The Choice Channel

When you enter a private school, both you and your parents are required to sign paperwork indicating that you have read the college or university handbook, understand it, and will abide by it. These documents are contracts; they are the rules that govern your relationships and rights at your private institution. The law of contracts forms the oldest branch of the law relating to transactions. In one form or another, it has existed from the beginning of organized and primitive societies. Just as the safety of persons and/or property depends upon the rule of criminal law, the security and stability of the business world is dependent upon the law of contracts. The law of contracts is one of the main structural supports with the right to acquire and dispose of property. A contract in the modern sense has been defined as “an agreement containing a promise enforceable in law.”

One important distinction between a private institution and a public institution is that there is much more room for change at a private institution. Let’s face the facts: It’s easier to change the policies at a private university than to change the policies of the federal government. For example, private schools have more leeway to set their own rules on free expression than public schools do because private schools are covered by something called contract law. Contract law is said to be a part of “private law” because it does not involve or bind the state or persons that are not parties to the contract.

Private schools, partly due to their expense, handle education under unique circumstances. Privately schooled pre-adults feel pressure to perform, in part because of high tuition; there is a lot of money riding on these students. Whether paid by loans, parents or scholarships, the tuition provider acts as an overseeing force, continually checking on progress. These private schools sometimes integrate religion, have low student/teacher ratios and at times practice extreme educational standards that cannot be duplicated in the public sector.

Those who can afford the specialized services offered by private schools should be entitled to them. Paying roughly $11,000 each year more than public four-year universities may provide benefits such as solitude due to location, extreme rigor, and the stigma of having attended a private institution.

The only money that private institutions gain from the government is minor grants and financial aid.

In a Supreme Court case called Tinker v. Des Moines, Justice Abe Fortas ruled that, “In our system, state-operated schools may not be enclaves of totalitarianism. School officials do not possess absolute authority over their students. Students in school as well as out of school are ‘persons’ under our Constitution.” In spite of the Supreme Court’s ringing endorsement of students’ rights in the landmark Tinker decision, constitutional violations are far too common in public schools across the country.

Articles about controversial subjects written for student newspapers are censored. Lockers and backpacks are searched without reasonable suspicion or probable cause. Minority students are disproportionately shunted in lower track programs. Majoritarian religious practices are officially sanctioned by teachers and school administrators. Female students are excluded from certain extracurricular activities; gay students are intimidated into silence.

Both private and public institutions are far from being educational panaceas. From grade inflation to policy enforcement, both private and public schools have their work cut out for them in the future.

According to National Center for Education Statistics, during the 1993-94 school year, private schools in the United States accounted for 24.4 percent of the total number of schools in the United States. These schools enrolled 10.7 percent of the students enrolled in kindergarten through grade 12. The same report reveals that nearly one-third of private schools required some kind of community service before graduation, as compared with only three percent of government schools that have a like requirement.

Clearly, there exists an additional objective of private school leaders more than of government school leaders to focus on issues that go beyond academic achievement (and) which serve to strengthen the community and uphold society’s moral values. The government schools continue to consider such goals inappropriate, but the private schools can deal effectively with the students’ academic and moral development.

The biggest and best benefit of a private school is simply that it is not a public school. Students are often shut down by the system that is supposed to be helping them succeed as individuals. Government-run education doesn’t work because it stifles creativity and individual initiative in a multitude of areas.

The hidden benefits of a private education are many: more creativity, less propaganda, more learning, less obedience, more responsibility.

Hopefully Americans will come to a similar conclusion; then and only then can the complete separation of school and state be brought to a reality.