Ravitch is one of the letter writers, and she takes Stern’s side of the argument. And then some:

In my experience, there are generally two camps of choice advocates: those who believe that markets and competition will produce better schools, just as they produce better products for the shopping mall, and those who support choice for students who, for whatever reason, need an escape hatch from the regular public schools. I count myself in the latter camp. I do not think it wise to use choice as a battering ram to destroy our system of public education. Our goal as a society should be to improve our regular public schools and to use choice schools judiciously as laboratories for innovation. Schools are not like businesses or hamburger franchises. They are vital parts of their communities.

This is not persuasive. First of all, there’s a difference between wanting school choice to “produce better schools” and wanting them “to destroy our system of public education,” and it is a little shocking that Ravitch can’t see it. Second, churches are vital parts of their communities, too, but that doesn’t mean we need to rely on a near-monopoly of the government to supply them.

Ravitch concludes with a “thought experiment.” Would you prefer a laissez-faire system of schools with “absolutely unlimited choice,” in which thousands of schools were “flowers” and thousands were “weeds,” or a choice-less system that has “an excellent curriculum and teachers who know how to teach it.” I don’t think this experiment illuminates anything. If men were angels, we would need no markets. In this world, might incremental increases in choice and accountability tend to lead to better instruction? I don’t see why not.