Alan McLawhorn

Aaron Kashtan
UWRT 1102
24 April 2017

Major Assignment #4

Education is an extremely controversial topic for many Americans, especially the debate

of public education vs. private education. There is an abundance of research about this topic, and

there are not clear advantages for either side, even though in theory private schools would offer a

higher level of education. However, both sides hold advantages, and disadvantages. Private

schools offer better education, but it really depends on the students ambition and motivation to

do well. Also, the education is sometimes not that noticeable, and private schools are extremely

expensive, so it is basically not available to most average families. Overall, there is really no

clear winner, as both public and private education in America are similar.

First off, I know from personal experience how public school is. Public school is

definitely not the best thing for students, but unfortunately most families cannot afford to send

their kids to private schools. The high school I went to is located in Kinston, NC, which is

located on the eastern side of the state. The reason I am saying this is because towards the south

and eastern parts of the states seem country compared to where Charlotte is located. Kinston

High School students are ninety-five percent black which obviously shows that the school is not

diverse at all. I know from experience that most kids at public schools are pretty normal kids,

even though Kinston High was definitely a different experience than most kids have probably

had in high school. Overall Kinston High School is an extremely low performing public school,

and so were the other public schools in the same district. This statistic shows that the region
where the schools are located is a deciding factor in if the school is productive, with also the

ethnicity of the students also playing a role. Kinston High educated a student body that consisted

of mostly poor students, or students that were less fortunate than other students, especially here

in college. Pretty much everybody here has a laptop and phone, while back home literally

nobody had laptops, and if they had brought them to school it would have probably been stolen,

since most students did not have much, and did not care. These examples show that my situation

was definitely a special case, and that most kids here did not go through it. However, these

things show that public education has many flaws. Since public schools are free, they are

obviously more students going there, which means that many students who are care free go to

these schools with no interest in school and no interest in careers which can be obtained by

college degrees. This was especially noticeable at Kinston High with the high gang population at

school, even if they were mostly harmless. On the other hand, the teachers were really bad at

their one job: teaching. While you can blame the students for not caring, it mostly falls on the

teacher to help the student, or at least try. The teachers never assigned homework, or even essays

to write, which looking back is ridiculous, and did not help to prepare me for college at all, since

homework, assignments, and essays seem to be in abundance in college. To be fair, the students

were terrible, and disrespectful to the teachers, going so far as to insult them and use profanity

directed at them. However, being a teacher they should know what they signed up for. Looking

back, my middle school days were different even though I went to a public school. My middle

school was more balanced in race, and variety of people. However, the school still had bad kids,

which shows that every public school has its share of screw ups. Overall the education given at

public schools was hilariously bad, at least in my experience. While I do not have any

experience at private schools, I will say that I would not go to a private school, because of the
price. I feel that going there would not motivate me anymore to do better, and I would feel bad

about my parents spending money for me to go to a school that may be better, but in the end not

make much of a difference. I know kids from private schools, and they are pretty normal

sometimes even dumber than students at public schools, at least common sense wise. The point

is, both public and private education in America have their flaws.

In the article Public Vs. Private Schools Albert Shanker talks about the comparison

made about public and private schools. He says They tell us that students in private schools

achieve at much higher levels than public school students. They say that Catholic schools, in

particular, take students just like the ones attending public schools and do a far better job of

educating them. So it is only fair that all children, and especially those who are poor, have the

same chance for a good education as kids whose families can pay for private schools.

Furthermore, they say, if public schools have to compete with private schools for students, they

will be forced to improve and will imitate the practices that make private education excellent

(Shanker). He is basically saying that private schools are better at educating students, but

Shanker also says that public schools should up their game and help the students who cannot

afford private school educate themselves. He also says A little more than half of seniors in

private schools achieve at the 300 level, which means they can handle decimals, fractions, and

percents--what NAEP identifies as seventh-grade math. This is a few percentage points better

than the public school figure, but it is no evidence for the excellence of private school education.

To argue that is a little like arguing that a kid who got a score of 38 on a final exam really

outshone the one who got only 35. Both failed. And the scores tell us that approximately half of

our graduating seniors, from both public and private schools, cannot handle those everyday math
operations that they should have mastered before they even entered high school (Shanker).

Shanker is criticizing the private education, basically American education in general.

In School Vouchers in the United States: Productivity in the Public and Private Sectors

Paul E. Peterson talks about productivity in public and private education in America. Peterson

talks about how scholarships helps out underprivileged students, and families. Possible

explanations for difference in impact across social groups include: 1) fewer choices available in

the public sector to minority and other disadvantaged families; 2) smaller schools, fewer

transfers among schools, and greater administrative simplicity in the private sector; 3) better co-

production in the private sector by providing stronger extrinsic learning incentives to students

and families (more homework, higher behavioral and educational expectations if student is to

remain in the school; more extensive communications between school and family, and

requirements that families make financial and educational contributions) (Peterson). He goes

into further detail about the pros and cons of each private and public education.

In Public or Private Schools: A Dilemma for Gifted Students? Joan H. Witham talks

about how gifted students are at a disadvantage because either choice of education would be

fitting for them. Witham used many experiments and instruments to test the kids to see what

type of school would be best suited for each student. She eventually came to the conclusion that

there was not much to differentiate between public and private schools, and that either is a good

bet.

In Education's missing link: how private school teachers approach evolution in The

American Biology Teacher, they talk about how private schools teach evolution. They used this

method: The four-part Teaching Evolutionary Topics Survey (TETS; Bilica, 2001) was used to

collect data from teachers. The first part surveyed teachers' emphasis in class of the seven
fundamental topics of evolution. Bilica (2001) assembled and validated these and created the

following evolutionary topic scales: Speciation, Diversity, Descent with Modification, Evidence

for Evolution, Natural Selection, Pace and Rate of Evolutionary Change, and Human Evolution.

These scales were adapted from the National Science Education Standards (National Research

Council, 1996) and Project 2061 (American Association for the Advancement of Science, 1990,

1993). Each teacher in the sample responded to statements on the survey using a Likert scale to

rate their emphasis from 1 to 5. The prompts for each emphasis were as follows: 1 = no

emphasis--I do not emphasize this concept at all; 2 = little emphasis--I may mention this concept

briefly or informally during the course; 3 = some emphasis--I emphasize this concept in one

lesson during the course; 4 = moderate emphasis--I emphasize this concept in more than one

lesson during the course; and 5 = strong emphasis--I emphasize this concept throughout the

course (The American Biology Teacher). The results were that all of the teachers teach

evolution, even if they do not teach all the details, they still teach the basic and most important

things.

In Intergenerational Mobility under Private vs. Public Education James B. Davies talks

about the inequality in public and private schools. Davies says This paper analyzes

intergenerational mobility in a model where human capital is produced using schooling and

parental time. We show that, across steady states, more mobile societies also have less inequality.

In addition, inequality is lower and mobility is higher in the long run under public than under

private education. The same contrast between schooling regimes is also found in transition, for

societies beginning with the same level of inequality (Davies). Davies basically ends with

saying that all the evidence in the articles shows that public vs. private schools, are not equal in

any sense, and that needs to change.

 In Academic Leadership in Americas Public Schools Stu Ervay talks about the

leadership in public schools, shown by the faculty. In the past, a principals managerial duties

filled much of the workday. Most tried hard to monitor instruction and oversee faculty

development but delegated other academic leadership responsibilities to teachers, subordinate

administrators, or district-level leaders in curriculum and instruction. However, under todays

man-dated expectations, academic functions have been moved to the top of a principals job

description (Bertani, 2002; Macmillan, Meyer, & Sherman, 2001; Mulford & Silins, 1998).

In conclusion, in response to my thesis, which was as both public and private education

in America are similar, and both have their advantages, and disadvantages. With this evidence, I

think it is a perfect thesis for this topic. Overall, private schools versus public schools are both

okay and overall people should just be happy to be at school somewhere with potential to be

better.
Works Cited

Davies, James B. Intergenerational Mobility Under Private vs. Public Education. (2005).

Scandinavian Journal of Economics. Date Accessed: 24 April 2017.

Educations Missing Link: How Private School Teachers Approach Evolution. The American

Biology Teacher, February 2010. Date Accessed: 24 April 2017.

Ervay, Stu. Academic Leadership in Americas Public Schools. NAASP Bulletin. 2 June 2006,

Vol 10. Date Accessed: 24 April 2017.

Peterson, Paul E. School Vouchers in the United States: Productivity in the Public and Private

Sectors. ZFE. July 2008, Volume 11. Date Accessed: 24 April 2017.

Shanker, Albert. Public Vs. Private Schools. National Forum. Date Accessed: 24 April 2017.

Witham, Joan H. Public or Private Schools: A Dilemma for Gifted Students? Roeper Review,

1997. Date Accessed: 24 April 2017.