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Review date:
09/11/2007
The Collapse of Public Schools Means More Choice in the Future
(School Choice After the Collapse of Public Schools: An Insider’s View of Why Choice is the Only Cure for the Failure of Public Schools. Richard G. Neal. AuthorHouse, Bloomington, IN, 2006. 198 pages, paperback, ISBN: 978-1-4259-8131-0-sc)
Review by Frances Felts, editor and reviewer
In this book, the fourth in a series of four, Richard Neal provides a crowning indictment of monopolized and monolithic compulsory government school attendance. The author also provides workable solutions to this situation in his book, School Choice After the Collapse of Public Schools. His series on choice highlights the systemic “anti-learning” aspects of The Education Establishment. He identifies the establishmentarian roadblocks to improvements and what must be done to overcome these obstacles.
Although the book is replete with helpful insights into why choice is needed, one of the most intriguing parts of the books clearly contrasts student learning under government control and student learning under freedom of choice. Of equal interest is the author’s succinct and complete listing of the prerequisites for true freedom of choice.
The key points revealed in this book are:
- The government’s legitimate interest in education can be satisfied while simultaneously allowing maximum freedom of choice for all families.
- Without certain essential pre-conditions in place, there can be no true freedom of choice.
- There are powerful lobbies in The Education Establishment that willfully resist change. To them, freedom is an enemy.
- Many obstacles are in the way of school choice, most of which are contrived to perpetuate the status quo.
- Striking differences exist between “education” in government schools and meaningful learning under freedom of choice.
- True freedom in education unleashes a bounty of new learning opportunities not possible in government schools.
- The dominance of the government education monopoly is coming to an end as competition is allowed to flourish.
- Technology is becoming an unstoppable force in releasing students from the compulsory attendance (incarceration?) in government schools.
- Revealed in this book are the fundamental guiding principles for effective learning, most of which are not usable in today’s public schools.
Richard Neal is well qualified to write on most aspects of K-12 education having authored some 25 books and dozens of articles. He has taught at all levels – elementary, middle, high, adult, community college and graduate school. He has served as an assistant principal, principal, supervisor, director, associate superintendent, director of a large adult education program, and executive director of a large teachers’ association. He served for may years as a national consultant on labor relations and on the process of decentralized management. His seminars on these topics have been presented throughout the U.S. and Canada. Neal served as a seaman on active duty in the U.S. Navy and as an officer in the U.S. Air Force Reserves.
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