The School Funding Thread- Merged
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Not trying to be offensive; there just are a lot of people piping in that are not in the education field and offering opinions, not facts. I will freely admit that I'm not the end all and be all. However I am a Catholic teacher with 10+ years in the system; I know what I'm talking about.glock17 said:
This is a pretty inflammatory issue with a lot of strong opinions on both sides; I don't think anyone wants to turn this into a p@ssing match. However, the facts are not always there. What the media reports (as we all know) is whatever suites their particular interest or need. People need to be aware of what goes on free of media manipulation or ignorance.
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Well said, and after a night's sleep, I see there's something we can agree on. I do concede that you're position inside the system would offer you some exclusive insight, however it doesn't negate the opinion of other's and it may also cause you to be somewhat subjective in your own.
I offered the article about the new text books as a counter to your earlier assertions that the Church wasn't running the schools, it seems that the truth is somewhere in the middle, the school's report to the Ministry, but the Bishops also have influence through the creation of part of the curiculum. Further, as I understand it, the Students at that level may opt out of religious instruction alltogether, so it's not like they're being forced into it.
As for the stats, yes we all know stats serve the master who manipulates them, but I did offer two different sources for my numbers. Selected to support my position, and of-course I didn't give reference to the one's that didn't.
Stay Safe
I offered the article about the new text books as a counter to your earlier assertions that the Church wasn't running the schools, it seems that the truth is somewhere in the middle, the school's report to the Ministry, but the Bishops also have influence through the creation of part of the curiculum. Further, as I understand it, the Students at that level may opt out of religious instruction alltogether, so it's not like they're being forced into it.
As for the stats, yes we all know stats serve the master who manipulates them, but I did offer two different sources for my numbers. Selected to support my position, and of-course I didn't give reference to the one's that didn't.
Stay Safe
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Brad Sallows said:
That is completely wrong; it is special treatment being asked for - it is private education at everyone else's expense. The public (secular) system is already openly funded for them - there has been no limitation of choice or freedom.
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Just as an elaboration in your point. The only role the church has in "writing" curriculum (which through ICE, is partnership of clergy, teachers and administrators-teachers actually do the writing) is with religious education courses. The ministry mandated curriculum in other subjects is only modified to add Catholic graduate expectations. I think that it was, to quote my students, "old school" when the church had a direct say in what happens. They do play a role today, but it is mostly limited to moral, ethical and spiritual issues.glock17 said:
I know that I'm biased, but I've tried to stick to the facts. Everyone is entitled to their opinion...sometimes facts help to clarify misconceptions and misunderstandings.glock17 said:
Nope...it's usually only in certain circumstances and at the discretion of the principal (in my board anyway). Catholic or non-Catholic, you have to take it. Besides, as I've already mentioned, religion has moved away from purely scriptural teaching. A lot of time is spend on morality, ethics, psychology, lifestyles, world religions, etc. I know that a lot of kids, especially at the senior level, get a lot out of it because of the discussions and interaction.glock17 said:
Brad Sallows
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"It is private education at everyone else's expense."
"It is public education at everyone else's expense."
"It is education at everyone else's expense."
I see no difference, unless it were proposed that private school students receive greater per-student funding than public students - a proposition which I have not seen seriously advanced. If each child receives the same basic funding package, what is your objection - why do you care where it is spent? If each child's parents are handed $7,000 annually conditional on it being spent entirely on the education of the child subject to minimum curricula, what magically transforms "acceptable" to "unacceptable" in the transition from a public to private school?
>The public (secular) system is already openly funded for them - there has been no limitation of choice or freedom.
The fact that there is exactly one publicly-funded option negates the possibility of "choice". How do you manage to miss that point? Much of public health care spending does not go into public employees and infrastructure. Do you object to that; if not, how do you justify your different stances with respect to health care and education?
"It is public education at everyone else's expense."
"It is education at everyone else's expense."
I see no difference, unless it were proposed that private school students receive greater per-student funding than public students - a proposition which I have not seen seriously advanced. If each child receives the same basic funding package, what is your objection - why do you care where it is spent? If each child's parents are handed $7,000 annually conditional on it being spent entirely on the education of the child subject to minimum curricula, what magically transforms "acceptable" to "unacceptable" in the transition from a public to private school?
>The public (secular) system is already openly funded for them - there has been no limitation of choice or freedom.
The fact that there is exactly one publicly-funded option negates the possibility of "choice". How do you manage to miss that point? Much of public health care spending does not go into public employees and infrastructure. Do you object to that; if not, how do you justify your different stances with respect to health care and education?
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Brad Sallows said:
The idea that there is a specific amount of money due to parents for their children is a myth, propaganda, poor logic, and bad math.
Why should Joe Gazillionaire get to drop off his Precious at Madame Truffle’s School of Short-pants and Beanies, and then get a cheque from the government to go buy matching plasmas for his yacht?
How does it make sense to pay someone to not use a service they were never going to use in the first place?
After all: Susie Spinster doesn’t receive a manila envelope every year containing a wad a cash and a note stating “thanks for not clogging our schools”; neither do parents whose children are too young (or too old) for school.
Perhaps single Corporal “no children that I know of” Bloggins should be voicing his desire for a turn at the money-for-nothing trough.
Governments in Canada that fund private schools cost more – because, even when public services are being reduced, they end up creating a complex system of redistributing the wealth amongst the wealthy.
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Brad Sallows said:
Why would there be unlimited choice with total government obligation to pay? Parents are not being charged to use public (secular) schools - and so they are free to choose any of them they can get their child to.
Nowhere is there the right for parents to choose the school that offers a free car for every child they enroll - and then have the government pay for it.
Brad Sallows said:
Yes I object to that. I have seen how hospitals in BC aren’t as clean as they were before they went with private companies. Check the news to see how well seniors are doing in privately run facilities.
Not everything needs to be done by a public employee (e.g. books can be purchased) but businesses are there to make money and so have a profit added to their expense; government services, of the same quality, should be less expensive.
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Perfectly good model for the PPP hospitals. The same as at Canada Packers or on Fishing Vessels in the Bering.
Hire a Federal Inspector. Just like towns hire the RCMP to police them. Meat Packers hired Government Inspectors to police them. In Alaska fishing vessels hire accredited inspectors to police them. (More like Underwriter's Laboratories (UL) and Canadian Standards Agency). They are private firms that are jealous of their reputations because they have nothing else to sell.
You don't need a CPSEU employee to deliver a Public Service of good quality. You need a fire-able employee. And someone with the ability to fire them (as well as reward them).
And by the way that applies to line and management. The difference in dollars between line and management is not the amount of sweat. It is the amount of responsibility. As Line Wages approach or exceed Management Wages then Line Responsibility should increase accordingly. And if you are responsible and get the money when things go well then you can carry the can when they don't.
Managers haven't been able to "discipline" their subordinates in an effective and timely fashion for donkey's years - nor for that matter have they been able to reward them. No carrot, no stick, no control, no authority.
Pre-requisites for a Manager: Responsibility, Authority, Budget.
Budgets are limited. Authority is non-existent. But everybody loves to pass along the Responsibility.
And I don't care what colour your suit is or if it comes with pants or a skirt.
Hire a Federal Inspector. Just like towns hire the RCMP to police them. Meat Packers hired Government Inspectors to police them. In Alaska fishing vessels hire accredited inspectors to police them. (More like Underwriter's Laboratories (UL) and Canadian Standards Agency). They are private firms that are jealous of their reputations because they have nothing else to sell.
You don't need a CPSEU employee to deliver a Public Service of good quality. You need a fire-able employee. And someone with the ability to fire them (as well as reward them).
And by the way that applies to line and management. The difference in dollars between line and management is not the amount of sweat. It is the amount of responsibility. As Line Wages approach or exceed Management Wages then Line Responsibility should increase accordingly. And if you are responsible and get the money when things go well then you can carry the can when they don't.
Managers haven't been able to "discipline" their subordinates in an effective and timely fashion for donkey's years - nor for that matter have they been able to reward them. No carrot, no stick, no control, no authority.
Pre-requisites for a Manager: Responsibility, Authority, Budget.
Budgets are limited. Authority is non-existent. But everybody loves to pass along the Responsibility.
And I don't care what colour your suit is or if it comes with pants or a skirt.
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Iterator said:
We are not free to choose which public school our child is sent to; I held off enrolling for one year since our gerrymandered boundaries would have forced me to enroll my child in a school rated (By the Ministry of Education) as being at the bottom of the list for all Ontario; no recourse, no appeal. You should be aware there is a flourishing underground of address and PO box magic as parents attempt to bypass the gerrymandering. You are also indulging in willful ignorance of where the money to run schools comes form; parents are being charged up the hoop, with no relief in sight.
But in case after case is far more expensive. The incentive to business is to make profits, through a combination of offering innovative goods and services or reducing costs (i.e. Wal Mart). Government bureaucracies have the perverse incentive to maximize their budgets, hence problems can never be solved except by increasing budgets, inflating the civil service and adding more paperwork. If problems were solved, then budgets would go to someone else. Civil service unions understand empire building perfectly, so drive up labour costs to increase their share of the pie. Notice innovation and service are no longer in the equation........
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Kirkhill said:
Public Private Partnerships are not ideal for public health or public education; they have to make profits, are exclusionary, and favour those with cash who just want a subsidized form of a purely private service.
But private schools and private health facilities must be made to pay for exactly the kind of inspectors you mention.
Kirkhill said:
It isn’t the public unionized employee that is the issue, it is the public institution – it is the best option. Besides, here in BC the government has signed contracts with unions and then legislated the contracts away – so public unions can be dealt with if they are the problem (I don’t see it that way though).
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a_majoor said:
All problems that are solvable without having to throw money away for the benefit of private schools and those that use them.
a_majoor said:
No; what happens for businesses that want government contracts is that they lowball their bids and then do not meet the requirements they were contracted for.
And one of the innovative ways that a private school will maximize profits is by kicking out (or denying entry) to any child that doesn’t fit into their specifications. They have no need for our tax money.
Brad Sallows
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1) The idea that there is any amount due parents for the education of their children is founded in the principle that education is a civil right (privilege) of the child, given voice in both domestic and international law. The Charter principle of equal benefit of the law strongly suggests identical funding be available to all within each responsible jurisdiction. $7000 is a ballpark example I wrote based on figures I've read, and note that the amount would not be simply based on total education budget divided by number of children in public system - there would first be a separation of some of the infrastructural and administrative overhead from the year-to-year costs of the service (chiefly, an estimate of supplies and labour at the school level). So, no myth, no propaganda, straightforward deduction, and basic arithmetic of estimation - only principles, reason, and reality.
2) Notwithstanding equality of benefit, means testing is an accepted principle of dispensing social and civil benefits. The attempt to create a straw man by appealing to envy of the super-rich is noted. Any astute observer will be aware that most children in private schools or the Ontario Catholic denominational system are not members of super-rich families.
3) Whether people choose to use the public system is beside the point, because the driving principle is that education shall be provided to children at public expense, not that public education agencies shall be sustained at public expense. If you wish to invert that, please state so clearly. That suggests we pay parents to use an education service, not that we pay them (indirectly, by selectively not charging them) to use only a public education service. Unless one believes the public teacher is the funding objective and the educated student is not, there is no sense to adopting lines of argument based on the primacy of the public service.
4) To suggest that people without children of school age should receive money is a manifestly pathetic straw man which suggests someone isn't reading or comprehending, since I've already noted that the funding would be subject to common-sense conditions: that it be spent on the education of a child, and not provided otherwise.
5) It is true that funding children (vouchers, for clarity) would cost governments more, because governments already are free-riding on those who use non-public schools by conspicuously abdicating the responsibility to fun d the educations of all children equally. This is not something to which a just and fair person would point with pride or wish to continue.
6) Parents are not in fact free to use any public school. Public school systems typically have catchment areas, and the specialty schools (eg. language immersion; emphasis on athletics, sciences, fine arts, or trades) by no means guarantee admission to all.
7) Who wrote anything about free cars or other come-ons?
8) Regardless of minor changes in public health institutions such as who mops the floors, most doctors operate privately and there are many private clinics offering various services. Squaring that circle rather than trying to defend the inconsistency between how we deliver health and education is still a burden that has not been met.
9) Profit is what the doctor with a private practice makes. To note the existence of profit is not a counterargument, although some people seem to believe the mention of the word is sufficient as if profit were somehow dirty. Since we know from experience that profit is generally a motivator for excellence, the reasonable conclusion is that a profit motive should be encouraged. And before another straw man is excitedly thrown out, note that I wrote "generally" - there can be exceptions.
10) Contracts that are not met can be litigated. Regardless, the contracts in question would be between parents and schools. Ineffective schools would not last long, because parents vote very quickly with their feet when their children are at stake - it is clear enough that private schools provide at least adequate education, and clear enough that the schools at risk in a more competitive environment would be the bottom-ranked public ones if parents had sufficient flexibility to avoid those schools.
2) Notwithstanding equality of benefit, means testing is an accepted principle of dispensing social and civil benefits. The attempt to create a straw man by appealing to envy of the super-rich is noted. Any astute observer will be aware that most children in private schools or the Ontario Catholic denominational system are not members of super-rich families.
3) Whether people choose to use the public system is beside the point, because the driving principle is that education shall be provided to children at public expense, not that public education agencies shall be sustained at public expense. If you wish to invert that, please state so clearly. That suggests we pay parents to use an education service, not that we pay them (indirectly, by selectively not charging them) to use only a public education service. Unless one believes the public teacher is the funding objective and the educated student is not, there is no sense to adopting lines of argument based on the primacy of the public service.
4) To suggest that people without children of school age should receive money is a manifestly pathetic straw man which suggests someone isn't reading or comprehending, since I've already noted that the funding would be subject to common-sense conditions: that it be spent on the education of a child, and not provided otherwise.
5) It is true that funding children (vouchers, for clarity) would cost governments more, because governments already are free-riding on those who use non-public schools by conspicuously abdicating the responsibility to fun d the educations of all children equally. This is not something to which a just and fair person would point with pride or wish to continue.
6) Parents are not in fact free to use any public school. Public school systems typically have catchment areas, and the specialty schools (eg. language immersion; emphasis on athletics, sciences, fine arts, or trades) by no means guarantee admission to all.
7) Who wrote anything about free cars or other come-ons?
8) Regardless of minor changes in public health institutions such as who mops the floors, most doctors operate privately and there are many private clinics offering various services. Squaring that circle rather than trying to defend the inconsistency between how we deliver health and education is still a burden that has not been met.
9) Profit is what the doctor with a private practice makes. To note the existence of profit is not a counterargument, although some people seem to believe the mention of the word is sufficient as if profit were somehow dirty. Since we know from experience that profit is generally a motivator for excellence, the reasonable conclusion is that a profit motive should be encouraged. And before another straw man is excitedly thrown out, note that I wrote "generally" - there can be exceptions.
10) Contracts that are not met can be litigated. Regardless, the contracts in question would be between parents and schools. Ineffective schools would not last long, because parents vote very quickly with their feet when their children are at stake - it is clear enough that private schools provide at least adequate education, and clear enough that the schools at risk in a more competitive environment would be the bottom-ranked public ones if parents had sufficient flexibility to avoid those schools.
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This issue is far from over. It may well come up in the next federal election, as many educators are pushing for a federal department of education. Canada is one of the only modern western countries that does not have a federal department of education (minus the enept INAC department of ed with no educators working there).
Brad Sallows
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Just laying in a stock of clubs to bludgeon the next one expeditiously.
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UberCree said:
And coming soon - from the Liberal/NDP/Bloquistes - The Ministry of Truth - for that is what a centralized Department of Education is responsible for - deriving a common curriculum with common history and common language to generate a common polity.
Societally it may have its advantages but historically it has had a stultifying effect on development and progress. Like my democracy I like my education messy and individual.
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UberCree said:
Kirkhill said:
Education is a ‘public good’ – it is one of those things, like national defence, which is ‘consumed,’ directly or indirectly, by all. It is also, broadly, a good thing – better educated societies are, without fail, I confidently think are measurably better than less well educated societies – by any sensible definition of bad/good.
Since it is a public good and a good thing, education ought to be:
1. Compulsory, at some level, for all;
2. Publicly funded, at some levels, for all.
There is, however, no especially good argument for government run education. In fact, I would argue, that anything which is government run – including the Canadian Forces – is bureaucratic, expensive, hide bound, risk averse, ill managed, etc, etc, etc ad infinitum.
It would be better if society (through elected governments) set the standard for an elementary education – the level which lets one at, say, age 16 or so, enter the work force or proceed on to higher levels of education but that all schools were independently managed.
That does not mean that a community could not run its own public school but it means that anyone who could meet the government’s standard could run a public and publicly funded school.
Education standards above the elementary (age 16ish) level should be set by the education system’s customers: universities, colleges, trade/industry groups.
All education beyond the elementary level should be provided on a ”pay-as-you-go” basis but government should provide funding to students (n advance and based upon their previous year’s performance) at some sort of sliding scale – say, just for example:
A+ 125% of the cost of tuition, books and fees
A 112.5% of the cost of tuition, books and fees
B+ 105% of the cost of tuition, books and fees
B 103.5% of the cost of tuition, books and fees
C+ 102.5% of the cost of tuition, books and fees
C 100% of the cost of tuition, books and fees
C- 100% of the cost of tuition, books and fees
D 95% of the cost of tuition, books and fees
F 50% of the cost of tuition, books and fees
This should apply all the way from high school (10th grade) to post graduate work (PhD) for all work in all public schools, colleges and universities.
Broadly, schools should be privately run. They should aim to serve customers (trades, colleges, universities, etc). They should aim to make a profit by ‘graduating’ a many students as possible – and the government should pay them based on a mix of enrolment and performance.
Clearly there will have to be exceptions. Schools in rural and remote areas will not able to reap the undoubted benefits of an open, competitive market. They will have to be funded almost without regard to performance – which (lack of incentive to do well) is one of the many problems with public education today.
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They can PUSH for the matter all they want but it will take an act of parliament plus the majority of provinces and territories to agree to it before a federal department of education can be created. Under the BNA s.91 and s.92 are the sections which outlines the responsibilities and authorities for both Fedeal and Provincial levels of government, and education is purely a Provincial responsibility, to create the curriculum and to administer it all without Federal interference. So another words to change something that is apart of our Charter will be tough.
Brad Sallows
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Brilliant; just fucking brilliant. A solution in search of a problem. Clearly we can see that our K-12 systems produce such ill-prepared adults that we need to have one federal agency. Is there even going to be a pretense of demonstrating an actual need, or does this community of university-educated people without the common sense God gave dirt just feel we should do this to be fashionable? What a bunch of oxygen-thieving wastes of skin. If any of them vote they should be executed for the crime of masquerading as competent adults.
I trust by tomorrow this will be revealed to be a hoax designed to trigger an outburst of utter contempt from me.
I trust by tomorrow this will be revealed to be a hoax designed to trigger an outburst of utter contempt from me.
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