Charging tuition at public schools
A quick Google search reveals very little on the topic line outside of plans to waive or charge tuition to students from outside the community (outside the school district or foreign students).
I'm referring primarily to primary and secondary education, not college. Still, there's this article in The Nation which notes that the nation's colleges, which Americans attend in higher proportion than most other nations including those in Western Europe (see this and this for example), are increasingly private. The article is slightly misleading, as it mentions that free college began in 1862 and continued until the 1960s, but has been getting costlier since, without once mentioning the fact that attendance is up significantly since both of those periods. Why? I'm guessing greater returns to education, especially in the last 15-30 years.
My point is that charging tuition at public schools isn't as radical as it sounds: it was taken for granted by Jefferson, perhaps the earliest strong advocate of public schooling. In "The Diffusion of Knowledge", Jefferson says,
Think of it as a co-payment. Or as a revenue-boosting program. In my earlier post, I slightly-tongue-in-cheek referred to it as a Pigouvian tax on a system that fails to provide a public good (analogous to the normal Pigouvian tax on transactions which yield actual public bads).
Tuition at public school is no panacea. People rightly protest about the wanton spending of public money, pointing out that allocating tax money without stipulating outcomes will not automatically fix problems. Others will ridicule such protests because they believe that all public school problems are the result of underspending, but they would be wise to remember that spending is an input, not an output. However, the additional revenue from tuition may address some problems, and it will also give some impetus to people seeking a cause for their voice. They can, in effect, go to the board and demand something for their tuition dollar which they only pay as a result of sending their child to that school, something which they can take away by exiting that school and going to another. They cannot plausibly threaten to take away their tax dollars, which are usually levied against property regardless of whether you have children in a school or not. It is funny that citation of Hirschman is usually done by the left in order to argue against vouchers, but people doing so fail to recognize how Hirschman revised his own argument and fail to recognize that payment through taxation alone does not give them a plausible threat of exit.
I'm certainly not the first person to have this idea, as evidenced by these letters to the editor (see this and this). However, I'm surprised that it hasn't occurred to more people. According to the recent Wall Street Journal ($) article, "Parents Rebel Against School Fund-Raisers", school fundraising has become so necessary that it has spawned both a cottage industry and a rebellion. According to the article, "The association of principals survey shows that 76% of schools expect to hold between one and five fund-raisers during the 2007-08 school year -- and 3% of schools could hold as many as 15." The cottage industry is there to reduce the agony of fund-raising with pre-packaged promotional offers:
I'm referring primarily to primary and secondary education, not college. Still, there's this article in The Nation which notes that the nation's colleges, which Americans attend in higher proportion than most other nations including those in Western Europe (see this and this for example), are increasingly private. The article is slightly misleading, as it mentions that free college began in 1862 and continued until the 1960s, but has been getting costlier since, without once mentioning the fact that attendance is up significantly since both of those periods. Why? I'm guessing greater returns to education, especially in the last 15-30 years.
My point is that charging tuition at public schools isn't as radical as it sounds: it was taken for granted by Jefferson, perhaps the earliest strong advocate of public schooling. In "The Diffusion of Knowledge", Jefferson says,
Sec. XIV. A visiter [sic] from each county ... shall be appointed ... who shall call and preside at future meetings, to employ from time to time a master, and if necessary, an usher, for the said school, to remove them at their will, and to settle the price of tuition to be paid by the scholars [emphasis added].(This is from Jefferson: Public and Private Papers, but many other interesting education-related Jefferson quotes may be found here) I have stated before a preference for this type of public schooling for which primary schooling is free for all or at least tuition is means-tested, secondary schooling tuition is also means-tested, and advance to further schooling depends on ability (with tuition picked up for those who can't afford it).
Sec. XV. A steward shall be employed [to cook and clean, etc.] ; the expense of which, together with the steward's wages, shall be divided equally among the scholars boarding either on the public or private expence [sic]. And the part of those who are on private expence [sic], and also the price of their tuitions due to the master or usher, shall be paid quarterly by the respective scholars.
Think of it as a co-payment. Or as a revenue-boosting program. In my earlier post, I slightly-tongue-in-cheek referred to it as a Pigouvian tax on a system that fails to provide a public good (analogous to the normal Pigouvian tax on transactions which yield actual public bads).
Tuition at public school is no panacea. People rightly protest about the wanton spending of public money, pointing out that allocating tax money without stipulating outcomes will not automatically fix problems. Others will ridicule such protests because they believe that all public school problems are the result of underspending, but they would be wise to remember that spending is an input, not an output. However, the additional revenue from tuition may address some problems, and it will also give some impetus to people seeking a cause for their voice. They can, in effect, go to the board and demand something for their tuition dollar which they only pay as a result of sending their child to that school, something which they can take away by exiting that school and going to another. They cannot plausibly threaten to take away their tax dollars, which are usually levied against property regardless of whether you have children in a school or not. It is funny that citation of Hirschman is usually done by the left in order to argue against vouchers, but people doing so fail to recognize how Hirschman revised his own argument and fail to recognize that payment through taxation alone does not give them a plausible threat of exit.
I'm certainly not the first person to have this idea, as evidenced by these letters to the editor (see this and this). However, I'm surprised that it hasn't occurred to more people. According to the recent Wall Street Journal ($) article, "Parents Rebel Against School Fund-Raisers", school fundraising has become so necessary that it has spawned both a cottage industry and a rebellion. According to the article, "The association of principals survey shows that 76% of schools expect to hold between one and five fund-raisers during the 2007-08 school year -- and 3% of schools could hold as many as 15." The cottage industry is there to reduce the agony of fund-raising with pre-packaged promotional offers:
Charles Best, a former high-school social-studies teacher from the Bronx, N.Y., created donorschoose.com, a not-for-profit Web site that teachers in more than 5,900 schools have used to raise nearly $12 million in the past few years. The site lets teachers, students and schools alert parents, friends, families and businesses via email and word-of-mouth to the individual projects that teachers need help funding. The philanthropically minded go online, read about the project and its needs, and then contribute. The site currently works with schools in just 10 states. It will roll out nationally in the fall.Even still, parents are trying to get out of selling crap nobody wants to people who really only buy because we all believe in supporting education, so they are apparently trying to figure out how to write checks directly to the schools, teachers, and coaches.
At Dutch Neck Elementary School in West Windsor, N.J., more than two-thirds of the school's families voted to do away with traditional fund-raisers two years ago and to instead rely on a "Just Write a Check" campaign. The school raises about $15,000 annually with the new campaign, slightly less than a traditional fund-raiser, "but parents like this program so much better because they don't have to solicit donations," says Anita Grueneberg, the school's PTA president.Why not simply call it tuition and formalize it?
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