NationStates Jolt Archive

While it is our belief that everyone deserves a good and fair education, the leadership of Zeldyr has the following conviction: It is not the government's responsablity to provide education. Government funded education is not the answer.

As it is, public school is rather lacking unless it is recieving heavy funding from the government, and not just people who have kids help share the burden for this school. This means that even if you don't go to school, you still pay for it. For the rest of your life. This isn't fair.

Instead, we suggest privatizing all public education. This will cause market competition between different schools and drive quality up while pushing prices down. In the end, it benifits everyone.


This resoultion needs 136 votes to be promoted to a resolution

Perhaps I should agree, because you've got pretty bad spelling there.

How is this any of the UN's business? You can privatize your nation's schools all you want, as long as you follow the pertinent UN resolutions on avaliability of education. Why should other nations be forced to privatize?

Firstly there is not a single piece of evidence to support the idea that privatising something makes it better. Generally it makes it a lot, lot worse.

Secondly education is a service, not an industry. It should be run by the government.

Thirdly education is a right. It should not be availble only to those who can afford it. Because you set up a two class system where the poor don't get educated, and the rich do.

Generally at this point I say "while I applaud the idea of your proposal there are a few issues" but since that is so patently not true in this case I will just say no, no, not a chance in Encana and no.

The current resolutions say education should be free for children up to age 18 so he would have to repeal those resolutions to pass this one.

That being said, the DRA will not support any resolution which supports the privization of education. Access for children to quality publicly funded education the DRA believes to be a fundamental human right which is why I am working hard to pass the Global Education Initiative which will bring together all of the education resolutions and present a very clear document on education, the role of the UNEC, etc.

Regardless how well worded you try to make this proposal (and I seriously recommend you work on wording), the DRA will not support this at all.

OOC: Well, it is my first proposal :-P

You can argue all you like about markets creating efficiency, but efficiency is not our first priority here, and it shouldn't be yours either. The primary goal should be to obtain a good minimum standard of education for all, something which total privatisation of education cannot do, because even if the inexpensive schools which would spring up to cater to the poor are efficient (in terms of value for money) due to market forces, they often won't provide an acceptable standard.

OOC: Well, it is my first proposal :-P
First proposal or not it is illegal. It conflicts with a previous revolution. the stickies include everything you need to write a legal proposal.

Giordano,
UN representative,
The Black New World

The Telidian government is firmly against the privatisation of all schools or any other educational body. As previously stated there is no empirical evidence to suggest that the private sector will have better results than the public sector. In Telidia we have some schools in the private sector and although some might do better than the national average, others do not.

Secondly, in no way will we create a two tier educational system where the fruits of knowledge will only be available to those who can afford it. Education is the key to a successful and productive society and therefore must be available to all.

Respectfully
Lydia Cornwall, UN Ambassador
Office of UN Relations, Dept for Foreign Affairs
HM Government of Telidia

The Bahgumian government looks forward to opening our schools up to a capitalist tendering competition. The establishment of McDonalds High School, Nike College, Exxon Juniors etc will surely be the aspiration of any decent nation?

The Bahgumian government looks forward to opening our schools up to a capitalist tendering competition. The establishment of McDonalds High School, Nike College, Exxon Juniors etc will surely be the aspiration of any decent nation?

Jennifer Government, anyone? ;)

How is this any of the UN's business? You can privatize your nation's schools all you want, as long as you follow the pertinent UN resolutions on avaliability of education. Why should other nations be forced to privatize?

Norfaria would like to point out that public education advocate nations forced us to publicize in the first place.

The Telidian government is firmly against the privatisation of all schools or any other educational body. As previously stated there is no empirical evidence to suggest that the private sector will have better results than the public sector. In Telidia we have some schools in the private sector and although some might do better than the national average, others do not.

Secondly, in no way will we create a two tier educational system where the fruits of knowledge will only be available to those who can afford it. Education is the key to a successful and productive society and therefore must be available to all.

Respectfully
Lydia Cornwall, UN Ambassador
Office of UN Relations, Dept for Foreign Affairs
HM Government of Telidia

Norfaria disagrees, private schools produce better workers who earn higher wages in the market.

observe this abstract (http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/B6VBV-3YYTFBM-7/2/124c22e99b9a7f4f3749d7c3af4459a7):
In most developing countries, education is largely publicly provided. However, the scarcity of public funds and recent evidence of public school inefficiency, calls for an examination of the dominant role of the state. In this paper, we use data from Indonesia to examine the effectiveness of public versus private schools. We use labor market earnings as our measure of effectiveness. Controlling for observable personal characteristics and school selection, we find that graduates of private secondary schools perform better in the labor market. This is contrary to the widely held belief, in Indonesia, that public secondary schools are superior. Our findings, coupled with the existing literature on private school cognitive and cost advantages, suggest the need for greater private participation in the education sector.

It seems in poorer countries private education benefits those citizens.

This article (http://www.mises.org/fullstory.aspx?control=1425) by the Ludwig Von Mises institute explains why Private education would be more desirable. Here is a preview.

A common view promoted by advocates of "free" or public education is that a system primarily based on fees would cause many children to forego an education. Subsequently, literacy rates would decline, and America would slide down a slippery slope toward low economic growth and stagnation. Whether education is part and parcel to economic growth is not the concern of this article. Rather, the charge of illiteracy in a fee-based or privatized system seems to be weak at best, considering the history of education in America and England.

The European University Institute seems to find private schools perform better as well. (http://216.239.57.104/search?q=cache:SEEeUY-0hY8J:www.iue.it/Personal/Dronkers/English/pisaprivate.PDF+Private+education+effectiveness&hl=en&client=firefox)

But one can also argue that education in post-industrial societies has become a major dimension of inequality, alongside occupation and wealth. In all these societies formal or informal school choice (either by choosing directly schools or indirectly by choosing school districts through housing choices) has become an important mean for parents to influence the educational success of their children, and thus the reproduction of the intergenerational inequality. This importance of parental school choice (whatever the educational system is) forces public and private schools in all of these societies to be attractive and thus educationally effective as possible. Private schools have more opportunities to become more effective than public schools because of their more effective school administration and their better school climate. As the long-term consequence of this competition, private schools in all these societies have on average a comparable higher net effectiveness, despite the original differences in histories of these public and private schools

These provide strong arguments for a privatized education system, however Norfaria believes that it's not in the UN's favor to force an inefficient system of it's constituents. It should be left to the nations.

Norfaria would be in strong support for this proposal, however we only have one endorsement. Good luck.

Jennifer Government, anyone? ;)
Dang it, I was goning to say that. :D

These provide strong arguments for a privatized education system, however Norfaria believes that it's not in the UN's favor to force an inefficient system of it's constituents. It should be left to the nations.


But - unless I misread it - all the private schools exist in nations where there are also public schools, so that people who can't afford to pay for their education can get it for free.

If you had an entirely private system, where everybody had to pay, then what do the people who can't afford to buy food, let alone pay for their child to be educated, do? Accept their kid is going to be uneducated and never get a decent job?

(occ)
Plus all the evidence in the UK points to privatising national industries as being a disaster for the service level they provide.
(back in character)

The only people who get anything out of it are the shareholders, and since we are talking about the future of the world here, I think that maybe the best interests of the children, not the shareholders, should come first.

I believe that it is a government's responsibility to educate its citizens but, this is not an issue to bring to the UN, a government can do what ever they wan within their own country unless restricted by law.

Maybe you should read this John Dewey: Democracy and Education. (http://www.ilt.columbia.edu/publications/dewey.html)

But - unless I misread it - all the private schools exist in nations where there are also public schools, so that people who can't afford to pay for their education can get it for free.

If you had an entirely private system, where everybody had to pay, then what do the people who can't afford to buy food, let alone pay for their child to be educated, do? Accept their kid is going to be uneducated and never get a decent job?

(occ)
Plus all the evidence in the UK points to privatising national industries as being a disaster for the service level they provide.
(back in character)

The only people who get anything out of it are the shareholders, and since we are talking about the future of the world here, I think that maybe the best interests of the children, not the shareholders, should come first.

Norfaria's position is it should be left to the nations. We shouldn't be required to have a public education system, but you may if you desire it.

Well, Norfaria, unfortunately, UN Nations are required to provide a free education until 16 years of age, by UN Resolution. In San Mabus, we have no public education system, yet we provide vouchers to every child in the nation, to be used at their parents' or guardians' choice of schools. We boast a wonderful school system, which self-regulates through accreditation.

We might also note that no governmental issue of racial segregation in the schools is an issue in our country, as the government does not run the school system.