教育代金券可行么？

There are those who believe that some things, such as healthcare or the road network, are just too important to leave in the hands of the market. And there are those who believe that some things, such as food or petrol, are just too important to leave in the hands of government.

有人认为，医疗和公路网这些东西太重要了，所以不能由市场来决定。也有人认为，食品或汽油这些东西太重要了，所以不能由政府来管。

Neither side can be happy with the British school system. The state sector dominates, but quality is patchy and any pretence of egalitarianism is punctured by the many ways in which money can buy an advantage: private school, extra tuition, expensive houses in the right catchment area... Worse, none of this money goes to benefit the state-school system.

这两种人恐怕都不会对英国的学校体系感到满意。公共部门在这个体系中起主导作用，但教育质量却良莠不齐，任何表面上的平均主义都掩盖不住金钱可以买来优势的事实：私立学校、额外的学费、适宜校区内的昂贵住房。更糟糕的是，公立学校体系没有从中分得一分钱的好处。

Is there a better way? One could, of course, try to negate the advantage that cash brings: this was presumably the philosophy behind Brighton and Hove’s decision in 2007 to allocate school places by lottery rather than proximity. Or more radically, we could nationalise Eton and criminalise after-hours maths tuition.

有没有更好的制度？毫无疑问，我们可以尝试清除金钱能买到的优势：2007年布莱顿和霍夫(Brighton and Hove)决定通过“抽彩票而非“就近方式来分配校址，想必就是基于这种想法。或者可以采取更极端的做法，把伊顿公学(Eton)国有化，把课余开小灶教数学的行为列为非法。

A more appealing alternative is to let the pendulum swing the other way, and privatise a large slice of the state school sector. Anyone who meets government standards could set up a school, and they could charge whatever they wanted to and make a profit if they could. This idea would embrace the willingness of many parents to spend time and money trying to obtain a good education for their kids.

更有吸引力的一种选择是，让“钟摆摆到另一端：将大量公立学校私有化。只要符合政府制定的办学标准，任何人都可以创办学校，学费想怎么收就怎么收，钱能赚多少就赚多少。这一想法或许正好能达成很多父母想花时间和金钱让孩子获得良好教育的意愿。

We couldn’t allow the children of poor families to be cast adrift in a commercialised education system, and there are two things we could easily do to prevent that. The first is to give every family an education voucher for, say, GBP6,000, redeemable at any school. Poor families could get more; the current “pupil premium for poorer children is GBP600, so we could add that sum, or more, to the voucher.

我们不能让贫困家庭的孩子在商业化的教育体系内被边缘化，为了做到这一点，有两个简单的办法。第一，给每个家庭发放一张比方说价值6000英镑的教育代金券，在所有学校都可兑换为现金使用。发给贫困家庭的代金券金额可以再高一些：目前向贫困孩子发放的“学生津贴为600英镑，我们可以在代金券里加上这笔钱、甚至更多的钱。

The second is that the government could continue to run schools, charging a fee equivalent to the voucher. Families who want exactly what they’re getting now - education both funded and provided by the government - could have it.

第二，政府可继续运营学校，收取与代金券等额的学费。这样，那些需求与现状（即所需教育和学费均由政府提供）无异的家庭，便可如愿以偿。

What possible objections could there be to this idea? Let’s consider a few. The first is that some parents couldn’t or wouldn’t spend their vouchers carefully, and their child would fall further behind her more fortunate peers. This is a risk - but competition is a powerful force, even if not everybody plays the game. People who do not bother to check prices at supermarkets will still benefit because more price-sensitive people are keeping the supermarkets honest. Similarly, schools must raise standards to attract pupils, even if not everyone responds to the improvement.

这一构想存在哪些潜在问题呢？我们来想几个。第一，有些父母不能或不愿谨慎使用教育代金券，于是他们的孩子会进一步落后于那些运气更好的孩子。这的确是一个风险，但竞争是一股强大的力量，即便不是每个人都参与到游戏中。由于存在许多对价格敏感的顾客，超市在贴价签时就不敢耍诈，少数懒得看价签的顾客也能从中受益。类似的，为了吸引到学生，学校就不得不提高自身水准，即便不是每个人都对这种改善作出回应。

The second concern is that schools will sometimes go bankrupt, and this will cause disruption. I have two words in response: Hurricane Katrina. After Katrina devastated New Orleans, many children ended up at better schools elsewhere. A study by the economist Bruce Sacerdote revealed that despite months with no schooling at all, and appalling stress and dislocation, the children who had to move schools quickly overtook the educational achievements of the slightly older children, who had finished school before the hurricane hit. When bad schools disappear, that is probably a good thing - even for those pupils who must move.

第二个问题是，学校有些情况下会破产，这将造成冲击。对此我以下面几个词作答：飓风卡特里娜(Hurricane Katrina)。在卡特里娜肆虐新奥尔良之后，很多孩子最终被转到别处条件更好的学校去了。经济学家布鲁斯·萨塞尔多特(Bruce Sacerdote)的一项研究表明，尽管有几个月没学上，而且面临可怕的压力和流离失所，但那些不得不转学的孩子的学习成绩，很快就超过了那些年龄稍大、在飓风到来前就已结业的孩子。糟糕的学校如果不复存在，很可能是一件好事，即使对那些不得不转学的孩子来说也是如此。

A third concern is that the voucher system will lead to a free-for-all, with schools provided by charlatans or religious extremists.

第三个问题是，代金券体系可能导致毫无规则可言的局面，骗子和宗教极端分子也会出来办学。

Clearly there must be some government oversight as a backstop to competitive pressure. The Finnish educationalist Pasi Sahlberg points out that the world’s leading school systems all make educational equality a high priority. That has to give pause for thought to an enthusiast for completely unregulated voucher schemes.

显然，政府必须实施一定的监管，以免竞争压力失控。芬兰教育学家帕思·萨尔博格(Pasi Sahlberg)指出，世界上领先的学校体系都将教育公平摆在很高的位置。热衷于彻底无监管代金券体系的人士，必须冷静下来想一想。

Nobody can be sure what might happen if a part of the UK embraced a voucher scheme; I can’t help thinking that it is worth a try.

没有谁能百分之百的肯定如果英国某个地区采用教育代金券制度会发生什么情况，但我还是忍不住认为这值得一试。