Betsy DeVos’s favorite education policy keeps looking worse. Last week, the Education Department, which she runs, released a careful study of the District of Columbia’s use of school vouchers, which she supports. The results were not good.
Students using vouchers to attend a private school did worse on math and reading than similar students in public school, the study found. It comes after other studies, in Ohio and elsewhere, have also shown weak results for vouchers.
Families sue city to prevent Harlem charter school closure
A group of families are suing the city to prevent the closure of their Harlem charter school, the Daily News has learned.
Source: Families sue city to prevent Harlem charter school closure – NY Daily News
Our Neighborhood School Didn’t Have a Dual-Language Immersion Program So Parents Started One
As soon as my fiancé and I moved to Washington, D.C. in 2008, we started looking at school options. Although children were still a few years off, we wanted to give ourselves plenty of time to research the various schools available to us.
The district provides multiple school choices for children starting at age 3, including traditional, charter and private schools, and we were thrilled to learn several dual-language immersion schools were among our choices.
Source: Our Neighborhood School Didn’t Have a Dual-Language Immersion Program So We Started One
Missouri Senate advances plan to expand school choice
JEFFERSON CITY, Mo. (AP) — The Missouri Senate has advanced a bill to create education savings accounts for children with disabilities, foster kids and children with parents in the military.
Source: Missouri Senate advances plan to expand school choice – West Plains Daily Quill: National News
The Second Great Migration for Black Families Is Embracing School Choice
Like hundreds of thousands of Black families, my paternal grandmother and several of her relatives participated in the Great Migration, one of the most dramatic population shifts in American history.
Although some Blacks left the South to pursue economic opportunities, a lot of them had no choice—it was often for safety and security, to escape overt and violent oppression. Blacks leaving the South in droves, was not, of course, the same as being sold as chattel, but it was rooted in oppression nonetheless.
Source: The Second Great Migration for Black Families Is Embracing School Choice
Jeb Bush: Let’s leave education decisions up to New Hampshire families
Since our nation was founded, the “Live Free or Die’’ state has stood out for its embrace of individual liberty. This makes pending legislation that would set up Education Freedom Savings Accounts a natural fit for New Hampshire families.
The first two words here are key: Education Freedom.
Source: Jeb Bush: Let’s leave education decisions up to New Hampshire families
How Not to Argue for School Choice
The enthusiasm of some school choice advocates is leading them to make their case in ways that are tone-deaf or counterproductive. Frederick Hess, in EducationNext, suggests that advocates for school choice take a less frontal approach in promoting choice.
Source: How Not to Argue for School Choice – Education Next : Education Next
Setting the Record Straight on School Choice – American Federation for Children
Recent columns in the news media, including ones in The New York Times and Los Angeles Times, are using self-selected data points to suggest that private school choice programs do not work for children. This assertion, while it makes a nice headline and feeds a false narrative the […]
Source: Setting the Record Straight on School Choice – American Federation for Children
School Inc. (a documentary)
School Inc. is a global exploration of discovery by the late Andrew Coulson, senior fellow of education policy at Cato Institute’s Center for Educational Freedom. He takes viewers on a worldwide personal quest for an answer to the question—if you build a better way to teach a subject, why doesn’t the world beat a path to your door, like they do in other industries?
The three-part documentary exposes audiences to unfamiliar and often startling realities: the sad fate of Jaime Escalante after the release of the feature film Stand and Deliver; Korean teachers who earn millions of dollars every year; private schools in India that produce excellent results but charge only $5 a month; current U.S. efforts to provide choices and replicate educational excellence; and schools in Chile and Sweden—in which top K-12 teachers and schools have already begun to “scale-up,” reaching large and ever-growing numbers of students.
Like the Cosmos and Connections series that inspired it, School Inc. takes viewers on a personal journey, led by an expert so passionate about his field that he made arrangements before his imminent death to ensure the documentary would be completed. Coulson offers his analysis with a sense of circumspection about the limits of science, as well as a sense of humor. From its surprising twists to its beautiful visuals, the series doesn’t just edify, but entertains.
A parent masquerading as a school choice consumer tells a misleading story about parental choice in education
Patricia MacCorquodale, a parent in Arizona, describes her experiences with school choice. She is obviously biased in her assessments of choice and charters. She describes her frustrations with choosing the right school for her child. But instead of advocating for a more streamlined access to information, she essentially concludes that choice is hard and therefore not worth pursuing.
My daughter attended two private, two public and four charter schools during her K-12 education; the search for each one was extensive. With 547 charter schools and 480 private schools operating in Arizona, there is a lot of school choice.
‘I navigated the school choice maze as a university professor with good income, flexible hours, reliable transportation, and a strong parent network. Imagine the process of school choice for parents of students attending failing schools, with limited income, or relying on public transportation.’
Source: The masquerade of school choice: a parent’s story – The Washington Post
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