Public Education in America

Public schools are administered at the federal level by the Department of Education. America spends $9,800 per public primary and secondary education student. The wealthy are being trained at private schools at more than triple the expenditures ($35,000). Beneath the numbers is the resegregation of children on the basis of class, race and immigration status. Johnson once said you cannot “take a person who for years has been hobbled by chains and liberate him, bring him up to the starting line of a race and then say, ‘You are free to compete with all the others.’ The investment in public school teachers is paltry for the wealthiest country in the world according to the National Center for Education Statistics, the United States ranks in some measures behind England, Italy, Japan, Scotland and way behind Germany in starting teacher pay.

An alternative teaching, Montessori Education, is an educational approach developed by an Italian physician and educator, Maria Montessori which is characterized by an emphasis on independence, freedom within limits, and respect for a child’s natural psychological development. Essential elements include: Mixed age classrooms with children aged 2½ or 3 to 6 years old for elementary; Student choice of activity; Uninterrupted blocks of work time; Students learn concepts from working with materials rather than by direct instructionMontessori's education method called for free activity within a "prepared environment", meaning an educational environment tailored to basic human characteristics and to the specific characteristics of children at different ages.

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