Ok, I think we are on the same page, now how do we do it?
I'ts probably easier to re post than to find a particular post in this long, long thread.
Here's the Dittohead not! solution:
Dissolve all district boundaries and allow parents to choose their school the same way they choose their supermarket. This would be easier in California than most states, as the schools are funded statewide and not by local property taxes.
Next, have each school set standards for academic achievement and behavior. If the student can't meet the standards, then the parents will have to find another school with lower standards.
Next, scale back the role of the state to two functions: Accrediting schools, and credentialing teachers. To be accredited, the school would have to hire credentialed teachers and would have to be teaching the basic subjects: Reading, math, science, and history. Anything else would have to be up to the school to decide. For this service, the state would get to keep 1% of the funds, everything else would go directly to the school.
Schools would then be evaluated by parents in a free market system. Schools that didn't work would go out of business or else open under new management, just like the local supermarkets.
Parents would be accountable to see to it that their kids met the standards of the school they chose, and kids would be accountable to meet the expectations of their parents and the school.
Everyone would be accountable, and there would be far more choices than there are now. Some of the secondary schools could be purely college prep, others could be vocational, some could be on line. The top down management system would be gone.
Oh, and close down the Department of Education.