What could a free market in education look like? Lets look at a system that already exists!

[Makalakumu]

http://www.examiner.com/article/in-praise-of-the-mcdojo-what-a-free-market-education-could-look-like

“The martial arts are numerous and varied. Some of them are more popular than others. Some of them have clarified principles that the curriculum is designed to teach. All of them are voluntary. The martial arts industry is more or less a free market depending on the country. In some countries there are governmental organizations that regulate the practice of martial arts through licensing and testing. In other countries, there are very few laws and regulations on martial arts schools. On the whole, most governments on this planet have very little interest in regulating martial arts and this has allowed an interesting experiment to take place. The martial arts industry, from the owner of a multimillion dollar business to the man who teaches a few students in his garage, is an example of what a free market education system could look like.”

I actually wrote this article, btw. I am a teacher and I own my own martial arts studio. Thoughts?

[Carlos Morales]

 Well, the amount of Chi woo woo (I'm sure you now exactly what I'm talking about, but just in case others don't understand http://www.skepdic.com/chi.html ) that goes on in many of these schools would cause me great concern if taken as an example for truly private schooling. I enjoyed my time in martial arts, namely boxing and muay thai in my case, from the ages of 12-17 and then 21-24. In all honesty though, my positive experiences in no way outway the negative physical outcomes that came from it - mainly, I had 3 concussions by the time I was 15 years old.

I'm not sure how schools will work when there is no public schooling, but I hope than rather than people asking "how will children be raised without public school", they will ask "how did we ever stick children in these conditions, and how ignorant was us to assume that 1 person could ever tell us how to educate 100, 1,000, 100,000, or 100 million children without a hint of skepticism."

[Makalakumu]

 

 Well, the amount of Chi woo woo (I'm sure you now exactly what I'm talking about, but just in case others don't understand http://www.skepdic.com/chi.html ) that goes on in many of these schools would cause me great concern if taken as an example for truly private schooling. I enjoyed my time in martial arts, namely boxing and muay thai in my case, from the ages of 12-17 and then 21-24. In all honesty though, my positive experiences in no way outway the negative physical outcomes that came from it - mainly, I had 3 concussions by the time I was 15 years old.

I'm not sure how schools will work when there is no public schooling, but I hope than rather than people asking "how will children be raised without public school", they will ask "how did we ever stick children in these conditions, and how ignorant was us to assume that 1 person could ever tell us how to educate 100, 1,000, 100,000, or 100 million children without a hint of skepticism."

 

 

I'm sure there will be lots of "chi woo woo" in a world without mandatory public school.  But organizations will be spawned that will protect the consumer and out fraudsters.  The education consumer is going to have to be savvy when shopping for schools in a free market, just as people have to be savvy when shopping for martial arts schools.  

On the other hand, learning information to better yourself is much more important than martial arts and I think the cream of the crop will become apparent quicker and will eventually lead to copy cats.  We see the same kind of thing happening in martial arts.  All of the "chi woo woo" schools are pretty much getting crushed by schools that actually practice and work on pragmatic technique.  BJJ copy cats and "MMA" gyms are appearing all over the place in place of Kung Fu and other forms of bullshido.  

[Alan C.]

From the 70s through the 2000s, "user groups" were very popular among computer enthusiasts. People found out about them through ads in the paper, newsletters, and BBSs.

They may not be as numerous as they used to be because of the Internet, but some still exist on Meetup.

[Mcattack]

coursera.org not exactly free market but still good quality free courses.