An Expanded Curriculum For High Schools

Privatize Public Schools

There are no convincing reasons why high schools need to be run by government. Why are secondary schools in the US organized as public schools? I suspect for some historical reasons. Wikipedia had this to say “In France and much of Europe from 1650 to 1790 educational aspirations were on the rise and were becoming increasingly institutionalized in order to supply the church and state with the functionaries to serve as their future administrators.” (Emphasis added).

Privatization would also automatically take care of labor unionization of teachers issues and how labor unions have been extorting ever so willing politicians to agree to unsustainable, sometimes outrageous contracts and work rules to benefit teachers at the expense of students and the general public.

I am not an expert on the history of secondary education in the Western world, but a little research suggests that some of the oldest Western high schools were founded and run by churches, e.g. Royal High School in Edinburgh, Scotland, which was founded in 1128 AD and it is still in operation.

The Imminent Transformation Of High School Education

The exponential advances in information technology have the power to completely transform how we teach our children in the future. Purely theoretically, one teacher, let’s say the best in one subject, can teach all children of the world via the Internet. A few educators can put together exercises, questions etc. for all children. This concept would completely change the role of a human teacher in a local school. Anyway, what will local schools look like in 10-20 years? Do we still have a class room and one teacher per class? Several states have already setup virtual schools. I believe Australia has a long history of long distance learning.

Here is a recent article by the Hoover Institution on the subject titled “The End of Teachers Unions” by Terry M. Moe published on 7/18/2012.

Economics

Since I am not very familiar with the high school curriculum in the US, I kind of have to speculate. From my own high school experience in Germany, I know I was sort of brainwashed with leftist ideas and prejudices against free market economies along the lines that capitalists are criminals, workers are exploited victims, and government is the good guy.

I also remember well that economics was taught as a tertiary subject with little emphasis. Now, I speculate that the situation is not much better in the US. From my observations it seems children learn more from their parents about how a free market economy works than in high school.

To teach free market economics well is as important as mathematics or science so the next generations will appreciate the benefits of free markets and limited government more than previous generations. Too many of our elected representatives in the US Congress or state legislatures have not much a clue about economics. President Obama is hostile to businesses and he is absolutely clueless or ignorant of how a free market economy actually works.

Law

If my memory serves me correctly, then I did not learn much about law in high school. Only when I entered college to study economics I was systematically taught in law. Everything else I know about this topic is self taught.

Understanding of law is fundamental in a society that is governed by the rule of law. One cannot start learning about law early enough. How many high school children learn the inscription on the east pediment of the US Supreme Court building, i.e. “Justice The Guardian Of Liberty”? This inscription was chosen by Chief Justice Charles Evans Hughes in 1932. He was one of the great Justices who opposed the New Deal and prevented President Franklin D. Roosevelt from doing more damage. Unfortunately, the US Supreme Court’s document on the East Pediment does not contain much about the origin of the phrase “Justice The Guardian Of Liberty”. I wrote a separate blog about the inscription.

I would easily argue this inscription is the more important inscription than the more well known “Equal Justice Under Law” on the West façade or main entrance of the US Supreme Court.

If you look at some of the more recent decisions of the US Supreme Court, e.g. Kelo v. City of New London or ObamaCare, you doubt that even the supreme justices know the above mentioned inscription on the east façade of the building they work in.

If teenagers were already taught in law perhaps we had fewer bad decisions by the courts of justice.

Trading Assets

Too few teenagers ever learn how to trade assets like stocks, futures, forex etc. Those, who are so fortunate to learn how to trade in assets as teenagers happen to learn it most likely from their parents or from a close relative.

In a free market economy everybody should be able and comfortable to trade in assets. Capital markets are an essential part of free market economies about which every teenager should as much as possible.

Medicine

Why are children or teenagers not trained in basic medicine? High school students ought to know more about healthy life styles etc. Repeated first aid training would not hurt either. E.g. why is it an important to get two opinions from different doctors even of different disciplines in important medical situations? Trust your doctor, but verify. Where do you find reliable medical information?