Friedman's 'Intellectual Carpet Bombing' Misses Target

School Administrator, Nov, 1995 by Thomas A. Shannon

I was bemused by economist Milton Friedman's Viewpoint essay on privatization of American public education ("School Change Begins with Free Enterprise," The School Administrator, August 1995).

His idealogy that raises the free market system to a grand deity capable of providing for every human service imaginable in the most effective way possible is gravely flawed, particularly when the benediction is aimed at the public schools.

To begin with, his damning description of the public schools as "wretched," "technically backward," "totally resistant to change," and in a "dreadful state" because they are "government schools" is a faulty hypothesis. The facts on performance of the public schools refute this bloated rhetoric out of hand, So, too, does the reality that the public schools, which have educated about 90 percent of the nation's children for generations, deserve credit for the United States being the most economically productive nation in the history of the world.

Misplaced Blame

Worse, though, Friedman airily ignores the changes that have been--and are continuing to be--made in the public school instructional programs across the nation to prepare students for a future vastly different from the past. Further, he is myopic in his view of children, evidently seeing them as interchangeable units on an assembly line and not as whole persons whose individual circumstances affect, for good or ill, their academic performance.

Thus, he fails to see that the community must serve youngsters holistically to ensure their maximum potential in school by looking to their health, nutrition, security, safety, recreation, and support of the family in these increasingly troubled times.

In essence, student performance is linked, not just to the schools but to the quality of life for children in the local community. To blame schools alone for any real or imagined shortcomings is the shallowest of scapegoating--and to assert that changes only in the way children are schooled or schools are operated are panaceas is foolish thinking at its worst, especially if public educational policy is to be anchored in it.

Friedman is silent on precisely how his private schools (financed, of course, by the government) would improve education. He does admit that current private schools (which he incorrectly declares provide children with a "superior education") haven't made "innovative change" because they haven't had the necessary dollar resources. Yet he paradoxically declares that his privatized schools, in order to be "politically viable," must be operated for less money than the government now spends per pupil on education.

He also insists on a differently leveled playing field for his privatized schools than is available for the public schools. He asserts that no conditions can be attached to the government vouchers to support them "that interfere with the freedom of private enterprises to experiment, explore, and innovate." Wow! What school board member and school administrator hasn't fantasized about that in his or her wildest dreams, knowing that public policy constraints imposed by the law governing public schools draws boundary lines in curriculum, employee tenure, collective bargaining, minimum salaries, etc.

Unanswered Questions

Finally, Friedman fails to address a raft of issues, including what will happen to educational equity; what will prevent the neighborhood Balkanization of communities; how privatization will affect children's understanding of others' cultures and ethnic, racial, and religious backgrounds in our diverse society; and how the degree of equalization of public dollar support required by law will be ensured. These are but a few of a long litany of issues that beg for answers.

Make no mistake about it: These are not administrative minutiae or the wailing of a nervous educational establishment. We must insist these questions are answered fully and in a timely manner, just as the public demands answers from school boards and administrators on any programs we propose.

We cannot let the intellectual carpet bombing of dreary essays such as Friedman's lessen our efforts at educational reform or dampen our spirits in the laudable effort to improve the public schools of our nation.