An Uneducated Education Policy
Col. Mike Walker, USMC (retired)
All,
I was fortunate to study microeconomics as a policy tool for educators at Harvard. One case study dealt with two former British colonies [M & K] that gained independence in the same year and enjoyed roughly the same population, standard of living and post-colonial education system.
After independence, country M chose to invest in K-12 education. As resources were limited, this was done at the expense of its university system.
Country K chose the opposite. That country created a merit-based acceptance & cost free university program. Also facing limited resources, this was done at the expense of the K-12 system.
A generation later, country M had exploded past country K.
With a literate work force, M became a desired destination for direct foreign investment and its economy rapidly expanded. In fact, due to wealth creation, country M soon was spending more on both its K-12 and university systems than K.
Things did not go as well in K. With too many university graduates and a poorly educated workforce, the economy stagnated, unemployment rose and that led to social unrest. More telling, despite the new cost-free “merit-based” system, children of the elite still dominated the ranks of the university students.
Why?
The elite switched their family education dollars away from college tuition towards private secondary schools, one-on-one tutoring, student enrichment programs, entrance exam preparations and the like.
In fact, those activities proved cheaper than college tuition so the better off class had even more money in their pockets. The now-superiorly prepared children of the elite had a decisive edge over the students coming out of K's public schools and they filled the new merit system slots.
The main lesson here is that K-12 investment beats out a college free tuition policy.
Next, we also have an American example of the failure that comes from narrowly focusing on college education.
Decades ago, the United States sought increase the number of Hispanic and African American students at our best universities and the dialogue was driven by college and university leaders -- not K-12 educators.
They redesigned how and where they recruited, they revamped their admissions requirements, created outreach programs, etc.
What happened?
After decades of effort the result was an “upgrade.” Students who would have graduated from Rutgers or Cal State Fullerton found themselves at Princeton or UCLA but the overall graduation numbers remained unsatisfactorily sluggish.
The solution is obvious: If you want more Hispanic and African-American college graduates then EXPAND THE NUMER OF QUALIFYING CANDIDATES. To improve university outcomes you must improve K-12 education.
Simply put, quality high school graduates make for a better society.
Finally, elites manage to take care of themselves and taking taxes collected from millions of non-college graduate American families to create a financial windfall for college-bound children of the better off is a SOCIAL INJUSTICE writ large.
Universal free college tuition for America is BAD policy and yes Bernie: socialism still sucks.
Semper Fi,
Mike
