Published: July 6, 2021

Despite schools’ having more funding, smaller class sizes, and teachers with higher degrees, student achievement isn’t improving like it should. School choice can remedy this issue by granting parents the ability to send their children to the schools of their choice. Consequently, it generates healthy competition among schools, leading to improvements in school quality and better outcomes for students.

Discussion Questions

  1. What are the benefits of school choice?
  2. How do school vouchers work?

Additional Resources

  • Watch as Milton Friedman debates school choice. Available here.

Cast

Milton Friedman

Milton Friedman

We have a situation today in which the amount of money spent per child in government school has doubled after allowing for inflation in the past 20 years. 

The fraction of teachers with higher degrees in government schooling has doubled for the 20 years. 

The average number of students per class has gone down over the last 20 years but what has happened to the scores of student achievement tests? 

What has happened to students’ performance has done steadily down. 

Throwing money at schools will not help. 

The way to get better education, the way to get better schooling is to introduce choice – to let parents choose the school their children shall go to. 

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