The Rumi Forum presented “Learning to Be Free: Why School Choice is the Key to Freedom and Unity” with Neal McCluskey.
It is almost an article of faith that to unify a diverse nation, children must be educated in a single system of public schools. It’s the only way to ensure that everyone embraces prevailing norms and values, the reasoning goes. But reality bears out the opposite conclusion: Where diverse people are forced to support a single system of government schools, conflict and atomization result. In stark contrast, when parents are able to freely choose their children’s schools, real unity ultimately follows.
Neal McCluskey is the associate director of Cato’s Center for Educational Freedom. Prior to arriving at Cato, McCluskey served in the U.S. Army, taught high school English, and was a freelance reporter covering municipal government and education in suburban New Jersey. More recently, he was a policy analyst at the Center for Education Reform, McCluskey is the author of the book Feds in the Classroom: How Big Government Corrupts, Cripples, and Compromises American Education, and his writings have appeared in such publications as the Wall Street Journal, Baltimore Sun, and Forbes. In addition to his written work, McCluskey has appeared on C-SPAN, CNN, the Fox News Channel, and numerous radio programs. McCluskey holds a master’s degree in political science from Rutgers University.