School Vouchers Can Be A Solution To Segregation
Private schools participating in voucher programs in the Milwaukee, Cleveland and Washington, D.C., districts are much less segregated than public schools, according to an eye-opening new analysis that also finds that segregation levels in private schools generally are not substantially different from those in public schools.
With one of the goals of the U.S. education system to increase integration in public schools, the report provides powerful ammunition against attacks by opponents of school choice who maintain that voucher programs are camouflaged attempts to promote segregation in education.
“Private schools have more potential to desegregate students because they break down geographic barriers, drawing students together across neighborhood boundaries,” according to the report’s author, Dr. Greg Forster, director of research at the Milton and Rose D. Friedman Foundation.
“But this potential for desegregation in private schools is hindered because many students can’t afford private school. School vouchers overcome the monetary barrier, enabling private schools to make desegregation a reality.”
Most big city school districts are segregated. Thanks to the radicals belief that education is gained not through quality teaching, parents involvement, superior material, but through putting students on a bus for up to two hours a day, government education is as segregated as the KKK would love. Those that can afford it, take their children out of the “system” and send them to private schools or home school.
In the case of the Kansas city schools a judge demanded ten billion in tax dollars–not voted on by a single legislator or approval by any elected official. At the end of the experiment the KC schools were more segregated, tests scores plummeted and the taxpayers burned ten billion dollars for a social experiment. Maybe we should go the other way, spend less money, but give the parents a choice in education. In California the current system fails a majority of the students/ Why doesn’t the NAACP, MAPA and other radical ethnic groups demand the end of segregation and demand quality education for all children, regardless of venue–public, private or home schooling. Isn’t education about children, not power plays, unions, or hack politicians like Antonio?
The time has come to admit what most parents know, we need to reform a broken government education system. Believe in the parents and the results of new studies.
This comes from the Georgia Public Policy Foundation. Maybe Los Angeles, Oakland, San Diego and other urban districts would put aside ego and power, and think of the needs of children?
What do you think, is this a good idea. Would vouchers work for the students or does it matter that government keep a monopoly on education?
—
Steve Frank is the publisher of California Political News and Views and a Senior Contributor to CaliforniaConservative.org. He is also a consultant currently working on gambling issues and advising other consultants on policy and coalition building.
Read more of his work here or at his blog.
Technorati Tags: Education, School Vouchers, Segregation