"Public education," according to the author, means "public schooling," ie, schooling (K-12) funded and controlled by government, universally accessible, formally concerned with learning and bringing it about in others. In broaching this topic, the author examines how various ministries of education in Canada regard the contemporary purposes of public schooling to be. He presents the findings of his informal survey and provides a short critical commentary and concludes with his analysis of how purposes or goals of schooling could be characterized. (Contains 6 notes.)