We just can't have nice things in this country.

Joel Klein has a fascinating, lengthy article in the Atlantic this past month, and while I agree with the majority of what he writes, I think he misses the boat on a few points.

Klein proposes using something called "teacher value-added," which tests students in grades annually in math and English, grades 3 through 8, and allows for analysis of a student's year-to-year progress by tying it into an individual teacher's performance. He adds,

"In essence, you hold constant other factors—where the students start from the prior year, demographics, class size, teacher length of service, and so on—and, based on test results, seek to isolate the individual teacher’s contribution to a student’s progress. Some teachers, for example, move their class forward on average a quarter-year more than expected; others, a quarter-year less. Value-added isn’t a perfect metric, but it’s surely worth considering as part of an overall teacher evaluation."

Klein, as Chancellor of the city of New York's schools, attempted to implement these standards as a means of judging teachers, especially on tenure. But when Klein attempted to implement this plan, teacher unions fired back, ensuring that anything of the sort would not pass in the New York legislature. Klein writes,

"As a result, even when making a lifetime tenure commitment, under New York law you could not consider a teacher’s impact on student learning. That Kafkaesque outcome demonstrates precisely the way the system is run: for the adults. The school system doesn’t want to change, because it serves the needs of the adult stakeholders quite well, both politically and financially."

Although I have some reservations about standardized testing, it may be the only way to judge which teachers are successful at their job, and which teachers are failing. Critical thinking, evaluation of the material, and applicability to the real world should certainly be the ultimate goal of educational policy, but there is no way to objectively measure if the students are garnering the ability to do these tasks. What can be measured is whether an African American 12th grader is reading on a 12th grade level, and not on the same level as a White 8th grade student, which is the norm now.

Klein proposes many solutions that make a lot of sense. I'd recommend the entire article, it is a fantastic read. Where my main problem with the article lies, is when Klein writes about competition within the school system, writing:

"Public education lacks both kinds of accountability. It is essentially a government-run monopoly. Whether a school does well or poorly, it will get the students it needs to stay in business, because most kids have no other choice. And that, in turn, creates no incentive for better performance, greater efficiency, or more innovation—all things as necessary in public education as they are in any other field.

A full-scale transition from a government-run monopoly to a competitive marketplace won’t happen quickly. But that is no reason not to begin introducing more competition. Many middle-class families have plenty of choice (even beyond private schools): they can move to another neighborhood, or are well-connected enough to navigate the system. Those families who are least powerful, however, usually get one choice: their neighborhood school. That has to change."

What Klein forgets to add, or omits, rather, is that many aspects of our society today our run by government monopolies. No one is calling for a privatization of criminal justice in this country, and while some states have begun to privatize roads and other aspects of transportation, for the most part, the transportation sector remains in the public's hands. Just because the industry becomes privatized does not necessarily mean it will become better. One way to look at improving education is through housing policy.

Poor people cannot choose to just move to a different school district. Many families in New York City, for example, are relying on charter schools that use lotteries to determine if a child gets a good education or not. Certainly, you should have problems with the idea of a lottery determining a child's future.

But alas, section 8 housing vouchers have been shown to work in improving education, if they are implemented properly with adequate funding. There is a intimate link between education and housing policy, and it certainly has not been explored properly in the past.