Debate: Should students be allowed to choose to be taught creationism?
Side: Yes

And who has (or is most likely to have) the child's best interests at heart? The parents, or the government?Whether or not which party has the best interests of the child should have little influence whether or not the child should be given the choice of being taught creationism or not. Just because one has the child's best interests at heart does not necessarily imply that one always will make the best decisions for the child or even tend to make the best decisions for the child.A market good that has a higher marginal utility (is more useful) is a better available means to achieve the ends desired than some other means. That is an economic definition of superior quality.I should have re-phrased and first ask you the question, "More useful, to who?" Yes, I do not doubt that your economic definition is true when we are speaking about economic goods. However, just as you argue that education is not necessarily a right, I would argue that there are no sufficient reasons to suggest that education is necessarily an economic good or should be analysed as an economic good. That is because education has such a large disparity in terms of variety and it's impact on people that it cannot be analysed as a whole. What is important is not completely cutting out the possibility of giving the widest and most sensible range of education options to students to choose from, which is what this debate is about.It is the parents' responsibility to see to the education of the child. Doing that in a manner that is consistent with the best interests of the child is not bad. The government doing that in a manner that is in the best interest of the state, and not the child, is a bad thing. I stand by my statement.Even if I were to agree with your statement (and I don't), the outcome of one's education is not determined by what type of education one receives or who the education provider/s is/are. It is very much a determinate of the individual student's attitude and what he/she chooses to, ultimately, make out of their education. All the parents and government can do is to help them make informed choices. But to be able to make informed choices, one must necessarily have sufficient choices in the first place. Sufficient in terms of appropriate scope and depth of education. And I would argue that creationism is appropriate, when doing studies in comparative religion and theology. One might not agree with theological concepts, theories or arguments, but that does not mean that one should not study them or that one should not have the choice to study them.The parents are acting as a proxy for the child, in the absence of the legal right to choose their own education and the child's inability to make a rational decision as to what sort of education is in his own self interest.Why should you have a legal right to choose their own education? I'm afraid you'll run the risk of going down a very slippery slope because at what level do you think a child has the right to choose what they study?Furthermore, if it is in the child's own self interest, shouldn't the child be the the ultimate decision maker? In a free market economic model, that is always the case in a specific market.No, it is a criteria for choosing the child's proxy.And are parents the best choice of the child's proxy in all cases? Or does it stop when the parents have no further personal and emotional interest in the child? And then what? Will you make the child's education entirely arbitrary?(1) Bearing in mind that the government will always make decisions based upon what is good for the government and (2) no third party would be any more likely to protect the interests of the childOn what basis do make these claims?what criteria would you use to choose the child's proxy for deciding what is best for that child?Are you assuming that I think a child needs a proxy in terms of choosing what subjects they study in schools?