For schools, one size does not fit all

Today's schools were not designed for today's challenges. This should come as no surprise.

After all, it took more than three centuries from the time of Massachusetts Bay Colony's first statutory education laws in 1647 until 90 percent of American students were actually showing up in school every day.

Just when we figured out how to enroll most children in schooling -- well into the 20th century -- the pool of talented women that had been staffing those schools began to thin out as new professional paths opened up for them. Simultaneously, we radically expanded the number of teachers we hired; repurposed schools to address the legacy of slavery and racial inequality; redefined the moral purpose of schools from promoting "Americanism" to appreciating diversity and tolerance; and promised to educate every child to a high level of proficiency.

Whew! And the glaring irony is that the elaborate system of schooling built over those three centuries -- now employing 3.4 million teachers in 100,000 schools governed by countless rules and routines -- was built to simply ensure access to the rudimentary three Rs.

This was a sensible system to serve founder Benjamin Rush's goal of indoctrinating young citizens in an era when literacy was defined as the ability to sign one's name. But it is not at all clear that this web of public monopolies is an ideal model for delivering a high-powered education that shrinks from religious dicta and patriotic fervor.

The founders of the American system never imagined that they were designing a school to system that would successfully educate all -- or even most -- students. It was Thomas Jefferson, champion of public schooling and firebrand egalitarian, who explained more than two centuries ago that the states in the new republic needed to promote schooling, not so that all might be educated, but so the "best geniuses [could be] raked from the rubbish annually."

In recent decades, our expectations have skyrocketed, with policymakers today insisting that all students need to master skills once thought the province of the elite. The result is that we need schools far more capable than the one-size-fits-all bureaucracies of an earlier era, and we're more comfortable than ever with the notion that different children can and will benefit from a variety of school models.

Rather than being the exception, schools of choice -- whether charter schools or private schools attended with the aid of a public voucher -- seem naturally suited to new circumstances.

The challenge of adapting isn't unique to education. Plenty of once-dominant private ventures -- from Pan Am to Bethlehem Steel -- struggled when labor markets, technology, and customer demands have changed. Unable to refashion themselves, many have given way to younger, more agile competitors.

Because that Darwinian process does not play out by itself in schooling, we must through policy and reform push that process along.

Even when we recognize that old routines and assumptions may no longer hold, we too often shrink from structural change or turn potentially sensible innovations into iffy new best practices. Altering arrangements, whether through school choice or merit pay, will not miraculously or directly improve teaching and learning.

The key is not to invest the new arrangements with talismanic power, but to use them as levers that make it easier to use talent, tools, and technology in smarter ways.

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