George F. Will & Muddled Thinking About Education

George F. Will’s recent Sunday column neatly captures the muddled thinking of conservatives about education. Halfway through the column, Will states flat out that the overwhelmingly dominant factors behind different education outcomes are the characteristics of the households where the students live. The most important of those factors is family income.

If that point is correct, then the charter school movement and criticisms of teachers unions have nothing to do with improving education outcomes and closing achievement gaps. We would also not expect wholesale firing of the teachers at particular schools to be a solution. None of those changes affect family income or other key household characteristics.

For a conservative, it is important to make that point about the vital link between family incomes and education outcomes. When progressive “do-gooders” advocate government programs, conservatives attack them as out of touch with reality. For conservatives, education is all about personal responsibility at the family level, not at the neighborhood or community level. Progressives say it takes a village to raise a child, while conservatives seem to think it takes an idiot to support a village.

So, at the halfway point of the column, Will is on familiar ground with conservative thinking.

By the end of Will’s column, he pivots and labels Education Secretary Arne Duncan a “Mrs. Jellyby” for blocking a school voucher program in Washington, DC. Will states flat out that Democrats are to blame for preventing children from low-income households being able to escape “execrable” schools. Will is certain that those children, regardless of their household characteristics, would achieve academic success by simply changing schools.

For a conservative, it is important to argue that incompetent teachers and administrators are the predominant cause of low test scores. When progressives defend public schools and teachers unions, conservatives attack them as oppressive special interests.

Income inequality is the villain of paragraph five, while institutionally bad schools are the villain of paragraph 9 in Will’s column. It is worth remembering that these contrary ideas are not espoused by rival camps within the conservative movement. They are contradictory ideas put forth by the same individuals, at the same time, without any awareness of the irony.

Will and many conservatives support charter schools and oppose government programs and teachers unions on the basis of their political principles. It is a shame that their principles themselves fail to adhere to any principle of logical consistency. Whether we should blame their muddled thinking on the poor quality of their education or on their family income level, I will leave for others to determine.