Abolish Local School Districts?

As someone who thinks that the Clarke County School District is a case study in brutally expensive and ineffective school administration, this piece about doing away with local school districts and implementing national standards, penned by the former head of IBM no less, immediately caught my eye.

One the one hand, the small government libertarian/conservative in me recoils at the thought of nationalizing education as, to date, our efforts in that regard have not been successful. The innumerable strings attached to federal education dollars merely means that state and local education officials prostitute themselves to federal mandates so as to keep the money flowing.

On the other hand, though, given the train wreck that is the Clarke County School District, and far too many other districts across the country, perhaps a radical solution such as that proposed by Mr. Gerstner is in order.

I cannot help but think, though, that a more promising solution would be to minimize the federal government’s role in education, not expand it.

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