Paying for education

[Accountable]

I was glancing over the teachers' pay thread and had a thought. I wanted to get this down before analyzing it to see where it goes:

What if we changed the funding scheme of public schools from one paid by property taxes & such to one of tuition based on family income?

 

[Johnfromokc]

Just look at the number of kids at the school where you teach and ask yourself these questions:

1. What is the average income of the families of your students?

2. What percentage of your students families are on public assistance of some type?

Then, ask the same questions of other school districts around the state. Remember - there are wealthy areas and poor areas. The wealthy area schools would be well funded and the poor schools would not.

All of society benefits from a well educated populous, therefore 100% of society should contribute to education - not just the parents of current students. All American students should be eductaed to the maximum of their potential. We all have to pay for this if we really want to see our world improve.

 

[Accountable]

No argument here. I look at my school and I see almost zero parental involvement. In fact, many of my school's parents look at high school as an obstacle to their teenager's getting out there and helping support the family. They pay virtually zero in taxes (I said virtually! Chill out.) and a scheme like the one I proposed wouldn't affect them, so it likely wouldn't have the effect I want. The only time we get any parental involvement at all from the kids that really need it is when the truancy or persistent misbehavior gets so bad that the courts get involved and the parents get hit with a fine they can ill-afford. I was just thinking that if the parents were paying directly into the school system they might be more interested in what goes on there.

 

[HK]

Unfortunately, you can't force people to be good parents. The ones that are uninterested aren't going to suddenly become genuinely involved because they're paying for it - more likely they'll be hard to get the money out of and begrudge their children attending school even more.

 

[Accountable]

Successfully educating teenagers is virtually impossible (I said virtually! Chill out.) without parental involvement outside of school, whether that role is filled by actual parents or some other adult influence.