It is interesting. I often mull over the notion of creating a private high school, that would be affordable to ordinary people. So far I really haven’t come up with a way to make it profitable though- I guess if you want to make a profit, then it has to be a school for the wealthy. Or, maybe you could sell stock... Education doesn’t really fit the business model......
There is a group in our area doing this on a Biblical model, and they are getting a lot of funding and things donated.
They don’t let the kids have any excuses for not doing well. It is mainly inner city kids that attend I think. I think it is working well.
The big problem I’ve seen with for-profit universities is that academic rigor is compromised by the need for retention. When you rely on turning over a high volume of tuition-paying students in order to maintain a positive cash flow, it’s hard to fail students for poor performance.
Of course, the other big problem is outright fraud in essentially selling worthless degrees on credit supplied by the taxpayers. Students at for-profit institutions are twice as likely to default on their student loans as those at public schools, and almost three times as likely as students at traditional private schools. I can only imagine the type of mischief that could be wrought with vouchers.
While I am not philosophically hostile to the idea of for-profit education, it’s hard to think of a business model that can be profitable while maintaining academic integrity.