The NYT had a story on a federal government sponsored study comparing public and non-public education in which one sees that public schools do as well or better than the alternatives. The exception is eighth grade reading -- the study concerns primary education, so it is unclear how things would go for high schools years. The article is entiled "Public Schools Perform Near Private Ones in Study" and further thoughts can be found here. A few thoughts of my own:
To start off, "as well or better in reading and mathematics than comparable children in private schools" suggests to me that 'perform near' is misleading. The term suggests 'comparable' or 'close to' while the lede paragraph suggests in some ways it is 'better.' Thus, the title seems questionable.
Second, I share the suspicion that the underwhelming announcement (and the timing) would have been different if public schools did not come off so well or "conservative Christian schools" so bad. Clearly, educational merit is not the only reason people send their children to alternative schools. I myself support public schools because of the civil republican values promoted, included the various groups coming together to learn and play together. Still, "public schools are inferior educationally" is often a club used against them.
Third, as further discussed in the entry linked above, this puts the voucher wars in further perspective. A limited tool at any rate; per Justice Stevens' dissent in a recent voucher case:
In the 1999-2000 school year, that program provided relief to less than five percent of the students enrolled in the district's schools. The solution to the disastrous conditions that prevented over 90 percent of the student body from meeting basic proficiency standards obviously required massive improvements unrelated to the voucher program. Of course, the emergency may have given some families a powerful motivation to leave the public school system and accept religious indoctrination that they would otherwise have avoided, but that is not a valid reason for upholding the program.
Finally, it does suggest public schools have to deal with reading scores in the higher grades. Likewise, there seems a tapering off of quality as one goes into the high school years. Clearly, they have serious problems in need of reform. From personal experience, I know their quality is also mixed. But, I can say the same thing respecting alternatives. Still, better to use studies for such analysis.
Of course, as one response to my post on this elsewhere noted, comparing the two leads to various problems. Public schools have less of an ability, for good or ill, to keep trouble students out. All the same, some rough comparisons can be made. And, rough is often the best we can hope for respecting various social issues.
Thus, keeping everything in perspective, this is a useful study. Again, the further reading suggested is helpful as well.