Quote:
Originally posted by [Labret]@Sep 18 2003, 11:35 AM
mine is actually the end result of countless people conducting research.
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Selected bits and pieces of various studies and history actually.
There are many reasons why there are public schools in the U.S. while the reasons you gave are indeed valid, they do not cover all of them and possibly not the vast majority of them.
Many colonies established public schools to teach kids the bible and the proper puritanical mindset.
Native Americans were forced into Mission schools and then later Federal boarding schools as a way to "breed the savage" out of them.
Vocational schools were established to place control over workers in the hands of the factory owners instead of the Union apprentice programs.
and many were established for the reasons you have stated.
However, as with anything, they have evolved. Many offer a very poor education and barely equip a person with the knowledge to survive in the real world. Some have excellent programs with the goal of preparing students to continue onward in their educational pursuits and often feed students into the various ivy league colleges.
The same can be said of private schools.
I know that I went to a public school in New York and received a fairly good education. I graduated in 1973. Our graduating class was close to 50% college oriented with SAT scores that were quite high (we had 2 students, twin brother and students with 1600s) I was somewhere around the middle of the class gradewise with SATs above 1300.
Since the public school systems are controlled at the state/local level predominantly, there is no one reason that they exist and there is no one standard level of education emerging from them.
Last edited by sarettah at Sep 18 2003, 11:49 AM