An Economist Looks at 90: Tom Sowell on Charter Schools and Their Enemies

when he was growing up in Harlem 3/4 of a century ago the schools were good in recent years Harlem has once again produced some very good schools charter schools and he found that intriguing today one day after his 90th birthday Thomas soul on his new book charter schools and their enemies uncommon knowledge now welcome to another special plague time edition of uncommon knowledge with Peter Robinson Thomas soul has taught economics intellectual history and social policy at institutions that include Cornell UCLA and Amherst now a senior fellow at the Hoover Institution dr. Sol has published many books including his newest volume just published charter schools and their enemies and yesterday Thomas soul turned 90 Tom happy birthday right here all right the argument of charter schools and their enemies I'm quoting from the book Tom charter schools and especially some particular networks of charter schools located in low-income black and Hispanic neighborhoods have achieved educational results not only far above the levels achieved by most public schools in those neighborhoods we're talking about New York City neighborhoods but sometimes even higher educational results than those in schools located in affluent white neighborhoods no one expected that put kids in good schools and they'll learn and in black and Hispanic neighborhoods that comes as a surprise why should it come as a surprise to so many the club for us they've heard a thousand excuses as to why they can't teach some of these neighborhoods that the kids before that and all sorts of things are wrong except that nothing is relevant thought to be wrong with the public schools themselves it's always somebody else who is responsible the society should have solved the integration problem set all right let's define terms charter schools differ from private schools because charter schools remain publicly funded but how do charter schools differ from other public schools they differ from the fact that the biggest difference is that children are assigned to go to particular public schools no Jonah are assigned to go to charter school charter the people who apply for charter schools are then selected by lottery and so the charter schools themselves well let me put it differently traditional public schools are radically different from almost any other institution in society whether they're these the hospitals the sports arenas automobile dealerships churches or whatever and then any institution in order to survive as an institution has to have some clientele that it must please enough of the clientele to come through traditional public schools are are a radical radically different in the compulsory attendance laws provide them with a clientele the clientele has no choice in the matter and there is no competition among different traditional public schools because each one has a monopoly in its own district charter schools are more like other institutions it survives as an institution only to the extent that they can attract people there voluntarily all right what about teachers and charter schools unionized not unionized a mix how does that work in the most charter schools the teachers are not unionized in the public traditional public schools the teachers are unionized and of course the trade the teachers unions are well aware of this distinction which has some huge financial implications without right all right back to the book you studies you mentioned charter schools in a number of places across the country but you focus and you focus very intently on charter schools in New York City you go the data in great detail let me quote you New York City has a substantial sample of ethnically and socioeconomically comparable students whose educational outcomes can be compared close quote can you explain that just to the extent of a sentence yes many of the people who are defending the traditional public school who are attacking the charter school say the charter schools don't get any better results as a whole than traditional public schools as a whole it's one of many statements that is technically true and grossly misleading at the same time white students and Hispanic students constitute a majority of all the students in traditional public schools black students and Hispanic students are majority in the charter school did I say white and Asian students yeah he said white in his time white in Asian articles in one of the public schools white an Asian right right the charter schools black in Hispanic for four generations white and Asian students have been scoring higher on tests than black and Hispanic students sort of say the bet that they're only equal now is to say that this gap that people have been agonizing over for years has now been closed it is this state for what is relevant I am most that most statements are true one is true and misleading the others true and add some effect to it right so I'm going to quote you just mentioned it but I'm going to quote this summary of your central finding in charter schools and their enemies New York City charter schools that have had no capacity to end poverty or racial concentrations of minority students that is they're in the neighborhoods that they're in they take the students who are selected by lottery they can't affect the poverty of the background of those students they can't affect the racial makeup of those students nevertheless these charter schools have closed the racial gap in education close quote now the first time you present this finding it's in a section where you're being relatively analytical and and frankly a little bit dry but that goes off that goes off like a can shot doesn't it I would hope mean to tell me we have discovered how to close this educational gap that has been a wound in the nation for decades yes and if the people who do it are being attacked after they have done it all right that's the finding let's let's just go through this is charter schools and their enemies and will come to the enemies in a moment but a lot of people of goodwill have in their minds various arguments against charter schools that they've picked up during well here in California during ballot initiative contests and so forth let's just go through these yes charter schools cream away the best students the smartest kids the motivated kids and that leaves public schools were the worst students in other words the kids do better in charter schools because they're better students in the first place Tom it sounds like so on the surface it sounds very plausible in reality the children who get into the charter schools are chosen by lottery and as in other lotteries a very small number of people win and a very large number of learners and so when say 17,000 applicants for 3,000 places in the Success Academy Charter Schools on children Success Academy takes 3,000 did the other 14,000 are gonna end up back in the traditional public school so the tourists will take a freshen of the applicants the applicants may well be better motivated than the average student but the fact is that even great majority of those motivated students remain in the public schools and they don't do anything with them comparable to what John school do in the charter school meaning as you mentioned in the book for their number of studies including by our hoover colleague caroline hawks be that track the kids who lose the lottery and get back to the public school and if they were special kids especially motivated you might hope to see that they outperform and they don't they fall behind the kids who make it into the charter school is that correct absolutely and moreover the girls who go into the charter schools become pregnant at a much lower rate than the girls who go back into the traditional public schools and the boys and going to the charter schools do not get it incarcerated at the same rate as higher rate as that the boys have go hoo-hoo left behind in the pump in the public school and this second point I think is important because they are always saying that the charter school because they have stronger discipline problem that this is the beginning of the pipeline from school to prison in point of fact yeah yeah if the evidence the hard evidence shows that kids who are in charter schools with strict and discipline are less likely to end up being incarcerated all right here's another argument against charter schools it's just I'm plucking these arguments from the air they're there what we've all heard over and over charter schools deprive ordinary public schools of the vital resource and that of course is money every kid who lived leaves the public school ordinary public school for a charter school takes tuition dollars with him and that's unfair because the traditional public schools have such high fixed costs they have buildings to maintain they have teachers contracts to honor and on and on and on and so the charter schools whatever they may be doing in the in their schools they're weakening the public school system by bleeding it of funds Tom you find my you find these arguments of music other wise that we cry they're so bad when it was child leave any kind of school to go to another school nobody says that the money to educate that child but a remain behind in the store he left rather than with implicitly galoot so also by the millions kids are moving from one public school to another from public to private whatever and nobody has ever advanced the ridiculous law that the money should stay behind when the kid goes but what also is also not known widely is that the public the taxpayers money that goes to these charter school students is less than what they what they are paying to pretty per pupil and the public schools now I've seen two studies probably at different times one of which says it's 19% less the other says something like 26 percent less but so the money per pupil goes up when the kid leaves for the charter school because he doesn't take as much money with him to the charter school as we're being spent on it when he was in the public school such as well the opposite of what people suppose is the opposite of what right all right charter school teachers the charter schools can do more with less money partly because they hire cheaper teachers they're younger they're less credentialed they don't belong to unions so they don't have union dues to pay so charter school charter schools are just working with a cheaper labor force Tom well I would love to see the numbers on that but but the fact of the matter is when when you look at the result that these supposedly less qualified teachers are turning out kids who know who know their math and the supposedly well-qualified ones in the traditional public school on turning out kids who can't do math I mean III cited this number that the charter school kids and the same in the same building with with the traditional public school kids pants the math test nearly seven times as often that's an average at these things it's almost unbelievable I mean when the one one classic example is a school where seven percent of all the all the kids in the traditional public school in that building passed the math test in the charter school 100% pass the math that hold on wait a minute I want to I want to repeat that they're in the same building in there the same building they're all the same F ethnic background the other same social economic and the kids who are subjected to the subjective who are participating in the traditional public school regime 7% passed the math test piglets last right right but one exam and then down the hall same kids same billions the difference is the the system they're in a different system and they pass at the rate of 100 percent more than that as I put on the book yeah you know there's four level and level three is proficient yes among the kids in the charter school 98% of our in level four which is the level above proficient and only 2% are in as low as proficient and the other only 7% are as high as proficient and again I want to repeat this these are in taking place in the same building they're using their rent and disused rooms in public school buildings and that's you know not that all charter schools do that but those are their schools you studied because they are so directly comparable yes all right just one more argument against charter schools you touched on it already but I want to I want to take it on directly and that's this question of discipline charter schools impose the results that they they achieve the results that they achieve because they are imposing discipline at such strict levels that it verges over into the inhumane they're scaring the kids they're turning them into robots you there if there's an incident you're laughing here's an incident that you touch on in your book charter school in New York that turned a little kindergartner away go home you can't come in today because the kindergartner was wearing the wrong socks now Tom Tom that that's taking things too far don't you agree it was the first day of school mm-hmm and the first thing they want this child to understand that rules are there for a reason and then if you don't follow the rules you don't belong they in there and that is enormous the important to socks themselves don't matter I don't think it matters two cents worth but what you must establish that a child's mind that rules are there and we disobey them there are consequences and so forth he misses one day of kindergarten and the next time he comes in he'll have his uniform proper probably on him and they'll let him in but if you're not gonna have you're gonna have rules without consequences you don't have rule you just have suggestions all right now we come to charter schools and their enemies Tom to quotations here's from this is from an article in The New York Times this is just months ago the city New York City the city and state's political forces have turned decisively against charter schools over the last few years close quote here's the second quotation this is Tom solo in charter schools and their enemies how can success be so unwelcome close quote charter schools producing results among the very disadvantaged kids in the very neighborhoods that New York's liberal establishment claims to most want to help and it is that very liberal establishment that has arrayed itself against those same schools what is going on well they understand that if 50,000 kids on waiting lists to get into charter schools but able to do so and the per pupil allotment of money is $20,000 more than $20,000 per student that means that the traditional public schools will lose more than a billion dollars a year and the public schools are in no mood to lose that money the teachers unions are by no means the moods that really teaches jobs and in the union dues that those teachers pay it's bigger than that even there is a whole way of life is come about in the traditional public schools there's no way that they can compete with a charter schools without changing that profoundly for example the ironclad job protection of teachers have so the teachers who have done all kinds of terrible things remain under favorable because it is just too expensive to get rid of them my gosh they're there they have one class of about teachers who did no teaching at all and would just report to someone baking room and sit there during the day and they would collect collect full pay and uh and that collects seniority and their various benefits is over because the cost of firing them is prohibitive its prohibitive in financial terms and in time if you want and money terms of study has shown that the to fire a teacher for any incompetence it takes an average of eight hundred and thirty days which is more than two years and costs an average of three hundred and thirteen thousand now and that by nobody's guarantees that you'll be able to do it and then doesn't even take into account that there's a whole labyrinth in procedure if you have to go through and not see the principal half of you as a huge amount of his time going to all jumping through all these hoops in the hopes of being you know getting rid of such a teacher and so it's like so they're kept in there in the end the school there they are not tested they're not judged by how well the students learn there they will not mean they they can pass on to the next grade kids who are two levels below the proficiency level and they just keep them moving on keep the line open and so you but you can't do that if you have to compete with for results with with with the results that the charter schools are able to get so you are telling me we're used to human nature we're used to politics we're used to the idea that there are vested interests but you're telling me that this is just what's going on in New York City is just a naked naked grab for power yeah the results that you're describing in the charter schools are known it is known that there are fifty thousand kids on the waiting list to get into those charter schools and I suppose we could even say well maybe it's not surprising the teachers unions the officials in the teachers unions they're set up to get as much money and as much stability and job security for their teachers as they can maybe we can say all right we'd expect them to behave the way they're behaving but the mayor of the city of New York Bill de Blasio has in all his life a progressive on the farther left in with in New York City he's on the not the leftmost in New York City is almost impossible to find the thing where the left end of the spectrum ends but he's over there and that means that all his life he has been arguing for help for the poor the disadvantaged blacks and Hispanics he knows what's going on he has to he sees that there's something that can help these kids and he's siding with the unions all the same is that correct yes all right what would he say in his own defense is there is there anything we're missing here are you being slightly unfair to this man oh the teachers union helped put this man in the office he hold he appeals to them he is and when he was here we had talk of a National Education Association which the country's largest new engineers he basically he he hates the people who that charter school there should be no federal funding for charter school he should get rid of charter school and I'm and that will of course get him the support of the National Education Association all right I can charter schools and their enemies the study where and and where you go into the present charts tables the facts the figures the argument is the results are just unassailable but that's in New York City because that's where they the data was available that allows you to compare so right but again you do talk about other places including California charter schools and their enemies and again we're on the enemies here new laws passed in California in 2019 and power local education officials that is the officials running the traditional or regular public school system and power local education officials to deny applications for establishing charter schools if the Charter School in question now you're quoting the new law is demonstrably unlikely to serve the interests of the entire community close quote or if if again quoting the school district is not positioned to absorb with the fiscal impact of the proposed charter school close quote well that's a lot of words and here's what it means again I'm quoting you in short incumbents those already in power incumbents are empowered to determine if the community really needs their competitors or or if the competition of newcomers would inconvenience the existing institutions closed whoa you don't you know you're not being unfair or too harsh there you don't want to take back any of what you wrote there one of the things I do in the book is point out that this whole approach has a long history in other fields of endeavor it is embedded in the the radio in the screens of their television ministry Freight can't free County in the airliners and which you set up a law says in order to be a otter eyes to operate this industry you must show that there is a public necessity or convenience that you're going to provide and this will of course be judged by people well looking at your impact on the existing people in industry and then that but for decades as people applaud more people are taking up the airlines they never could seem to find a need for anymore airlines that come into the industry because they realize if you had competition some of these this the airlines would go bankrupt I'm gonna but when they finally it was during the Carter Administration one of the two things done right they got rid of this legislation immediately other airlines would create airline prices film for more seeds had an airline service so the this idea that doing this to protect the public is absolute nonsense then doing it to protect the incumbents just to give one of the other example and when FM radio came along and REM radio has a better sound which is why most music station or on FM radio rather than a.m. there it was technologically available decades before it became widespread because they were saying this will have a bad effect on the am stations if we allow FM stations and so they just they delayed it but well unless long as they possibly could as it's absurd when you think about it but they wouldn't need wonderful sounding words and then hope that you don't think about Tom well charter schools and their enemies again we're on the enemies teachers unions I'm quoting you teachers unions are the politically strongest of the organizations opposed to charter schools they possess millions of members and make millions of dollars in political campaign contributions close quote now here's something I'm sure you've heard this and I've heard it over and over again wait a minute alright advocate for charter schools if you want to but don't bash the good people who are trying to make the public school system work good the good people who are trying to make the public school system work I'm doing it by making it by putting roadblocks in the ability of team of students to transfer out of traditional public schools one of those roadblocks is simply laws this give an arbitrary number as a limit to the number of charter schools that can be authorized this number has nothing whatever to do with whether the charter schools are good bad or indifferent it has nothing to do with whether the existing traditional public schools are good better and this an arbitrary number which means that in New York this success Academy the network for example was received over nine million dollars federal money let last year but is unable to expand because they're they're up against this magic number and therefore no matter how how well they train at this Newton's but how how barely the other thing other schools are training them they simply cannot expand and cities across the country there are places where there are bacon buildings buildings that have been vacant for years school bill and they block the charter schools from getting into those school buildings because if they get into those still buildings they will have classrooms and which to think the kids are on the waiting list in some places they have actually demolished no school buildings making sure the charter schools can't move into them so these are the good people as you speak of who are really trying to protect the traditional folk and connect I'm gonna take one more one more salad look I know I take my life in my hands when I try again against you Tom but how all of us can picture teachers and put in the public's well oh those of us who went through a public school system in the old days ordinary teachers in my experience tend to be very good people I guess what I'm asking is do you what happens I think we can posit that most teachers go into the profession hoping to do good with the kids they retain some idealism though job for most of them they take it seriously it's hard and they want the best for the kids and then the teachers unions behave just as you say they behave what happens when individually good teachers come together to try to affect collective action is there some distinction is there some explanation some systemic explanation for why good people can end up supporting a bad system well first of all teachers unions are not created by teachers there are people who create unions and in fact in fact the the the interests of the teachers unions Canon can be opposite to those of the teachers presently there's a large increase of money and into the school system and they're always saying it's under fund no matter how much matter how many billions of dollars go down a bottomless pit when that would like money is healthy and available you can use that money to raise teachers salaries that would be good for the teachers it would be bad for the teachers unions the teachers unions again get more news if instead of raising the teachers salaries you create more jobs more teachers aides more counselors more nurses more this or that more bureaucrats in the system because all those people will be paying union dues whereas if you simply have a higher pay teachers you don't in you don't get any increase in you and you do all right all right we've been talking about the success charter schools have and teaching the kids let's take a moment to talk about what charter schools can teach the rest of us there are some lessons in the book I as I read it for the rest of us chart what charter schools teach us about money you just touched on this you quote in charter schools and their enemies you quote your friend Walter Williams of George Mason University and he conducted a study on schools in Baltimore George Mason's in Virginia Baltimore is just up a 91 I think is the route anyway 95 95 here's Walter Williams in 2016 in 13 of Baltimore's 39 high schools not a single student scored proficient on the state's mathematics exam not one citywide only 15% of Baltimore students passed the state's English test the money is not the problem of the nation's 100 largest school systems Baltimore schools ranked third in spending per pupil close quote you you said a moment ago you described it as a bottomless pit yeah you spend the third highest amount per pupil of a hundred big systems and you end up with 13 high schools in which not a single kid not one can pass the mathematics exam at a proficient level all right so what does that teach us if money isn't central what is it that the charter schools are getting right aside from money values rigored what are the what what what what does matter well the institution's I mentioned earlier have different incentives and different constraints in the charter school they have to please the parents in order to have the parents send their kids there because no no no kids are required by compulsory attendance laws to go to a charter school so they help there are they're an all-volunteer institution and if you have poor education you have a bedlam and it's in schools dangerous of students who are allowed to run amok those parents are not gonna send their kids to a charter school so that so the incentives are entirely in government also the kind of people you attract the charter school do in fact keep track of how each teacher how the students of each teacher turn out when they test them and you have a teacher whose kids keep flunking the test that teacher not likely to survive her in law in in a charter school that teacher can survive for a half a century in a traditional and they're you know because and moreover the true people in the box traditional public schools and those who are defending them are absolutely opposed to having these annual tests that they have and they have good reason to be opposed to it because those tests show just how badly the the kids are being educated in their school mmm there was a new one when the phrase chip chip which is one of the one of the net the charter school network the first chip but school was put into a traditional public school building in the South Bronx years ago then they were allowed in only when they agreed to the precondition that there would be nothing ah inside or out that's outside that building to indicate that there was a second school in there when the test for tests were given they initially left instead of allowing them to publish their test course separately they love to gather all the test scores for all the kids in the building someone who tried to do a study in those early years was unable to find anything of course now that there that we have the New York State Education Department publicizing this on their website and we find out what's happening we can understand why they didn't want those separate test results to go out because they would have shown that the charter school kids were doing fine and that one is in the same building with them in its regular public schools were failing terribly got it so it's it's it's what you focus on its incentives the schools are accountable to the parents yeah and the teachers are accountable to the principal's because the schools are accountable to the parents it's accountability yes and they're accountable for results see one of the arguments that gets caught on a school they're not accountable and what they mean is they don't have all these enormous numbers of rules that that you have in their pilot attrition you're accountable for following those rules you are not accountable for the end results educationally for the students right right what charter schools teach us about I don't even know how to put this culture ordinary neighborhood culture I guess is the way to put it I'm quoting you again Tom charter schools and their enemies an empirical study of more than 90,000 black white and Hispanic students in grades 7 through 12 found that among black and Hispanic students whose grade point averages are above some level 2.5 among Hispanics and 3.5 among blacks they have fewer friends of their own ethnicity yes that is black and Hispanic kids who are good students and seems to start losing friends among their own ethnicity and then you quote Roland fryer professor Roland fryer of Harvard concluded that this pattern quote is most prevalent and racially integrated Public Schools and is less of a problem in the private sector and in predominantly black public schools close quote untangle that what's going on there see the people who have been saying that the way to get black kids who have better education result there's to put them in a school with white kids and what it would sounds plausible but the problem is they don't follow up by factually verifying that and in fact we create an almost impossible situation if the black kids have had very poor education before they could go to the white school they're gonna be concentrated in the lower levels a Long Beach grade and but those particular black students who follow the same kinds of regimen that the white students Wow tend to get the same kind of result that the white gives Yeah right they go unto the AP classes and so forth and the other other black kids then I resent that because there they seem to be repudiating they're in their own people and then joining the whites and then these are kids after all he's on adults and so and so these these kind of ideas leave them to be very hostile it was that there was a black elite school in Washington many years ago called Dunbar High School and they got all kinds of outstanding results then one one figure nine fifty-three 81 percent of Dunbar graduates went on to college which was higher than for any white public high school in Washington DC all right Dunbar High School was enormously controversial within the black community oh really yes yes I mean it lasted for heaven when there was there was a debate when they got a new bill and whether the same the old building as a monument and so forth and that the bitterness that was brought out produced a legal case in one all the way up to the Federal Circuit Court of Appeal and when the flinger Court of Appeals ruled that the building to be torn down there were members of the Washington DC City Council who said none blog represents a model of a leaders alone among blacks they should never arise again and soapy and people who have been successful in education escalante for example Jaime Escalante who had das in the LA or Southern California's I've oculus to Hispanics and some high percentage of all those bangs in the country who passed the AP Calculus test came out of his class you know whereas the rest of school couldn't do it he was he was this light in his school he was pretty sociable and he laughs he saw the argument the result is the resentment is that Dunbar High School in Washington was teaching black kids to be white it was somehow eventually it that that it was somehow unfaithful being unfaithful to the black community or insulting I see I see yes and so in schools and these charter schools in New York that you were studying that effect does not seem to take long oh there most of the kids they were there are there precisely because they want to get an education or their parents want them to and so when you do better is not in that situation you're fine but you have a full point over Irish and you're Hispanic in a predominantly white school you lose your hispanic friends so tom you know why this is very hard to accept for me at least because you're saying that one of the one of the signal moments in American history 1954 Supreme Court decision and Brown versus the Board of Education in which Chief Justice Earl Warren said separate schools this was ruling segregated schools unconstitutional separate is inherently unequal yeah and do you are you saying in certain circumstances separate may be better for the minority kids themselves wow I would go that far but I would say that that his proposition does not stand up on under the record and I use an example in the book of the time before blacks were allowed in the major leagues in those days there was a separate Black Widow League for black players diaramas and others came out of that once that what's the color barrier was really was the taken down in the major leagues there were seven consecutive years when no light player won the National League Most Valuable Player Award separate was not unequal right right what happens very often is there's a wrong idea namely that it's okay to segregate the black kids great you go against that but very often you go too far in the opposite direction and you'd say it's all black then it's inherently honey that and and and that is that's going well I'm bridge too far as they say all right so tell me if this is a fair summary statement I've found this again in the book charter schools in their enemies quote racially homogeneous school should not be sought as a goal yes aggregation that was a stupid pernicious idea we're we're far better off without it no segregation Jim Crow should stay in its grave but where charter schools are located in predominantly black and/or Hispanic neighborhoods the reality of educational success should not be sacrificed for the rhetoric of integration or diversity close quote absolutely all right all right what last question here about what charter schools teach us what they teach us about root causes this is another argument that we hear all the time you mentioned it at the very top of the show it may be most associated with the education expert professor Diane Ravitch and she argues that in assessing underperforming urban schools the poor performance of the students should be blamed on the schools it should be blamed on the root causes such as the students socio-economic background the kids are poor they come from ethnic groups that have suffered in the case of African Americans decade after decade after decade of prejudice and bias that's the problem and you can't ask schools to fix that Tom soul you have to take the root causes into account Tom I love record because people say those magic words see no reason to look at anything so mundane as facts it so happens that the success Academy Charter School Network has a higher percentage of its students passing the math and English tests on the human annually than any traditional public school district anywhere in the state of New York that includes places where the average family income is in excess of a quarter of a million dollars a year the average family income of a kids and the success Academy school is $50,000 a year and yet they do better on those tests than people whose family's got five times much income so the idea that poverty prevents them from learning apparently people who are saying these things who not bother to check back all right Tom I'm I want to return to charter schools and they're enemies in a moment but you just turned 90 yesterday and I have a few of my favorite Tom's soul quotations I want to just read it I want to read a little bit of you to yourself well I'm sitting down all right you're sitting down and you know just because there are so many of us to whom you have meant so much over the years okay this is from the vision of the anointed which is a brilliant book to ever to the those who are aware of it they've they think of it as a classic and I wish more people were aware of it it is a classic quote the vision of the anointed you're talking about elites in society is one in which ills such as poverty irresponsible sex and crime derived primarily from society rather than from individual choices and behavior to believe in personal responsibility would be to destroy the whole special role of the anointed whose vision casts them as in the role of rescuers of people and treated treated unfairly by society close quote all right how did it come to be that in your lifetime actually substantially even in my lifetime the anointed ended up running so much of the show major universities the mainstream media even now we see in the the way corporations are responding to the politics of the moment even corporation after corporation after corporation Ben and Jerry's makes ice cream and they sold Ben and Jerry I sold that company to Unilever which is a gigantic corporation and yet a couple of weeks ago Ben and Jerry's took it upon itself to release a statement about systemic racism in America dating from 1619 how making rocky road enabled entitles them to if it makes them feel as though they're entitled to make such a statement I do not know but maybe you do how did this happen how did the anointed end up on top in so many places I think they were in strategic places to begin with namely the educational system and when you have and one of the written other differences between the charters and the others is that the charter schools are very strong on the basics to public schools how all kinds of indoctrination courses on which they waste each children's time whether what they say is good is correct or incorrect in one way or another really does not justify the enormous waste of time of kids who desperately need unto master mathematics the English language and a couple of other basics with which they can go out into the world and compete with anybody but it's there their time is frittered away on these on these self intelligences in school system mm-hmm Tom soul on diversity quote if there is any place in the Guinness Book of World Records for words repeated the most often over the most years without one speck of evidence diversity should be a prime candidate is diversity our strength or anybody's strength anywhere in the world it has not been our diversity but our ability to overcome the problems inherent in diversity and to act together as Americans that has been our strength again how did diversity how did diversity come to be this kind of totem in society to which we must all this is why the propaganda principles of Nazi propaganda minister Joseph gerbils and said that you know people will believe any lie it's big enough and told often enough and loud enough and this lies been told you if you look at it see diversity is really another angle when he's to be called balkanization and they had to get rid of that because if you if you looked at the mall cos you would see that the horror that have gone on there about script anything ever happened in the United States a back in the 1970s when I was running a research project in Washington Auburn acting on Yugoslavs of Scala he might have visited me and he said you think blacks and whites in America have a problem the problems of blacks and whites in America is nothing compared to the problem of servitude cronuts and usual honoré and if you read the horrors that have occurred there I'll just mention one throwing and people the babies in the air and catching them on pea nets and forcing the parents to watch it while it happened I mean we have not reached that point yet even though we are headed in that direction diversity has not be a strength the ability to deal with the problems of the that is our strength all right all was Tom soul on government assistance quote do people who advocate special government programs for blacks realize that the federal government has had special programs for American Indians including affirmative action since the early 19th century and that American Indians remain one of the few groups worse off than blacks close quote yes the point there is do not look to government action or to politics to solve to solve everybody's problem is that if you think that the government actions if there is the answer at least look at the facts and check and test your belief against facts rather than just keep repeating words that are popular all right by the way the California Legislature I don't know whether I I can't sort out whether it's actual legislation or it was a resolution non-binding resolution any event something moved in the California Legislature calling for formal reparations to African Americans how do you respond to that one I know and they know it's not going to happen so what so what we're looking at is someone who wants votes all followers and that this will get them votes or get them followers and finance but it's not all it will do is simply charity other country acquired all right back to charter schools and their enemies once again I want to repeat that central finding charter schools located in low-income black and Hispanic neighborhoods have achieved educational results not only far above the levels achieved by most public schools in those neighborhoods but sometimes even higher educational results than those in most schools located in affluent white neighborhoods close quote Tom at a moment when the country is tearing itself apart over questions of race and inequality over all of it Tom Saul steps forward and says wait a moment there's a way out and it's not a particularly surprising way out good schools give black kids and Hispanic kids good schools they'll be fine and we know they'll be fine because that's what the data shows it is as if we were all in a burning house and Tom soul said everybody everybody there's an open door let's just walk through let's just walk through and I don't know if I look at this and I think to myself tom is able to remain calm about this but it is beyond infuriating infuriating it's a kind of madness it's as if I was oh the door in a burning house and Bill de Blasio's trying to keep it shut yes oh I'm not I'm not always this calm other what otherwise I wouldn't the time that I spent that I am investing more on this book than any other book that I've written because I realized just how how big the stakes are that there are kids for whom education is their one big opportunity for a much better life and there are people out there stopping them from getting it because it would interfere with the requisites over all of the adults in the system last question I'd like to close if I may buy in a moment by asking you to read the the closing passage from the book but two things happened yesterday one was that you turned 90 and the other was the charter schools and their enemies was published and by the way it's not as if you just awoke after a long retirement slumber I've added it up you've written a new book or re-edited produced a new edition of a book about every 18 months since turning 80 and and Tom I don't know I have news for you you haven't had anything to prove to anybody in a quarter of a century at least what keeps Tom Sol 90 plus one day old going why do you you're not just going you're fighting let's let's let's face it this book is a polemic you want action to follow from this book I'm hoping I am hoping it's desperately needed and there are people who are organized to try to make sure that these kids do not escape the traditional public school and cost them money union dues and teachers jobs in there in the traditional schools if the charter schools get going and all these kids get off they're off the waiting list they're gonna have to change the entire way of life in the traditional public schools and it will not be pretty it won't be pretty it'll be pretty for the kids yes yeah Tom would you would you read the closing passage from charter schools and their enemies this is especially important when considering children from a cultural background lacking the advantages that are common among children born into more fortunate circumstances children who have not received at home the educational behavioral the other foundation for making the most of their natural ability must get those things in school these are the plain and harsh realities of circumstances the stakes are huge not only for children whose education can be the one clear ticket for a better cat bit of life but also for a whole society that needs more productive members fulfilling themselves while contributing their talents to the progress of the community at large children who emerge from their education with a mastery of mathematics the English language and other fund fundamentals are ready to be those kinds of people regardless of what color a class they come from no narrow vested interests of adults with a financial political or ideological should be allowed to block that dr. thomas sole author of charter schools and their enemies thomas sol age 90 and still swinging thank you thank you and happy birthday again Tom and Tom will you do me a favor yeah take the afternoon off will you please was that good for uncommon knowledge the Hoover Institution and fox nation on Peter Robinson [Music] you

Channel: Hoover Institution

Views: 703,959

Rating: 4.9255733 out of 5

Keywords: Uncommon Knowledge, Peter Robinson, Thomas Sowell, Charter Schools and Their Enemies, Hoover Institution, Charter Schools, New York City, Teacher Unions, quality education, poor, minority, children

Id: 9boQrCPwMws

Length: 57min 47sec (3467 seconds)

Published: Thu Jul 02 2020

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[u/HildaMarin]

Same results for homeschooling. Homeschooling increases achievement from the nominal 50% level to 80% for whites, and from 20% to 80% for blacks. The achievement gap in the public schools is entirely due to systematic racism perpetrated by the public schools. Sure they are not aware of it and believe they are good people with the best of intentions. The Klan also believed this, as did the Nazi Party.