Thomas Toch and Chad Aldeman commend New York and Boston schools for implementing fair matching systems that now accommodate the wishes of virtually every student. New York and Boston schools must offer choices to where students will attend.
Too often, school choice programs offer students limited options, or are not able to match students with the schools they choose to attend.
In New York City, each year, middle-school students and their parents determine which of the city’s 693 high school programs will suit them best.
They choose 12 and rank them accordingly.
The school system has adopted new computer software that allows it to place students in the schools on their lists “far more efficiently and fairly than most public school choice programs,” according to Toch and Aldeman.
As a result, this year 99 percent of students will attend a school they selected.
In addition, the authors note, the two districts offer a diverse array of schooling options.
Although choice is mandatory, students in New York, for instance, can choose from among schools focused on animal science, architecture, communications, computer science and technology, cosmetology, culinary arts, engineering, environmental science, film and video, health, hospitality and tourism, humanities, law and government, performing arts, science and math, teaching, and visual art and design.
The results have stimulated a new entrepreneurialism among many public educators, improving the perception of public education among middle-class families, and serving as catalyst for school reform.
The model, say authors Toch and Aldeman, could serve “as a model strategy for harnessing the power of the marketplace to better serve students’ diverse educational interests and needs and to stimulate improvement through competition for students.” It could also “improve both the quality and equity of court-ordered school choice programs.”
Next, I’d like to see Tablet and other mobile PC programs for students interested in accelerating their learning rates beyond what they demonstrate through classroom instruction.
What would it take for schools to offer that option as part of their required choices?
For Release: Enabling Mandatory Public School Choice
Toch, T. & Aldeman, C. (September 8, 2009). Matchmaking: Enabling Mandatory Public School Choice in New York and Boston. Education Secton. (Captured September 8, 2009, 5:42PM.)