In a recent comment, Jacob raised some substantive issues worth addressing in more depth. I’ll do so here and then return to a post I’m writing about re-emphasizing teaching at the post-secondary level. I think it’s worth reading Jacob’s comments first since they lay out the libertarian argument on education pretty clearly. To begin with,…
Increasing State Subsidies to Education
The Problem of Student-Funded Education As both Grant and David point out, over the last generation the cost of higher education has been substantially shifted from the public to the individual student. For a nation that prides itself on equality of opportunity, this is really a scandalous development, for reasons I articulated in a previous post. From a…
Keeping Education Costs Down
First, my apologies for the recent writing drought. Though you may not have been aware, this week Arizona celebrated one hundred years as a state. I have an academic specialty in the history of the state, so I made my small contribution to the celebration by writing three published essays on the political legacy of the…
Capping Student Loans
There is an idea making the rounds that the way to keep costs for higher education down is to place a cap on student loans. If students can only borrow a set amount they will look for cheaper alternatives. Schools who want to attract these students will have to keep the price of tuition and…
Ethnic Studies and Bible Studies in High School
The state government of Arizona has been in an ongoing fight with the Tucson Unified School District (TUSD). For more than two years now the school district and office of the state Superintendent of Public Education (with assistance from the state legislature) have been butting heads over a Mexican American studies program. Opponents charged that the program…
The Purpose of Education in a Democratic Society
I think it is fair to say that the educational system in the United States faces an existential crisis. From the university level on down it, the expense continues to increase without producing recognizably better outcomes. The United States continues to lag behind other nations in student performance while our system of higher education (once…
A Moderate Path on Same-Sex Marriage, Part II
Courtney! raised a crucial point in her comment on the last piece: Will this prove emotionally satisfying to those who have spent years imagining and planning their perfect wedding (rather than a perfect ‘civil union’)? I think yes, and here’s why: When I got married (in California), my wife and I went to the county registrar…
Denigrating the Faculty Lounge
When did it become acceptable to publicly belittle teachers? I get that we need to have real conversations about the way in which we certify and compensate teachers for their work. But where would any of us be without their efforts? I’m sure Mitt Romney benefited from some great teachers and remembers some of them…
A Moderate Path on Same-Sex Marriage
One of the challenges of moderate politics is to find creative solutions that will appeal to (or at least resolve the concerns of) those on either end of the political spectrum. This is particularly true for those seemingly binary issues that so easily divide us. Here is what I think we should do about one…
A Speech for Obama
Recently, David Brooks called on Obama to take up the mantle of reformer, leading a charge to make government “simple, elegant and user-friendly.” Though his column was directed at liberals, Brooks suggested a program designed to appeal across ideological lines. Since my purpose here is to articulate a moderate politics dedicated to a better practice…