The trend toward private purposes for education, as in choice, charters, and vouchers, is accelerating, historian David Labaree of Michigan State University told the Education Writers Association at its annual seminar. This goal, he said, makes it seem "more important to get ahead than to get an education."

Up through the end of the 19th century, the dominant theme in American education was one of democratic equality. This produced the common school, where "all children were to learn to think, act on shared values, and where social differences could be reduced," Labaree noted. This resulted in neighborhood schools, the comprehensive high school, social promotion, and a strong emphasis upon inclusion.

A second theme, that emerged in the early part of this century, stressed social efficiency and the economic benefits of education. The emphasis shifted from general education to specific skills and resulted in vocational education tracking, and an emphasis on efficiency.

The third theme, education as a private good, focuses "not on what education can do for society or on what it can do for the economy, but what it can do for me," Labaree said.

In fact, said the historian, Americans want the education system to accomplish all three of these goals, and the conflict among them "has made it impossible to accomplish any of them efficiently." He added that the bureaucracy of school systems has prevented the "private good" theme from taking over, even if it has its own problems, but he believes the balance is tipping in favor of the private good. However, Americans have always regarded education as a pillar of society, and he does not think they are willing to drive the democratic purpose out of the education system.

For Howard Fuller, former superintendent in Milwaukee and a strong proponent of vouchers, his support of vouchers is not anti-democratic "but the opposite." He told the seminar that "it is not a question of whether or not parents have choice in education, but who has choice." Poor parents in Milwaukee need to have the opportunity to leave schools that fail their children just like white parents, he said. The academic gap between black and white students is growing, Fuller said, and drastic actions are needed "as long as America does not have the political will to do what we know we need to do."

The past goals and present failures of the education system may shrink in importance if the predictions of futurist Jennifer Jarratt come true. Technology is going to erase "schools as we know them," she told the seminar, and the distinctions between what schools do and what other educating influences do will blur. Eventually, she said, brain research will lead to "a lot of social engineering or brain design" that will change what and how people learn.