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- Contents:
- IN THIS REPORT
Readers will find a synopsis of important state-level, parental freedom developments, a sampling of important new documentation, David Kirkpatrick's assessment of public opinion on school choice, an Editor's View on assessing charters, and a second Editor's View on the NEA's persistent confusion of educational ends and means.
ARIZONA
In his State of the State Address Governor Fife Symington
proposed that a $10 million school voucher plan be added to the state budget
this year. He recommended a statewide program which would begin in the
1997-98 school year with the first and ninth grades, and which would then
expand to include two more grades each year until all grades (one through
twelve) are eligible. (Arizona Republic, 01-14-97; Education
Week, 02-05-97)
FLORIDA
The Miami Herald reported on January 30 that because
Republicans are in control of both Florida legislative houses this year,
which has not happened in over a century, "the outlook for tuition vouchers
in the 1997 Legislature is much improved from previous years." As evidence
of this, "the House Education Innovation Committee began this year's debate
by asking advocates of vouchers to make presentations." According to the
committee chairman, Rep. Jerry Melvin, the committee expects to hear several
voucher proposals. (Miami Herald, 01-30-97)
MARYLAND
Senator Larry Haines has introduced a tuition tax credit
bill, Senate Bill 427, which would provide a tax credit of up to $1,000
for tuition paid to a private elementary or secondary school, including
religiously affiliated schools, on behalf of a dependent child. (The taxpayer
could claim $500 each from state and local income taxes.) The bill furthermore
received a hearing on February 12 during which school choice supporters
were able to testify before the Taxation Committee. (Information was provided
by TEACH Maryland.)
NEW JERSEY
The school board of Lincoln Park, a small New Jersey
school district voted to introduce a voucher program for its high-school-age
students. The measure was approved in a preliminary vote of 7-2 on January
30 and then again on February 11 with a final vote of 7-2. Beginning with
next year's Freshman class, students would be allowed to attend any public
or private school of their choice, including religious schools. Until now
students of Lincoln Park have attended nearby Boonton High School, but
Lincoln Park parents and school officials have been greatly dissatisfied
with the standards of that school. The Lincoln Park school board has even
filed two state law suits recently against the Boonton district over the
exclusion of its representation in Boonton board meetings and in the selection
of a Boonton High School principal. Vouchers would be available to parents
regardless of income. The voucher amount would reflect the amount of tuition
Lincoln Park pays to Boonton for each student, with a minimum voucher amount
of $1,000 and a maximum voucher amount of $4,600. There are reports that
Governor Christine Whitman is supportive of the Lincoln Park effort, while
the Washington group Americans United for the Separation of Church and
State has been pressuring the state Education Department to halt the initiative.
(The Record, 02-14-97, 02-13-97; Education Week, 02-12-97)
OHIO
On February 13 the Ohio Court of Appeals heard an appeal
to Judge Lisa Sadler's August 30 decision which upheld the constitutionality
of the Cleveland Scholarship Program. The three-judge panel focused exclusively
on First Amendment issues. The Court of Appeals is not expected to decide
on the case for about three months.
Meanwhile, Governor George Voinovich proposed as part of the next two-year budget a $5.8 million provision that would allow 3,100 additional children to participate in the Cleveland Scholarship Program. Also, fifteen Ohio House Republicans released a proposal late last month which would allow voters to decide upon a ballot initiative next November. If approved, the initiative would facilitate a temporary tax increase which would fund public school improvements. However, the funding would only be available under certain conditions, one of which would be the installment of a limited voucher program for districts with graduation rates below 50%. (Plain Dealer, 01-22-97, 02-04-97; Education Week, 02-12-97)
OKLAHOMA
Governor Keating said in his State of the State Address
that it is necessary for the state's legislature to pass laws that would
allow for tough academic standards and more creative educational strategies,
such as school choice and charter schools. (Education Week, 02-12-97)
PENNSYLVANIA
With a situation not unlike that of Lincoln Park school
district in New Jersey (see above), the Southeast Delco school board has
been considering a voucher program for a limited number of students entering
grades five through ten in the district. Students in grades five through
eight would receive a $1,000 grant, or 80% of tuition, whichever is less.
Students in grades nine and ten would receive either $1,500 grants or 80%
of tuition, whichever is less. The proposal was submitted by board member
Byron Mundy, and copies are available at the Blum Center. (Details provided
by Byron Mundy, who can be contacted at (610) 583-1200.)
UTAH
Representative Evan Olsen is sponsoring a bill in the
Utah House this year which would provide state income tax credits to parents
who choose to send their children to non-public schools. The credits would
be small during the first few years of implementation, but would eventually
grow to about $2,000 per year per child as more students transfer out of
public schools. Homeschoolers would also be eligible for the tax credit.
(Information provided by David Salisbury of the Sutherland Institute.)
UNITED STATES CONGRESS
On January 21 Senate members revealed their agendas for
this year's Congress. It included a $50 million proposal by Senator Paul
Coverdell (R., Ga.) that would fund pilot voucher programs in 20 to 30
school districts across the nation. District officials would provide the
scholarships to low-income parents with children in unsafe schools. Republicans
are especially supportive of the proposal. (Washington Times, 01-22-97;
Atlanta Journal, 01-23-97)
WISCONSIN
Two state lawmakers, Rep. Annette Polly Williams (D.,
Milwaukee) and Sen. Robert Welsh (R., Redgranite), announced on January
21 that they will co-sponsor a modified school choice bill this session.
The bill would expand MPCP from 1,650 to 15,000 participants, a measure
which was approved by the legislature in July of 1995 as part of the state's
budget, but which was blocked by Judge Paul Higginbotham in his January
15 decision. The bill would momentarily disallow religious schools from
participating.
(Milwaukee Journal Sentinel, 01-22-97)
The Blum Center now has a copy of Judge Higginbotham's January 15 decision. (See Freedom Report # 43.) The Institute for Justice in Washington, D.C., which headed the defense in the case, has said that Judge Higginbotham's fifty-page decision contains several sections which are "especially remarkable and provide a strong basis for appeal." In regard to the expansion of the Milwaukee Parental Choice Program (MPCP) to include religious schools, Judge Higginbotham glibly stated, "It can hardly be said that this does not constitute direct aid to the sectarian schools. Although the U.S. Supreme Court has chosen to turn its head and ignore the real impact of such aid, this court refuses to accept that myth." Governor Tommy Thompson's lawyers have already requested an expedited appeal in the hope that the Court of Appeals will issue a decision before the beginning of the next school year.
Announcement
¨ We are pleased to alert
our readers to this month's issue of Columbia, the magazine of the
Knights of Columbus, which features as a cover story an excellent profile
of the Blum Center, the Freedom Report, and school choice in general,
entitled "Choose or Lose." Written by Marie-Anne Hogarth, this article
deftly presents Blum Center insights into our nation's educational problems
and into the school choice solution. Its publication is a tribute to the
Catholic leadership which has voiced support for genuine parental freedom
in education.
Surveys, Reports, &
Studies
¨ Dr. Celia Elena Rouse,
professor of economics at Princeton University and research fellow at the
National Bureau of Economic Research (NBER), released a December 1996 study
called "Private School Vouchers and Student Achievement: An Evaluation
of the Milwaukee Parental Choice Program." It concludes that participants
in the Milwaukee Parental Choice Program (MPCP) have made positive academic
gains on account of the program. Dr. Rouse concluded that there were "quite
large" gains in math scores. She believes that MPCP "likely increased math
scores by 1.5 to two percentage points a year."
¨ Three professors from the University of North Texas have recently published a report discussing the effects of existing and proposed school choice policies on distributional equality. Dr. Kenneth Godwin, Dr. Frank Kemerer, and Dr. Valerie Martinez have concluded that school districts and housing markets segregate by ethnicity and income, and therefore create unequal academic opportunities for different income groups. The three conclude that the negative impact of those situations can be reversed by empowering parents with genuine choice among schools. The report recommends a "five-year pilot voucher program in a metropolitan area that encompasses families with all levels of income." Readers may obtain copies from the Blum Center or from CEO AMERICA, which can be contacted at (501) 273-6957.
Noteworthy Item
¨ In the November/December
issue of Report Card is a quotation that came from Malcom Frasier,
who was minister of education in Australia before he became Australia's
Prime Minister: "I have never understood the argument that parents who
are willing to pay nothing for the education of their children are entitled
to everything from the government while parents who are willing to pay
for something for the education of their children are entitled to nothing
from the government."
- The January 19, 1997, Philadelphia Inquirer carried
a story about the development of charter school legislation in New Jersey.
The story is a particularly important one for all who are interested in
achieving parental freedom in education, and who recognize that charter
schools can be either a help or a hindrance in this vital cause.
A key part of the report is the assertion by some observers that successful charter legislation in New Jersey (by contrast with failed charter proposals in Pennsylvania) derived from touting charters as an alternative to true parental choice. In other words, it was possible to stunt the drive for genuine parental freedom by throwing a charter bone to New Jersey's parents. The Inquirer's story is a classic. It says "the voucher concept creates far more turbulence than charter schools, because [and here the Inquirer sounds like the NEA, the primary educators' trade union] vouchers provide public money to private schools. . .." That is the traditional smoke screen error, of course, since any true school choice program, including vouchers, provides funds to parents, not schools, thereby enabling parents to exercise their best judgment without financial penalty.
"But Joseph Doria (D., Hudson), the New Jersey Assembly's minority leader and a prime sponsor of the state's charter schools proposal, said he and others turned the controversy over vouchers . . . into an argument for charter schools," the Inquirer continues.
"'We argued that charter schools are a good, less controversial alternative to vouchers,' Doria said, 'and we sold our bill that way. Charter schools are public schools, not private.'"
Yes, they are state schools, under state control, costing as much as other state schools, and unable to manifest parental interest in specific moral and religious environments. Bad in themselves? No. Better than one-size-fits-all monolithic public schools? No doubt. But a complete answer to legitimate parental desires for educational freedom? Hardly. Rather, they are essentially an American compromise, dictated by tormented church-state bogeymen and by beneficiaries of the status quo who want, above all, to maintain an exclusively state school funding monopoly. A proposal for true parental freedom "creates far more turbulence than charter schools," indeed — because true parental freedom means the end of finance monopoly, and is violently opposed by the monopoly's defenders. But that self-interested opposition is no reason for citizens to settle for charters.
If one stands back from the peculiarities and particularities of the United States, and asks whether charter schools would be thought adequate in another context, where straightforward parental freedom ruled, the answer is "no." In those many democracies where parental freedom is a reality, schools are schools, and any form can exist which satisfies parents and basic social intentions for educational achievement. Those democracies know enough not to confuse the ends of education (intellectual empowerment for youngsters under the watchful eyes of devoted parents and guardians) with specific means of providing such education. (See p. 4 of this Freedom Report.)
In such an enlightened environment, charters would never be thought of as sufficient, because they are not needed as a halfway house to parental freedom. Americans need to realize that the attractiveness of charters in the U.S. derives from frustration with the destructiveness of the prevailing monopoly, and the artificial limitations placed on America's parents. In this sad situation, there is a tendency for even well-intentioned reformers to wear down, as the monopoly's war of attrition is prosecuted. When that happens, such reformers are tempted to buy out with halfway measures such as public school choice and charters. And when that happens, true parental choice, rather than being advanced, is actually put at risk.
That is why I have always said "Charters, yes — if seen as stepping stone to true and comprehensive parental freedom." But "Charters, no — if accepted as a substitute for or 'alternative to' true parental freedom." As I suggested in Freedom Report #6 (2/18/94), "The very spirit which makes support for charters logical insists on going beyond them."
- A quite hopeless situation confronts people if they come
to think of one means to an end as if it were the end itself.
It is a simple enough idea. If I need groceries (and I do); and by habit
I act as if there is only one source for those groceries (the corner store);
then I am at the mercy of the corner store, and may well think of it (the
means) as equivalent to the groceries themselves (the end). In that sorry
situation, if someone says "groceries," I, like Pavlov's dog, think "corner
store." At that point, I am oblivious to the other grocery providers available
to me, and am damaging my chances of securing the best groceries at favorable
prices. And, I am encouraging slovenly behavior at the corner store
because its proprietor knows that he need not excel in order to retain
my patronage.
One among many means to an end can be measured, assessed, and compared to other means available for seeking the same objective. In that circumstance, I have a chance to make a rational selection among alternatives. But if the means comes to be seen as the end, ruination beckons. The means cannot effectively be evaluated, because it has been elevated to the level of good-in-itself. (For a fuller discussion of this destructive condition, see, e.g., pp. 91-97 in my Financing Education: The Struggle Between Governmental Monopoly and Parental Control, 1996.)
Not surprisingly, a great deal of the defense of today's educational finance monopoly (EFM) is devoted to promoting profound confusion between educational ends and educational means. To the extent the monopoly's public schools can be portrayed as good-in-themselves; as the end of public policy rather than as one means of achieving the public policy of educational achievement; then critics of the status quo have been effectively neutralized and the monopoly's governmental schools are beyond serious evaluation and criticism. The major educational trade union, the National Education Association (NEA), is a classic defender of EFM's status quo. It is a perpetual fountain of ends/means confusion. It persistently speaks of "public education" as the thing which, above all else, must be protected, preserved, and funded at ever-increasing levels. It seems essentially unable to speak of education for America's youth as the end of public policy, with public schools as one alternative means thereto. Yet, unless that distinction is made, America's citizens and parents are trapped in irrationality and impotence regarding education, just as I would be in buying groceries if I imagined the corner store was the only provider.
Lest readers imagine I am exaggerating the NEA's monotonous, self-serving consistency in this regard, I urge you to examine the NEA Handbook 1996-97, esp. pp. 7 - 10. Those four pages contain the "calls to action" uttered by the NEA's President, Bob Chase, and its Executive Director, Don Cameron. These spokesmen for the NEA are, most assuredly, not spokesmen for the education of America's youth. They are, rather, chanters of the monopoly's mantra: "public education" proclaimed as the end, rather than as one means to the good end of educational achievement for youngsters. "Public education," to be defended at all costs; never to be assessed nor measured outside its own tax-increasing "reforms," and especially never to be compared to alternative educational providers; to be sheltered against all critics by branding them "extremists" who are "disproportionately from the far right-wing" — even though those critics include concerned citizens from all over the political spectrum; to be protected, in short, by as many smoke screens as can be squeezed into four pages.
Never once is there introduced in these tone-setting pages this reality: the true end of rational public policy on education is the educational empowerment of young people, under the loving and watchful eyes of parents and guardians. Never once is there any recognition that this good end can be and always has been achieved by many means, of which public education rightly seen is but one. Thus does the NEA try, as it regularly tries, to confuse ends and means. It is time and past time for America's citizens and parents to say "enough." It is time to break apart the monopolistic presumption which limits those citizens unnaturally, and which deprives the monopoly's schools from experiencing the normal incentives to excel, and thereby make themselves truly worthy of parents' choices. Most urgently, it is time to recognize and state plainly this simple and decisive fact: the NEA and its smaller educational trade union cousins and local affiliates have as their central purpose in life the enhancement and enrichment of the material benefits of their members. They do not have as their special mission the enhancement and enrichment of the educational welfare of America's youth.
To recognize and state this inescapable reality is in no sense to demonize the unions, nor their members. Material enrichment for members is what trade unions exist for, after all. And there is no surprise in their attempts to portray their self-serving efforts as if they were altruistic. But if the educational unions cannot be expected to have children's welfare as their basic focus, who in the monopolistic system can? As we will see in the next Freedom Report, the essential answer is "no one." Those who are thought to safeguard the henhouse are too often co-opted by the foxes.n
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The Blum Center grants full permission for all of its documents to be copied, in part or in whole, to extend the reach of the Center's messages and information. We appreciate it when our readers keep us apprised of state and national developments in the area of school choice, particularly legislative developments. Any Blum Center documents not available on our web page may be obtained by contacting us by telephone, fax, or mail. Virgil C. Blum Center for Parental Freedom in Education |
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