Schools for profit

As I glanced through a recent issue of Time Magazine, one headline stopped me short: “School for Profit.” Imagine public schools run by private companies charging no tuition but operating classrooms for local school boards or independent chartering organizations and showing a profit for shareholders. They are challenging public schools that they can do a better job educating students and make a profit doing it. Once considered a foolish idea, the forprofit schools are capturing an exuberant following among its students, parents and teachers.

Edison Schools Inc., a company whose shares are traded on the NASDAQ, started in the idea in 1990. Though it still has to show a profit, it is catching the attention of parents who are clamoring for its product. Currently there are about 250 forprofit public schools with an enrollment of 120,000 students. Ten years ago there were none. As Wall Street begins to see the profit possibilities more companies and more money will be poured into for profit schools.

The basic idea is to take the same government funds that a school district spends per pupil per year the U.S. average is $6,500. From this sum the companies must deliver superior education and make a profit. Time Magazine states: “Chris Whittle, Edison’s founder and CEO, is staking his company’s future on its ability to slash administrative costs.” Whittle feels that it they can be reduced without sacrificing the quality of teaching and still show a 7% to 8% profit.

Edison’s major challenge is to prove that it can deliver topquality schooling. Edison provides more instruction than the typical public school  eight hours per day. Another is 200 days a year vs. 180 days. Every Edison student above the second grade gets free use of a home computer linked to a library. Consider this impact to better learning when 60% of Edison students come from families with incomes below the poverty line who would never be able to purchase their own computer.

In addition to academics, Edison emphasizes instilling pride and discipline in youngsters who may have known little of either. Time states, “Board chairman William Granville Jr. recalls how students initially covered the walls with graffiti and ran shouting down hallways. Today, after hours of instruction devoted to such concepts as dignity and selfrespect, orderly students file through spotless white corridors and volunteer to sweep litter off the carpeted floors.”

Though the impact on learning is still being measured, the schools are showing an initial modest improvement on student achievement. Edison students have raised their performance on standardized tests an average of 5% points a year. Whittle says: “We either make it or don’t make it on the basis of test scores.”
A growing number of companies are prepared to face the challenge. One of them is Nobel Learning Communities, which runs 145 private preschools and elementary schools in 13 states. Nobel plans to open five more charter schools by the end of this year. It is predicated that the market share of traditional public schools will shrink from 89% to 70% within 20 years with forprofit schools claiming about 15% of the new educational mix. In a current public school market of $360 billion, this translates to roughly a $60 billion industry for the for profit schools.

I welcome for-profit schools, along with charter and other private schools, as benevolent trend which will have a rejuvenate impact on a flagging public school system. Society is changing and concepts concerning the “free public schools system” must change also. Too many parents and students for too long consider “free” as the right to abuse. Welcome to innovations. Long live better education.