According to the Public Accountability Initiative, “the austerity and privatization agenda for education goes something like this: impose big tax cuts for corporations and the .01 percent and then use declining tax revenue as a rationale to cut funding for state-funded services like public schools. Because they are underfunded, public schools cannot provide the quality education kids deserve.” This leads to vocal criticism that schools are underperforming and a push to hand over the reins of the school system to private corporations running charter schools. It seems there was some legitimacy to the 19th-century reformers’ fear that for-profit competitors could pose an existential threat to the public education system.
The arguments between proponents of charter schools and public schools can get heated. Charter school advocates argue that they provide smaller class sizes, more flexibility and innovation, more accountability for students, and greater specialization. But public schools require a standardized curriculum and education levels for teachers, greater accessibility for students regardless of needs and backgrounds, and more extracurricular opportunities. Some teachers at charter schools feel safer, but they also tend to get paid less and are not offered the protections afforded by unionization. Wading into the middle of this debate seems counterproductive when both charter schools and public schools have myriad strengths and weaknesses, often reflected to varying degrees in each individual facility. A school in one area may be fantastic, and one district over a comparable institution may be woefully mismanaged.
Whether or not one believes charter schools are the way of the future, it’s hard to argue that they are capable of covering the range of needs that public schools are capable of. Well-funded public schools must be a priority if we are even to pretend we are a nation of equal opportunity. The public school system is one of the most critical rungs in the ladder between social classes, and kicking it out eliminates social and economic mobility. Closing a public school disrupts students’ lives, forcing longer commutes and erasing the communities they have built.
The phrase “American Dream” was popularized by the American historian James Truslow Adams. According to his definition, it meant “that dream of a land in which life should be better and richer and fuller for every man, with opportunity for each according to ability or achievement.” To Adams, the American Dream was a meritocracy, where personal people should be seen “for what they are, regardless of the fortuitous circumstances of birth or position.” You can even trace support for public education back to the Founding Fathers—Thomas Jefferson passionately argued for free public schools, believing that they would prepare the populace to choose wise leaders.