What if America Didn’t Have Public Schools?
“The United States has witnessed heightened interest in the role of private schools in the broader K-12 education landscape since Donald Trump tapped Betsy DeVos as the country’s education secretary in 2016. DeVos is a vocal proponent of voucher programs, which allocate taxpayer money to families—namely those who couldn’t otherwise afford it—that want to enroll their children in private schools. Parents choose to send their kids to private schools for all kinds of reasons—religious affiliation, single-sex classrooms, specialized curricula, strong academics, and location, among others. For some parents, a small, specialized campus is the dream setting for their child; others are afraid of parochial schools teaching their kids as much about the Bible as it does math. Many other parents still, of course, are simply happy with—and often prefer—the default public option in their neighborhood.”