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School Sends Child's Lunch Home After Determining it Unhealthy
halfEvilTech writes "A North Carolina mom is irate after her four-year-old daughter returned home late last month with an uneaten lunch the mother had packed for the girl earlier that day. But she wasn't mad because the daughter decided to go on a hunger strike. Instead, the reason the daughter didn't eat her lunch is because someone at the school determined the lunch wasn't healthy enough and sent it back home. What was wrong with the lunch? That's still a head-scratcher because it didn't contain anything egregious: a turkey and cheese sandwich, banana, potato chips, and apple juice. But for the inspector on hand that day, it didn't meet the healthy requirements."
Vouchers.
It solves practically every issue you could name with public schools.
A comprehensive voucher program that ensured that every child got a free education at a private school would solve pretty much everything.
Many states spend a LOT of money on public education. It's hard to see all the money because it's spread around in lots of different accounts that are rarely all taken together. But it's big money. And private schools designed to operate on that budget are very practical and would be superior in every way.
Parents don't like the school? In big cities there should be a dozen other options and in small towns there should be at least two alternatives. It's not a big deal. it's not that hard.
What we're suffering from here is over centralization. Well meaning people make up a bunch of rules from some central planning office and then force everyone else to follow them with no discretion. The larger a system gets the less efficient centralization becomes. Fragment the system and all those problems go away.
Rather then having huge school boards or state education programs. Break it down so that every school manages itself. Make them accountable for what their students achieve. And if they don't achieve make it very clear that parents can take the kids out at will and put them in a competing institution... leaving the first school starving.
Do that and schools will compete with each other for students. Teachers will compete with each other. And that competition will make our schools better.
Think about the real world. Where does competition not make people and companies better at what they do? Basically nowhere. Make this part of the system and this sort of mindless incompetence will vanish.
I've decided to stop wasting my time responding to AC trolls/sockpuppets... so if you want a response from me... login.
Yes, you can. If you mod things flamebait or troll and the metamodders disagree, and it happens frequently, you get permanently banned from moderating.