Jennifer, thanks for your response but I'm sorry you disagree with me because I'm right! I KNOW students who do not value public education, and it's not because they have to deal with guns and leaks; I'm talking about relatively safe, suburban, middle-class areas. I don't mean to oversimplify or overgeneralize, but it is human nature to take things for granted which you don't have to pay for directly. Concepts of monetary value do influence attitudes. I didn't know there was any question of "buying into" negative connotations about free or cheap commodities and services; "free" and "cheap" can be negative, positive, or neutral, depending upon context, viewpoint, and other variables. I never said EVERYONE thinks EVERYTHING free is worthless, I'm just pointing out that concepts of monetary value need to be factored into any discussion about admission fees for museums. The relative value of time is an interrelated factor. I know a teenager who would never willingly spend his allowance on a museum admission fee. If someone else pays his way, he immediately heads for the gift shop, where he spends all his time and all his money on REPRODUCTIONS of the very objects that he wouldn't pause for 10 seconds to study in the exhibition areas. I find this phenomenon highly significant--I could write an essay about such "values." I work in a "free" museum, but seldom see young local visitors who have freely chosen to come on their own; they're usually part of a school field trip. Most of them would rather be someplace else. Many value entertainment, not education, and they would rather pay for something they enjoy than spend time engaged in something free that they don't consider relevant to their lives. It's not just fear of violence and annoyance with crumbling buildings that makes kids "shun" education: some of them are actively resisting it and are never going to embrace museums as an alternative form of education, whether they have admission fees or not. Most of my high school class, back in the dark ages when we had virtually NO violence, NO drugs, NO leaky ceilings, NO poverty, and very few problems (but hey, it was hell, let me tell you) would have had to be dragged kicking and screaming into a free museum. --David Haberstich