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Re: [Phys-L] Private schools



And double everything here - for the Home Schoolers.
.
At 10:44 AM -0700 7/11/12, John Denker wrote:
On 07/11/2012 06:07 AM, Anthony Lapinski wrote:
What is the rationale behind parents seeking private schools in the FIRST
place? On average, the teachers aren't better; if anything the reverse is
true. The programs aren't better; in many/most cases they are more
limited. AP classes, for example, tend to be very rare in private
schools. The supposedly better education is an illusion based on comparing
populations which are not statistically comparable int he FIRST place! So
what's the draw?

That's a good question.

An obvious hypothesis presents itself, namely that parents want to
partake of an educational system that is segregated along sectarian,
partisan, and racial lines.

This hypothesis is supported by overwhelming statistical data,
occasional exceptions notwithstanding, showing that private schools
tend to be very much less diverse.

Further support for this hypothesis comes from the observation that
many of the same people who are pushing for charters and vouchers
are simultaneously pushing other policies that are guaranteed to
result in the rich getting richer and the poor getting poorer.

One of the rules for good decisionmaking (in science and in business
and otherwise) is to consider all the plausible hypotheses. In that
spirit, we must consider the hypothesis that the rationale is to
improve the educational result by ensuring that the student is not
placed in a class at a too-high or too-low level. This hypothesis
is supported in a few conspicuous but rare cases, and not well
supported overall, as you can see by considering the types of
information that schools make available to guide the selection
process. Mostly the schools are touting cultural issues. They
sometimes dress it up in terms of "neighborhoods" and "affinity
groups" but that is just double-talk for segregation. They are
also very selective about /where/ they advertise.

On 07/11/2012 07:01 AM, ron mcdermott wrote:
It fundamentally has little
or nothing to do with politics.

Dream on.

This is ground zero in the culture war.
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