Michael Block: “I would privatize the entire government school system.”

by David Safier

At the end of a long discussion about education in the Republic, the moderator, Robert Robb, asked the three panelists, "If you could implement any single one idea to improve K-12 education in the state, what would it be?"

One of the panelists, Michael Block, the man who started BASIS charter schools, had a very simple answer: "I would privatize the entire government school system."

Block, by the way, is a conservative economist with present connections to the Goldwater Institute and past connections to ALEC. He apparently believes what works at BASIS charters will work at other schools, even though none of his schools attempts to educate a cross section of the state's students. Using Occupy parlance, Block's BASIS schools educate the academic one percent, yet he thinks he's an expert on what would work for the other 99%.

And he's sure, like most good conservatives, privatization is the answer.

The current president and chair of BASIS is Craig Barrett, who is Gov. Brewer's point man on education. It would be interesting to know if he agrees with Block about privatization.

Block's answer was longer than one sentence. Here is the whole thing.

Robb: If you could implement any single one idea to improve K-12 education in the state, what would it be?

Block: I would privatize the entire government school system. I don't think you can actually run schools today with the amount of disagreement we have over the fundamental mission of schools. Is it social welfare? Is it academic excellence? Is it social justice? You can't possibly have an educational system if you have this amount of disagreement, so privatize it.