Not every child has educational backup at home, and thus we're all for improving public education so that all children have a chance to succeed. Unfortunately, there's a strong reaction against public schools in this country, a negative culture that has had some success in promoting a negative image of "public school" by using such terms as "government schools," making public school seem sinister and Orwellian.
Teaching is hard work; guaranteeing good teaching is hard work. But today's politicians and leaders seem to be too easily charmed by business leaders and people with narrow agendas when it comes to providing education for our nation's children, the citizens of the future.
In Louisiana, Governor Bobby Jindal and the Louisiana legislature recently passed educational reform bills that have stirred up some controversy. One of the bills creates a new school voucher system: students in schools identified as C, D, or F schools (under-performing schools) can apply for a voucher that will enable them to attend a private or public school designated as an A or B school:
The new statewide program targets students who live in households with income at or below 250 percent of the federal poverty level. According to the department, all rising kindergarteners who meet that standard can apply for the vouchers. Older students must also be enrolled in a public school that rates as a C or below on the state's accountability scale. Under the program, students can use the vouchers at participating private schools or participating public schools that earn at least a B on the accountability scale. Taxpayers will finance the enrollment or tuition cost up to what the students' original local school would have received under the Minimum Foundation Program formula, which averages about $8,500 per pupil. [Bill Barrow, "State Opens Voucher Applications for more than 7,000 Spots," The Times-Picayne, 22 May 2012]I am troubled that tax payer money, in the form of state funding, will go to private institutions, most, if not all, of which are religious institutions, thus further eroding separation of church and state. I am troubled that students left behind in the "failing" schools will have even less opportunity, as more money, peer role models, and the influence of active parents leave the schools for better-funded private and public schools. I am troubled that this whole educational reform movement is really an attack on public education and on public education teachers. As Diane Ravitch points out, the advocacy groups pushing these types of reforms "differ around the edges, but mostly they are pushing an agenda that will privatize public education and de-professionalize teaching."
Bobby Jindal's education reform has not begun auspiciously. How well has the Commissioner of Education and the Louisiana Board of Elementary and Secondary Education fared so far in oversight of the voucher system just instituted by Governor Jindal and the state legislature? Evidently, no one on the board that makes the decisions on which schools to accept as eligible for the voucher system actually visited the campuses of the private schools that submitted paperwork. Thus, some private schools that were accepted to participate in the state's scholarship program don't even have the facilities to accommodate those extra students. One of those schools, The New Living Word School, "was approved to provide 315 spots to students from failing schools, giving it 100 more slots than any other school in the state." However, a visit by a reporter from The News-Star "revealed New Living Word did not have facilities, computers or teachers to accommodate the students the state approved them to accept."
Since the newspaper's reporting, the Department of Education has added new requirements in the approval process, thus adding to the confusion of those school administrators who thought the process was complete.
Oh, and by the way, now that private schools are eligible for state funding, guess what's happening? Those schools are raising their tuition in order to benefit more generously from the state's funding.
The reform system has barely left the ground, and already we can see that the schools profiting from the voucher system have received even less oversight than the public schools that have been so criticized for their failings. And the opportunities for graft increase exponentially.
How about that?
2 comments:
As a former employee of the Louisiana Department of Education (and former high school and college English teacher), I experienced first-hand these types (some better--some worse) of dysfunctional attempts at "reforming" schools from without, by people who often seem to know and feel nothing for the real people they're affecting. Unfortunately, those in control often are unable or unwilling to listen to any arguments to the contrary for their schemes and even what seems obvious goes unnoticed. Reading this brings back a lot of pain and frustration. Oh, well (as Jon likes to say).
Yeah, I thought of you when these reforms were implemented. No research supports the claim that student learning is greatly improved in the voucher system. And the way the process here in Louisiana has made it out of the gate seems almost comical: the horses are all running into one another, and the clowns are falling off and rolling in the arena dirt. At the very least, it's ridiculous that no one created a process that included a campus visitation to vet the accommodations and teaching staff of the supposedly "better" private schools. And that claim that it would be cheaper to provide state funds for a student to attend private school because, on average, private schools spent about $4500 instead of $8000+ per student? Have these folks not been paying attention at all when generous state funds are made available for student scholarships? Tuition goes up. We saw this happen in Georgia with the Hope Scholarship for higher education. Did they think Holy Mother Elementary wouldn't do this, too? duh.
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