How Private Choice Affects Public Schools

In deciding to send their daughter to a private school, Bill and Hillary Clinton have decided not to sacrifice their child to symbolism. Will their decision hurt the cause of public schools in America? Sure it will.

We all know that when the middle class deserts the public schools (the upper classes having deserted them long ago), it leaves the impression that city schools are fit only for the underclass.

This wouldn’t be so bad if the quality of the schools was maintained, but it isn’t.

I are a public school graduate. (Sorry, I couldn’t resist. I am a public school graduate.)

I went to inner-city schools on the south side of Chicago. I later became an education reporter in that city and got to see the problems from both ends.

The school system was a gigantic, unmanageable bureaucracy constantly enmeshed in political and union squabbles. It was a political entity that gobbled millions of tax dollars but couldn’t provide enough textbooks for the kids.

In some neighborhoods, the schools were excellent. But these were almost always neighborhoods where the parents played not only an active role, but had an almost fanatical devotion to quality.

The parents were watchdogs. They demanded things from the school board. And if they didn’t get them, they wrote letters and went to see administrators and took their case to the media.

As these people moved out of the city or opted out of the public schools, they were replaced with parents who were struggling to survive and who didn’t have the time to battle the Establishment.

They expected the schools to give their kids a good education because that’s what schools were supposed to do. In city after city, the schools declined.

In some cases administrators figured if nobody was complaining, if kids were still graduating (whether they could read or not) then the schools must be doing a good job.

Teachers had their own point of view: They had kids for only a few hours a day. The parents had the kids the rest of the day. And if parents didn’t demand that the kids do homework, or instill in their kids a sense that education was important, what could schools do?

Unlike private schools, public schools could not pick the cream of the crop. In my high school, there was a tracking system. It went: Regular, Honors, Advanced Placement.

A few years after I left school, a new track was added at the low end: Basic. Later, an even lower track was added: Essential.

A few years after that, the tracking system was ended as “stigmatizing” the kids.

And then came the issue that was really the crusher: safety.

It doesn’t matter if your child is learning particle physics and Japanese in the eighth grade. If you fear that he is going to get shot in the lunchroom you are going to pull him out of that school if you can.

Violence on streets surrounding the schools invaded the schools. Guns appeared in lockers and hallways. Metal detectors were brought in and daily weapons pat-downs were conducted.

And at that point, some of those remaining parents who wanted their kids to remain in public schools as a symbolic statement and in a personal attempt to save public schools, began opting out.

In Little Rock, Chelsea Clinton went to a public school. In Washington, D.C., she will not.

Did safety play a part in that decision? It is hard to tell from the statement released by the Clintons: “As parents we believe this decision is best for our daughter at this time in her life, based on our changing circumstances.”

Sure, Chelsea will be accompanied by Secret Service agents even at her private school. But a public school actually could have benefited from the added protection.

D.C. public schools are not the worst in the nation, some are good, but they are below the national norm in almost all areas.

And I’m sure the Clintons want for Chelsea what all parents want for their kids: the best.

The Clintons are aware how much of their own lives have been altered by their career choices.

They know the acts of public citizens are symbolic: It is important whether you attend church, whether you play golf at a restricted club, whether you send your child to a public school.

I believe both of them would sacrifice almost anything to put up the best public and symbolic image they could. But they were not willing to sacrifice their daughter.

I don’t blame them. I’m just sorry they had to make the decision they made.