Given the importance of educating for democratic citizenship, the involvement of individual business people with policymaking bodies and task forces is highly desirable. However, schools should limit business involvement to civic-minded contributions free of marketing or advertising hype. To do otherwise betrays the spirit of educational…

Presents data supporting the widespread perception that commercializing activities in schools have risen in recent years and that those activities influence the structure of the school day, shape curricula, determine whether some children have access to a variety of technologies, and undermine the quality of education. Considers school…

Conservative economists claim that educational-funding amounts and student-achievement levels are unrelated; that schools serving poor children should spend less money more wisely; and that spending increases to reduce inequities is money wasted. Public schools become the enemy, not economic and political injustice. A serious debate on educational…

In the probusiness 1980s, marketing and public-relations schemes were characterized as legitimate contributions to the curriculum, helpful teaching aids, or effective school-business cooperation models. By the late 1980s, commercialism in schools had become so rampant that Channel One was regarded as a school-reform proposal. Today, profit-making…

Despite the rosy image projected by child-centered reformers, zealots and profiteers are really driving the charter school movement. Charter schools cannot flourish without drastic wage reductions or huge spending increases, nor will they benefit America's poorest children. The market, which has already destroyed kids' neighborhoods and parents'…

This essay reviews the history of school commercialization in the USA and the forms that it has taken over time, with particular attention paid to research measuring the scope and variety of commercialization trends in US public schools. The implications of commercialization activities such as those that promote the consumption of nutritionally…