Acton Institute Powerblog Archives

Educational Choice

November 19, 2012

Why Can’t We Fire Bad Teachers?

Timothy Dalrymple wonders whether education reform should be one of the great objectives for American Christians in the twenty-first century. Taking up that cause will require overcoming the intransigence of the teachers’ unions: Try firing an ineffective teacher.   Continue Reading...
September 26, 2012

Societal Development and the Kalamazoo Promise

In a recent New York Times article (here), Ted C. Fishman offers and in-depth feature on the Kalamazoo Promise: Back in November 2005, when this year’s graduates were in sixth grade, the superintendent of Kalamazoo’s public schools, Janice M. Continue Reading...
August 07, 2012

Teacher’s Union: We Want to Help You By Suing You

For decades teachers’s unions have been giving teachers—and unions—a bad name. A prime example is the intimidation tactics used by Louisiana Association of Educators (LAE): A Louisiana teachers union is threatening private schools with legal action if they accept money from a new voucher program – and the threat has already forced at least one school to put its participation in the program on hold. Continue Reading...
June 21, 2012

The Demand Side of College Education

One of the most worrisome economic troubles coming down-the-pipe is the “student debt bubble” which many argue is caused by too many students seeking degrees in higher education as the costs of tuition increase. Continue Reading...
May 22, 2012

What Happens When ‘Free’ is Unaffordable?

As I noted yesterday, I’m in Montreal for the next couple of weeks, and today I had the chance to see some of the student protests firsthand. These protests have been going on now for over three months, and have to do with the raising of tuition for college in Quebec. Continue Reading...
The Right to Education
April 30, 2012

What Christian Education Is Not

“Each generation needs to re-own the rationale for Christian education,” says philosopher James K.A. Smith, “to ask ourselves ‘Why did we do this?’ and ‘Should we keep doing this?’” In answering such questions, Smith notes, “it might be helpful to point out what Christian education is not”: First, Christian education is not meant to be merely “safe” education. Continue Reading...
April 27, 2012

The Next Civil Rights Movement

During last year’s Acton University—have you signed up for this year yet?—Nelson Kloosterman gave a lecture on the subject of school choice and private education. In the latest issue of Comment magazine, Kloosterman expands on his claim that parental choice is “the next civil rights movement“: Let me begin with some contextualizing comments designed to set up the discussion that follows. Continue Reading...