For School Choice, in Chile and Elsewhere!

In her second term as president of Chile Michelle Bachelet is set to impose significant educational reforms to further her socialist agenda. An estimated increase of 1.5-2 percent of GDP on top of existing spending is supposed to improve the quality of and access to (higher) education and thereby reduce the problems of inequality and segregation. Bachelet’s plan to provide “free” college education to all Chileans exposes her ignorance of the effect of such policies in other countries. It is a statist’s’ knee-jerk reaction: once we’ve identified a problem naturally all we need to do is throw a bunch of money at it and have the government point guns at people, and the rest will take care of itself! After all, the Danish taxpayer is forced to pay for everyone’s college tuition, and they are prospering! This sort of simplistic stance on education completely ignores historical and empirical evidence that shows that the voluntary system in existence before the dawn of compulsory schooling already met the existing needs for education, or that modern public schooling is a lot more likely to increase social segregation. The latter is confirmed by Chilean figures correlating people’s addresses, incomes and test scores. Besides, we already know that putting more power into the hands of bureaucrats in faraway government buildings, where we can be sure their views and policies will be heavily influenced by special interest groups, will invariably reduce transparency, accountability and quality. In the United States, for instance, this has lead to a ballooning student loan debt that now stands at $1.2 trillion or some $30,000 per student. In three decades tuition fees have risen by 1,120 percent, meaning that the same college degree today costs 12 times as much as in 1978. The total bill ranked up on behalf of the American …

Be Free with English

Would you like to be free? Learn English. It is a language that connects the world. Despite the fact that Chinese is still spoken by more people in the world, on an international level English is more useful, since it is not concentrated in the same geographic area and thus it is used as the language of business, science and technology and aviation. Latin used to be the Lingua Franca that crossed over borders. However, it was the language of the select few. Modernity made education available to more people and with English, these people can break free from the confines of their national borders and interact with people from all over the world. What if there was a still better option? Not only to help people learn English, but to take it a step further and teach them about liberty? The good news is that there is such a possibility now! The Hungarian Free Market Foundation’s exciting new project, called Be Free with English teaches the language using pro-liberty, libertarian material. In the process of furthering the English skills of the learners, they are also presented with the idea and practical side of liberty. With the help of material such as I, Pencil, a video of a speech by Milton Friedman and Hayek’s ideas on society the basics of the libertarian idea gradually unfold and in the meantime people will be better and more skillful in the English language. This is done with the help of a software called Lingo, which integrates into the browser and pops up on the sites of the materials asking various questions testing both grammatically and contextually the learners. It goes further than this however. When an unknown word is found in the text, upon clicking on it lingo will explain its meaning and …

Doug Casey on Opting-Out: from the state, formal education, and standard employment

Today we are launching a series on “Opting Out” of the system, where we will explore actionable methods of enhancing our individual liberty. To start the series off, we have with us today Doug Casey, the Chairman of Casey Research, who is not only a highly regarded authority in investment, but also in “internationalization”, which he believes is key to protecting oneself, as it keeps one from being dependent on any single government. His latest book Right on the Money, written together with Louis James, one of ISIL’s directors, has come out recently to give readers actionable advice on building and safeguarding their wealth. (Interview conducted on 28 Feb, 2014) Kenli Schoolland [KS]: Hi Doug, it’s great to have you with us. Doug Casey [DC]: Likewise, Kenli, thank you. I guess you’re in London as we speak? KS: Yes, how about yourself? DC: I’m in Punta del Este, Uruguay, which is a fashionable international beach resort in the backward little socialist country of Uruguay. It’s actually quite pleasant. But then I spent a couple of weeks in the Congo between wars and thought that was quite pleasant too. So perhaps I’m not as discriminating as some… KS: Sounds very nice. How do you choose your locations? Is there a trade off between sunshine and socialist governments? DC: Actually it’s hard to find a non-socialist, non-fascist or non-statist/collectivist/ progressive government anywhere in the world today. There’s almost no place you can go to escape them. They cover the face of the earth like a skin disease. And they’re all becoming more virulent and aggressive, which is disturbing. KS: So you might as well take it with sunshine? DC: Governments that are located in tropical areas do tend to be more overtly socialist, they’re mostly undisguised kleptocracies… that’s the bad news. The good news is that they also tend to …

Meeting the Cheetah Generation

“Music is Freedom” declared the lead singer of H_ART the Band—as they opened up the first East African Students for Liberty Regional Conference at the Catholic University in Nairobi, Kenya—welcoming in the 476 students who came from across the continent to learn more about liberty and student activism. The students came from countries such as Tanzania, Nigeria, Malawi, Ethiopia, Uganda, and even war torn South Sudan, eager to meet their Kenyan counterparts and learn how to expand the freedom movement across Africa. Starting off strong, the talks commenced with the subject of entrepreneurship, with Mike Rotich of the East Africa Policy Centre and David Muumbi of the Kenya Youth Business Trust elaborating on how entrepreneurship can pave a stronger future for Africa and how the students could pursue entrepreneurship in their own lives. This was followed by an open mic session where students already engaged in entrepreneurship were invited to share their experiences and to suggest what would be the most important political or social change to help entrepreneurs on the continent. Over a dozen students eagerly told their stories, concluding with statements that what Africa needed most was “free trade” or “an end to corruption”. In fact, there were so many in the audience that were already involved in businesses of their own that they had to limit the number that came up to speak. Apparently the students didn’t need to be told to become entrepreneurs, they were already taking action on their own! Indeed, entrepreneurship was the predominant theme throughout the conference. I’m not sure if I’ve ever heard a single word said so many times in a single day before. Thus it was no surprise that the star speaker at the event was the multi-millionaire legendary Kenyan industrialist Manu Chandaria, who challenged the students to reach their …

Reflections on Kazakhstan: Ideas & Performance

I’ve traveled a lot, but never to such an exotic destination as Kazakhstan. The country and the people are a mix of everything Asia—Russian, Mongolian, Turkish, Indian, modern, prosperous, intellectual, traditional, proud, friendly, and aware. I landed on the vast steppes of Astana, the amazingly glamorous new capitol fueled by vast new oil riches of the Caspian Sea. And departed from Almaty, the old capitol nestled at the foot of spectacular snow-capped peaks that skirt the ancient Silk Road. Through the auspices of Pavel Kotyshev, Executive Director of the Institute for Development and Economic Affairs (IDEA), and the Entrepreneurship Development Fund (DAMU), I was fortunate to have been invited to join 10,000 other participants at the Astana Economic Forum & the UN World Anti-Crisis Conference. It was truly a gala affair. I am grateful to Aigerim Zhumadilova, Galiya Zholdybayeva, and all wonderful folks at DAMU for their extraordinary hospitality. If you are looking for a man of action to promote entrepreneurship and the ideals of liberty in Central Asia, Pavel Koktyshev is the star. Pavel is efficient and capable, he is a superior intellect, and he is good friends with everyone. At every turn, there were people and projects familiar to him. Why such global events in Central Asia? I think the preeminent purpose was to showcase the strategic prominence of Kazakh oil and the leadership of President (for life), Nursultan Nazarbayev (above left). On a tour of a local park I found this quote from the national constitution: “The Republic of Kazakhstan proclaims itself a democratic, secular, legal and social state whose highest values are an individual, his life, rights and freedoms.” This was surely music to a libertarian’s ears. Yet, one could wonder if this was a reference in practice to the natural rights of all—or to one individual …

Truant in America

Have you ever heard of anybody who never went to school? No, I don’t mean ‘home schooled’. I’m talking about no school at all. No curriculum. No home school course. No online accredited program. Never went to Kindergarten, or any other grade. In America, that is rare, because education is compulsory.  Kids are forced by law to go to school. Christian’s mom learned that lesson well. She said when Christian was six years old, “They came out with a police officer, and wanted to inspect the home environment. We eventually moved out of the state because of it . . . because they wanted him to be tested, and they wanted this, and that . . .” “They were going to get him?” I asked. “Yeah. They were going to reel him into the system. I said, ‘That’s not happening!’” The family fled to Hawaii, where it was easier to hide a kid from the truancy laws. After all, how could anyone distinguish a truant kid from a tourist kid? It was the perfect plan. “My parents were upfront with me,” Christian said, “It’s like, ‘You’re supposed to be in school. But we’re not going to make you do it. So, if you don’t want to school, you should keep your mouth shut about it.’” Christian Regan, now 22 years old, has never gone to school in his life. Yet, you would never know by meeting him. He reads more than most adults. Christian’s dad said, “He basically taught himself how to read. There was no ‘A is Ahh, B is Buhh’. We would just read books to him. He’d watch us reading him books, and before long, he was reading them instead of us.” Christian learned to read and write when he was only five years old. “I remember …

Children’s musical production of Jonathan Gullible in Kazakhstan

ISIL funds supported the making CD’s for the children’s musical production of stories from The Adventures of Jonathan Gullible. Lyudmila Людмила Мельникова and Pavel Koktyshev have accomplished a magnificent success in Kazakhstan. Along with the internet distribution, these CD’s are going to schools throughout the member countries of the Commonwealth of Independent States (CIS), formerly of the Soviet Union: Armenia, Azerbaijan, Belarus, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Moldova, Russia, Tajikistan, and Uzbekistan. In August, Lyudmila will be presenting the theatrical performance in Finland, introducing the play to a music festival competition of European theater for youth. The play has already been performed in numerous schools and on television in cities of Kazakhstan and today I enjoyed a special performance at Kenesary St. School in Astana. Pavel was instrumental in bringing the book to Kazakhstan and to Lyudmila who became fascinated with the concept. Lyudmila composed the music and script, and directed the performance with a cast of 15 children and the musical and video production. Pavel arranged a press conference at the World Anti-Crisis Conference for the public release of the CD. Pavel and Lyudmila have shown me around Astana. Yesterday we visited a monument which memorializes a third of the Kazakh population that perished under Stalin’s collectivization famine in the 1930’s. It is a stark reminder of reasons to remain diligent to the cause of advancing liberty everywhere. Children everywhere are our future. [justified_image_grid preset=13 ids=”3177, 3178, 3179, 3180, 3176″]

Parents for Liberty Conference announcement

October 12th in Austin, TX An all star lineup of dynamic presentations… Learning, the path to achieving liberty, prosperity, and joyfulness, in our lifetime. This event will sell out. Only 100 tickets available. Our speakers have been carefully chosen to offer a unique perspective to the meaning of education, and to explore how the love of learning may truly set us free. While other conferences give you tools to teach your children what they “need” to know, our conference focuses on the critical thinking skills needed to distinguish propaganda from useful—and truthful—insights. Home schooling can be more than just an education. Unlike “regular” schools, home schooling provides an ideal environment where students can be encouraged to reason things out for themselves, to become fully immersed in their interests, and to create an adventurous life that follows a ‘curriculum’ of real experiences. We understand that home schooling isn’t for everyone. A couple of our presenters have started their own academies and have the insight to help you explore other options. Without the ability to think critically, children and adults can easily be duped, cheated, and robbed. Government-run schools—and even some private ones—do not teach our children to question or reason; instead, they demand acceptance of the viewpoint presented. Instead of learning to think independently and evaluate what they hear, our youngsters are taught to be subservient and accepting of whatever “authorities” tell them. This orientation makes the next generation more susceptible to propaganda and manipulation by those who would control them, including the political elites and special interests. Physical control of a population by a government or a minority is virtually impossible without some level of consent from the people. If our children are taught to defer to “authorities” rather than their own internal compasses, propaganda can more readily get them to …