The Dropout Nation Podcast: Using School Reform to Build a Nation of Millions

On this week’s Dropout Nation Podcast, I discuss how Black America can use school reform and embrace entrepreneurship in order to expand our presence in corporate suites and other areas of American economic and social power. As wonderful as it may be to see the success of Oprah Winfrey and Barack Obama, we need a nation of millions of strong, well-educated African-American men and women to achieve long-lasting success. This, by the way, also applies to Latino and other minorities.

You can listen to the Podcast at RiShawn Biddle’s radio page or download directly to your iPod, MP3 player or smartphone. Also, subscribe to the podcast series. It is also available on iTunes, Blubrry, Podcast Alley, the Education Podcast Network and Zune Marketplace.

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Watch: Milton Friedman on Parents, Choice and Education Funding

As a titan of economic theory, Milton Friedman more than deserved his Nobel Prize. But perhaps his greatest contribution came not with the Monetarist theory or the concept of permanent income hypothesis, but in developing the concept of school vouchers — the first step in expanding parent and student choice over education. Although vouchers remain controversial, small-scale experiments, his theories on school choice have helped education reformers offer an alternative path to traditional public education.

This excerpt from a debate with several education and economic theorists — including longtime American Federation of Teachers Albert Shanker –  from Friedman’s show, Free to Choose, offers a sense of the understanding Friedman had about the power of choice that most educators still lack today. Whether or not one agrees with him, one has to admire the intellect and the apparent care he had for the lives of children and families.