New Book Explores School Choice in 11 Countries From Ireland to Ukraine

Macey Wyler

Professor Robert Maranto

Routledge recently published the book School Choice in Europe, which brings together leading European researchers who present rigorous, readable studies exploring how education markets work in 11 countries from Ireland to Ukraine.

The lead editor is Robert Maranto, Twenty-First Century Chair in Leadership in the Department of Education Reform. Professor Maranto co-edited the book with Tommaso Agasisti from the Politecnico di Milano School of Management and Rodrigo Queiroz e Melo of Universidade Católica Portuguesa and chairman of the European Council of National Associations of Independent Schools. 

"American states increasingly adopt policies which publicly fund school choice, so it makes sense to learn from the experiences of European countries, many of which have a 100-year head start subsidizing private schools, including religious schools," said Maranto, who proposed the book. "Likewise, Europeans can learn from other European countries, since the continent has a wide range of school choice policies."

The chapters cover a range of topics, including empirical examinations of the reasons many Irish parents choose single-sex education, how a Ukrainian school improvised to serve students and parents in a war zone, how school choice defused culture wars in countries as varied as the Netherlands and Estonia, how the German left and right embraced increased parental agency for different reasons, the effectiveness of central regulations of autonomous British schools, how changing subsidy levels affect demand for private schooling in Italy and Portugal, the motivations of Hungarian parents choosing schools and the impacts of social class on schooling choices and policies in Sweden, Germany and Spain. No other volume fills this niche.

This is Maranto's 16th scholarly book.