It would definitely be worth it to run some experiments on education, Bryan Caplan argues:
When you’re spending an enormous amount of money, you can take off 2 percent of it, and then use standard social science random assignment to really learn something.
It’s been pointed out that a high percentage of government spending on healthcare is for medical research, but only a very small amount of education spending is for education research.
The main disappointment there is, despite all the education research, it seems like it’s not very often actually used for any education policy. Medical research, you might have a similar pessimism, but I don’t think it’s as bad as that at least.
It’s not as bad as there being a big literature saying that highlighting is totally ineffective for improving student learning. Yet almost every kid in America still has a highlighter. It’s actually on the list of mandatory school supplies for Fairfax County: “You must have a highlighter.” This is an item that science says you don’t need. Yet everyone must have one to be at school.
I don’t get this…. everything in that school system is online … virtual … screen-based.
There’s got to be a version of that Matrix scene adapted for the highlighter where Agent Smith is saying “…but how will you highlight if you have no books…”