy is predicated on an educated electorate, zoombats. Those who prefer a system of government that is not democratic know that education is dangerous.

jrkrideau said...



Why must they [the Cons] always erode a once highly regarded system? they are never the smartest person in the room to begin with

Aha, aa chance to use a favourite qote.
Although it is not true that all Conservatives are stupid people, it is true that most stupid people are Conservative.
John Stuart Mill

Ford has been performing relatively adequately for the last 7--8 months but it looks like he is returning to his "normal" self. Perhaps this sudden surge will shock him back into listening to his experts.

Still, the few things I have noticed in Alberta suggests that we are very lucky we have Ford and not that religious nutcase Kenny who seems to be doing his best to kill Albertans.

Pope Francis would probably try to exorcise him.

Owen Gray said...

Ford and Kenney both call themselves Conservatives, jrk. But they are not clones.