The answer to why US public schools do such a poor job is pretty easy and obvious when you think about it. The US has among the worse primary and secondary schools in the developed world. Other than elite private schools nobody would want to send their star child to the US for primary or secondary education. On the other hand, everyone wants to send their college age young adult to the US for a college education.
There are both private and public primary and secondary schools in the US. There are both private and public colleges and universities in the US. So it can not be more competition from the private sector at the college level. So why are US colleges and univesities relatively good and why are US primary and secondary schools relatively bad compared to the world?
The answer in a word is VOUCHERS. US colleges and universities operate in a voucher world. There is college choice and vouchers, called Pell Grants, in the US. There is no or limited choice in secondary and primary education in the US, other than paying your taxes and then paying extra out of pocket for private tuition or home schooling.
Allow primary and secondary school choice with vouchers and US primary and secondary education would become competitive quickly. US colleges and universities are helped by foreign colleges and universities often being monopolies like US primary and secondary school.
Yes, provided that the vouchers or tax credits would eventually lead to **complete** and total privatization and **complete** separation of school and state. That means parents pick up the entire bill and charity funds the poor.
On the college level, the problem with the Pell Grant vouchers is that every time the voucher is increased, the colleges and universities raise their tuition. This means the more and more of the middle classes must look to the government for a voucher to pay the tuition, and students are burdened with more debt that the voucher doesn't cover.
If we have vouchers for K-12 education we **will** see the ***same** thing! Private school tuition will continually increase.
I support vouchers but only as a stop-gap measure. The only permanent solution is complete separation of school and state.