Giving students choices is no laughing matter
Have you heard the one about the priest, the rabbi and the Baptist minister who went to a political rally? This one’s no joke.
To understand what was special about Thursday’s school-choice rally at the state Capitol, you didn’t have to hear what was said or feel the freezing temperatures which more than 100 attendees braved.
You had to look at the crowd, which didn’t look at all like what the machinery of the education status quo would have you believe. It was a crowd that was multiracial, multi-ethnic and multi-faith.
The minorities present were not token representatives. They were a reflection of the fact that school choice — including charter schools and vouchers — is an issue that concerns all Georgians, not just a privileged few.
So much so that, in imploring the crowd to remain persistent, Rich Thompson, a Southwest Atlanta parent and school-choice advocate, chose to cite a dictum from the abolitionist Frederick Douglass: “Power concedes nothing without a demand.”
So much so that when Senate Majority Leader Chip Rogers described school choice as “the moral calling of our time” and compared it to the civil rights movement, no one in the crowd blinked.
School choice brings together blacks and whites, the rich and the poor, Catholics and Protestants and Jews and the unaffiliated, even Republicans and Democrats. That fact is one of the least remarked attributes of the cause.
Here’s another: Despite the urgency of improving education for Georgia’s children, and the radicalism of which they’re accused, school-choice supporters have been awfully willing to accept incrementalism.
Shaking up an old and ineffective system, an apt description for much of public education in Georgia, does require some radicalism. We need to do something radically different if we’re to achieve radical improvement.
Still, patience has been the practice.
First came vouchers for children with special needs. Those kids now can spend the state tax dollars allocated for their education at the school of their choice. (Note that this option includes other traditional public schools as well as charters and private schools.)
Now, Rogers proposes vouchers for Georgia’s 15,000 foster kids and tens of thousands of children in military families.
Combine this incremental approach to vouchers with the tendency of charter schools to spring up in areas where students can’t afford other options, and it’s clear that school-choice supporters are keeping their word about first serving those with the greatest needs.
It’s a good-faith effort to earn the public’s trust little by little. Compare that to the “comprehensive” overhaul of health care and restriction of carbon emissions — whether you like them or not — favored by the left.
Amid the patience, however, Thompson reminds us that thousands of kids’ futures are at stake.
“I understand the rationale for incremental progress,” he told me after the rally. “But my daughter will only be in the fifth grade one time. So I don’t have the time or the patience for gradually fixing the [Atlanta] middle school system.”
All the more reason for school-choice advocates to take heart from their achievements so far, but also to view them as motivation to keep going.
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147 comments Add your comment
Will
February 21st, 2010
11:02 am
Kyle:
As a public school administrator, may I take a moment of your time to tell you what is wrong with vouchers and charter school funding?
Both reduce public school funding without reducing public school operational costs.
Let’s use an example of an 800 student elementary school. Further using Eric Johnson’s estimate that vouchers would probably reduce enrollment by approximately 05%, let’s apply this to this example.
These 40 students (and their funding) will leave this example school, reducing each classroom in the school by around one student. There would be no reduction in teacher need or operational costs assoicated with the school (utilities, custodial, cafeteria, and other ancillary costs. This loss of forty students would also not reduce the costs associated with transporting students.
The biggest misconception of those advocating for vouchers is to take a number of anticpated students and dividing that number by the maximum class size and then declaring that the number of teachers needed at the public school would be reduced. For example, let’s guess again that 40 students would leave this example school. Advocates for vouchers would say this represents the equivalent of two classrooms, thus the costs associated with the reduction of these two classrooms would represent significant savings. This would only be true if, somehow, all the students leaving were in the same grade. That is an incorrect assumption.
Same with charter schools. Advocates say their target enrollment (let’s say 400 students) would reduce the public school system’s costs by the equivalent of a small elementary school. Again, only if all the charter school students were to come from one exisiting public school. As you and I know, this target enrollment will likely include students presently in private schools, home schools and a number of different public schools.
In summary, the opposition to charter schools and vouchers is legitimate as it relates to the reduction in funding without a correspondining reduction in operational costs.
Michael H. Smith
February 21st, 2010
11:15 am
Houckster, I’m sure you do. Die-hard proud race cripples eventually go to the grave, as will the bigotry of the social crutch that a so-called race depends upon to survive, which is very reassuring to me.
Houckster
February 21st, 2010
11:23 am
MICHAEL H. SMITH writes: Die-hard proud race cripples eventually go to the grave, as will the bigotry of the social crutch that a so-called race depends upon to survive, which is very reassuring to me.
___
I hope you understand that I’m going to live for a very long time and I’m counting on you to keep me entertained. I did very much enjoy your last comment and am looking forward to more of them.
Houckster
February 21st, 2010
11:30 am
Oh, one other thing: I never mentioned race in any of my posts. I mentioned students who were poor and lack mobility. You brought up race.
Michael H. Smith
February 21st, 2010
11:37 am
What right does your GUB’MENT school monopoly have to exist, is it some unalienable right that only the GUB’MENT schools get taxpayer money, Will?
If the only means whereby children in this country could possibly obtain an education was a public school then charter schools and private schools would never have came into existence. No schools should be endowed with taxpayer dollars as an entitlement. Schools should have to compete for student dollars to earn their right to exist.
Michael H. Smith
February 21st, 2010
11:41 am
I never brought up your name specifically either, the inference was made to earlier posts made perhaps by different people under different names, by the way.
Houckster
February 21st, 2010
11:44 am
Michael H. Smith: You and I both know very well that you meant me. If you hadn’t you would have clarified that in response to my first reference to the term.
Michael H. Smith
February 21st, 2010
11:49 am
If the shoe fits, wear it. Otherwise why continue to complain as though it does?
Barry
February 21st, 2010
12:30 pm
Anyone who uses the term “GUB’MENT” in such discussions is a Neal Boortz robot incapable of independent or intelligent thought.
Woodrow
February 21st, 2010
1:14 pm
Will, your numbers make sense and I don’t disagree with them. There does however seem to be something missing. I’m not an administrator, just a parent who cares about my kids education. For the last half century we have poured more and more money into the school systems of our nation. That has done two things. Teacher pay (adjusted for inflation and based on the last decade only) has risen roughly 3.4 percent (Cato.com study) and secondly the number of employees in education has risen drastically. Federal, State and Local employee numbers have grown by OVER 50% while the child population growth has stayed in the low single digits.
Meanwhile, over that same period of time, average student performance on NAEP reading and math test are virtually unchanged. Zero. That’s the improvement we’ve bought for literally billions of dollars. (Sources: Digest of Education Statistics, Table 64, and National Assessment of Educational Progress, Long-Term Trend results)
How can we even pretend that we’ve made any progress at all? We can’t. That’s why a simple reading of the U.S. Constitution will provide all the answer you need. Look up the section on education. Oh yeah, there isn’t one. That’s because “the powers not delegated to the United States by the Constitution, nor prohibited by it to the States, are reserved to the States respectively, or to the people.”
The Tar and Feathers Party
February 21st, 2010
1:42 pm
My MY, more crooked teacher scum and their scum bag husbands, imho: FROM THE AJC: “The project is one of six, worth more than $110 million combined, under investigation by the DeKalb County district attorney’s office.
Pope’s attorney, Manny Arora, has said she has done nothing wrong.
Pope’s husband, Anthony “Tony” Pope, said his wife did not make the changes to give him work. But he acknowledged that her actions helped him financially.
“You’re doggone right it benefited me,” Tony Pope said.
The revelation about Pat Pope’s actions in this project is the latest in a series of AJC articles about the official and her involvement in the construction projects under investigation.
Pope, who headed the school district’s construction program until the criminal probe intensified last fall, solicited bids in fall 2007 for work on the massive Mountain Industrial Center complex, records show.
At the time, Tony Pope had teamed up with a construction company to compete for the job of renovating the complex, which includes two schools and other facilities near Tucker.
But that company decided not to pursue the project, leaving Tony Pope without a business partner to bid on the work.
Had Pat Pope moved forward with the project as it was, it would have gone to one of the other contractor-architect teams in the running.
Instead, she broke the project in two and the district gave a fraction of it to one of the original bidders, without advertising the changes. The much larger portion of the work was put out to bid a month later.
By that time, Tony Pope had teamed up with Nix-Fowler Constructors. That company won the contract, which now stands at $21.3 million, through a competitive bid process. Tony Pope’s portion so far is $1,075,718, according to financial documents obtained from Nix-Fowler.
The project is expected to be finished by spring.
The district attorney’s office is probing whether Pat Pope, who has been reassigned from her position as chief operating officer, broke the law by allegedly steering contracts to her husband’s architectural firm and two other construction companies where she has connections. Investigators won’t discuss the case.
Pat Pope declined to comment when reached by phone Tuesday.”
No More Progressives.
February 21st, 2010
1:42 pm
truth
February 20th, 2010
4:57 pm
Private schools work because they kick out all the students who can’t behave. Those kids ruin public schools. It takes a long time before public schools get rid of them.
Just till they drop out.
Michael H. Smith
February 21st, 2010
2:05 pm
Attacking Boortz is your last means of defense for GUB’MENT, Barry? I’m sure Boortz has worst things said about him by smarter people than you or I all the time and most of them probably lost to him in a court of law before some very intelligent people that favored his case arguments.
Now, pardon dumb me for asking Barry but just how big did you say your listening audience is once again?
It can’t be very large considering your defense of G’MENT, since 86% of the dumb incapable unintelligent Americans polled by CNN (Not Fox News) believe that your Big GUV’MENT is broken and no longer works properly when viewed in such discussions as this one. They really didn’t need Boortz to reach that conclusion nor do I.
myron
February 21st, 2010
3:06 pm
The illogical, irrational arguments that arise when the discussion is education mystifies me. The success or failure of a school is about personnel and policy, safety and security, funding and finance. Many of the successful ideas and programs from the 80s until now are due to GOP input with monies passed by democrats… so please, stop the banter about liberal vs conservative or big vs little government. Private schools operate differently than public schools in many cases and unless we are willing to change the environment/involvement for many parents, teachers, and students then America will continue to lag behind other countries who do not invest in their children like we do.
Barry
February 21st, 2010
3:47 pm
Funny, Michael H. Smith. So the level of your intelligence is measurable by the size of your audience? Seriously? Whew.
Michael H. Smith
February 21st, 2010
4:13 pm
You should be more concern with your level of intelligence Barry and the acceptability of your arguments, Boortz is not the focus of this topic nor is my intelligence in case you haven’t figure that much out.
It is about school choice and the GOVERNMENT solely making that choice for the individual that often entraps a student in a bad school simply to keep government in authoritarian control of government monopoly over education and some government employees in a job they really don’t deserve to keep.
In regards to intelligence is measurable by the size of your audience: My advice to you Barry, is don’t quite your day job if you have one to do comedy or go on the lecture circuit.
Michael H. Smith
February 21st, 2010
4:29 pm
Private schools operate differently than public schools in many cases and unless we are willing to change the environment/involvement for many parents, teachers, and students then America will continue to lag behind other countries who do not invest in their children like we do.
Private schools were meant to operate differently and those of “the we” who were “the willing” did exactly that changing of the environment/involvement for many parents, teachers, and students, which the majority of public schools will never do and those private schools and their parents, teachers, and students have just as much right to the exact same share a taxpayer dollars the public schools receive on a per student bases as the government schools. Care to argue the logic of this statement, Myron?
LA
February 21st, 2010
7:57 pm
Toyota gets it!
Toyota: Dems ‘not industry friendly’
Internal Toyota documents derided the Obama administration and Democratic Congress as “activist” and “not industry friendly,” a revelation that comes days before the giant automaker’s top executives testify on Capitol Hill amid a giant recall.
According to a presentation obtained under subpoena by the House Oversight and Government Relations committee, Toyota referred to the “changing political environment” as one of its main challenges and anticipated a “more challenging regulatory” environment under the Obama administration’s purview.
http://www.politico.com/news/stories/0210/33248.html
random observer
February 21st, 2010
8:11 pm
Michael A. Smith, your mind is obviously closed on the issue! So, then is my discussion of it with you!
Michael H. Smith
February 21st, 2010
9:49 pm
random observer your mind is also closed on this issue, there really never was a discussion only statements of positions held, which is of no loss to me!
MrLiberty
February 21st, 2010
10:15 pm
It is inappropriate to say that “school choice is the moral calling of our time” when vouchers and charters schools both maintain the immoral action of stealing monies from people through taxation to fund what only a portion of society benefits from. There is no morality in government action. Everything government has to spend must be taken from people in the productive sector of society.
Charter schools and vouchers will always be plagued not just by the implicit immorality of their funding mechanism, but by the never-ending bureaucratic and legislative strings that will be attached to money for their operation.
Private schools and homeschools excel because they can operate under their own directive, driving themselves to please their customers, not the state legislature. Any time vouchers are mentioned, there is always a call to restrict access to and school not considered “mainstream.” No doubt catholic and other religious schools would fall into this category. One only need look at the history of government education in this country to see that it was premised on being a mechanism to undermine the culture of the large waves of catholic immigrants to this nation and to create “good citizens” of compliant protestant leaning.
No option that maintains any government involvement will ever solve the fundamental failures that plague our schools. Parents, businesses, and the market must be the only people involved in the education of children. Anything less, ignores the real moral imperative we face.
And yes Kyle, sometime it is important to reach for the highest ideal and stick with it. Watered down principles, no matter how “pragmatic” are the reason the republican party is such a failure and the democratic party no longer cares about freedom and liberty. Principles must always be upheld. How else can we ever recognize when we waver from them or how to get back to them?
dewstarpath
February 22nd, 2010
8:35 am
- I just finished reading the Editorial section of Sunday’s AJC.
The responses from APS superintendent Beverly Hall and
Governor Sonny Perdue about the suspected erasures and
changes in the CRCT exams are striking.
In his entire response, Gov. Perdue only uses “I”, referring
to himself, only once – and the reference is 2/3 of the way into
his response. The quote:
“I think we can all agree that a second look is warranted”.
Supt. Hall, on the other hand, uses “my” as the second word
of the first sentence of her response – which is followed by four
uses of “I”, referring to herself. The quote:
“For my entire career in education, I have been dedicated
to making sure students learn what they need to succeed in
life beyond school”.
Although she is on the defensive in explaining the CRCT
discrepancies to the public, the word usage is telling about who
is a team player as far as advancing the state of public education
in Georgia, and who is primarily concerned with helping themselves.
dewstarpath
February 22nd, 2010
8:37 am
CORRECTION: The “I” reference by Gov. Perdue is about
1/3 of the way into his response.
HDB`
February 22nd, 2010
9:55 am
What many people fail to realizae is that the MANDATES of public and private education are different; private schools can discriminate as to who is taught, what is taught, whereas the public schools are to teach the MASSES!! Private schools can not handle the VOLUME that public schools are mandated to cover.
There ARE issues with public education, but for the most part, those who have successfully navigated the system do come productive!!
Also, vouchers don’t work for in order to compensate for the loss of revenue, overall taxes would have to increase……an anti-conservative idea!!
LA
February 22nd, 2010
10:00 am
“private schools can discriminate as to who is taught, what is taught, whereas the public schools are to teach the MASSES!!”
“discriminate?”
elaborate please.
LA
February 22nd, 2010
10:02 am
“Also, vouchers don’t work for in order to compensate for the loss of revenue, overall taxes would have to increase……an anti-conservative idea!!”
That comment makes absolutely no sense.
Why do you hate white people, HDB?
HDB`
February 22nd, 2010
10:17 am
LA – IN this case, discriminate mean that a school can PICK AND CHOOSE who enters; the public school mandate is that ALL children are to be educated!! Private schools can not handle the PURE VOLUME that the public schools are mandated to educate.
The cost per student will necessarily INCREASE due to the reducing volume of students per school; in order to compensate for that reducion, the funding sources would have to see an increase…i.e., property taxes.
…and I DO NOT HATE WHITE PEOPLE!! Please refrain from that insinuation, please!!!
LA
February 22nd, 2010
10:20 am
More on the liberal professor who shot her co-workers. Looks like she also made “herpes bombs.”
Yep, liberals sure are peace loving people.
For Professor, Fury Just Beneath the Surface
Several people with connections to the university’s biology department warned that Dr. Bishop, a neuroscientist with a Harvard Ph.D., might have booby-trapped the science building with some sort of “herpes bomb,” police officials said, designed to spread the dangerous virus.
http://www.nytimes.com/2010/02/21/us/21bishop.html?th=&emc=th&pagewanted=all
LA
February 22nd, 2010
10:26 am
“IN this case, discriminate mean that a school can PICK AND CHOOSE who enters”
Of course they can, just like private Ivy League schools can pick and choose. Just like Universities that pick and choose……..
Do you always see things in black and white?
“the public school mandate is that ALL children are to be educated!!”
That MUST be why public schools have a higher drop out rate than private schools!
“Private schools can not handle the PURE VOLUME that the public schools are mandated to educate.”
Well no kidding. They don’t get taxpayer dollars to waste like public schools do.
“and I DO NOT HATE WHITE PEOPLE!! Please refrain from that insinuation, please!!!”
Well, that is my assumption of you. You’re always talking about race in your comments.
LA
February 22nd, 2010
10:27 am
More bad news for the global warming cult.
Climate scientists withdraw journal claims of rising sea levels
Study claimed in 2009 that sea levels would rise by up to 82cm by the end of century – but the report’s author now says true estimate is still unknown
http://www.guardian.co.uk/environment/2010/feb/21/sea-level-geoscience-retract-siddall
HDB`
February 22nd, 2010
10:41 am
LA…so you’re allowing a QUOTA of students to be educated?? By discriminating, you limit the number of student being educated…..and that’s a QUOTA…something anathematic to conservatives, isn’t it?? The mandate of public education is that ALL students are to be educated…not just the elite!! What you are basically stating is that everyone does not need an education to progress…..and I would counter that by saying asking: IF education the initial stepping stone towards progress and assimilation, why would not educating ALL be desired…rather than just educating the elite??
saywhat?
February 22nd, 2010
10:42 am
Kyle, why do you tolerate LA on your blog? All she does is clutter it up with nonsense. Do you really think she adds anything of value to the discussions? I just skip over the multiple crap postings to get to the next post anyway. As for the upcoming personal attacks she will now make against me, I won’t read any of them either. Of course, knowing that won’t stop her.
As for vouchers, I agree with the intelligent objections I have read so far. I agree with school choice on principle , but the vouchers route has too many downsides. One need only apply the same theory to any other tax paid public service and extrapolate the results to see how chaotic and unproductive such a system would become.
LA
February 22nd, 2010
11:06 am
“so you’re allowing a QUOTA of students to be educated??”
Your words not mine.
“By discriminating, you limit the number of student being educated…..and that’s a QUOTA…something anathematic to conservatives, isn’t it?”
Again, your words and again, you bring race into it.
“The mandate of public education is that ALL students are to be educated…not just the elite!! ”
If that were true, public schools would have a higher graduation rate.
“What you are basically stating is that everyone does not need an education to progress”
Again, your words not mine. I never said that or implied it.
“rather than just educating the elite??”
I thought affirmative action corrected that? Huh.
LA
February 22nd, 2010
11:08 am
“but the vouchers route has too many downsides.”
Like what? It helps poorer kids go to better schools. Why do liberals want to keep minorities down?
Kyle Wingfield
February 22nd, 2010
11:09 am
I just wrote the following beneath my most recent post. It applies equally, and immediately, on this thread or any others on my blog.
***
LA, dewstar and whoever else piles on from time to time: Consider this a pre-emptive warning:
The pointless bickering and name-calling has once again risen to intolerable levels. I have been a little slack in policing it lately because I’ve been spending a lot of time at the Legislature and away from my computer. With a two-week break from the session starting today, I am going to tighten things back up.
The first instance of name-calling will result in a one-week ban. Responding to name-calling, or celebrating someone else’s ban, will also result in a one-week ban.
I am mostly talking about pointless, irrelevant trash-talking which LA and dewstar specialize in…but I reserve the right to act on any other excessive bickering.
There has been a good bit of substantive exchange in between the taunts, and that’s what I want us to focus on here.
You have been warned.
LA
February 22nd, 2010
11:10 am
Kyle Wingfield
Fine, I will follow your rules.
LA
February 22nd, 2010
11:11 am
saywhat writes: All she does is clutter it up with nonsense. Do you really think she adds anything of value to the discussions? I just skip over the multiple crap postings to get to the next post anyway. As for the upcoming personal attacks she will now make against me, I won’t read any of them either. Of course, knowing that won’t stop her.
So Kyle, from what I read from that paragraph, saywhat is throwing the first stone.
LA
February 22nd, 2010
11:12 am
Kyle,
One more thing. The reason this fight has gone on between dewstar and myself is because you never took down dewstars remarks like “horrace and LA are gay” or LA is stupid, a moron, a douche bag etc….
Just sayin’
Kyle Wingfield
February 22nd, 2010
11:17 am
Rest assured, LA, that I will be watching everyone’s comments closely from here on.
chuck
February 22nd, 2010
11:34 am
@Michael Smith and dewstarpath:
I am a conservative AND a Public School Teacher. It is a little distressing to hear your opinions about so-called school choice, especially considering how little you know about public education in general. In Georgia we do NOT HAVE TEACHER UNIONS. I would not belong to one if we did. Teachers don’t control what goes on in education anymore than cashiers control what goes on in Wal-Mart.
I teach in a great school with really good test scores, yet I can name you 5-6 students who probably will not pass standardized tests in April. They are perfectly capable of doing so, but they won’t. They have essentially decided that education doesn’t matter to them right now and there is absolutely nothing I can do about it.
You can go to ANY so-called “failing school” and see teachers working their butts off EVERY DAY. They are trying their best to motivate and inspire students who have been beaten down their entire lives. It isn’t easy. You see the reason “private” schools SEEM to do so well is that they get to choose their STUDENTS. Public schools don’t have that luxury. Nor should we, except we should be able to kick out the ones who keep others from the OPPORTUNITY to learn.
Kyle, I can tell you what this school choice movement is about. It is about MY KID not having to go to school with THOSE KIDS. Pure and simple.
HDB`
February 22nd, 2010
11:39 am
LA….if you LIMIT the NUMBER of students being educated, in essence, that IS a QUOTA….i.e., a specific number to be met or desired. I’m speaking PURELY of numbers!!! A pure-numbers system, I thought, is anathematic to conservatives; if private education were as OPEN as the public system, the private system would be so overwhelmed that nothing would be accomplished!!
Public education IS educating the masses…..and the masses have ISSUES: for some, English is the SECOND language; in other cases, there are learning and/or physical disabilities that the private schools choose not to handle. For some, there’s DISTANCE and transportation; for others, it’s cost-prohibitive.
The reason that many are against vouchers is that it removes funding from the public system, allows the private schools to discriminate…and thereby INCREASES taxes for all!! If private education were good for the masses, why won’t the private schools have OPEN enrollment, scholarships for the disadvantaged……ESL classes, et. al?
LA – Affirmative Action granted ACCESS to those who were previously denied such; it HAS assisted in creating several conservative icons: Clarence Thomas, Colin Powell, Thomas Sowell…et. al. Justice Thomas was admitted to Holy Cross under its initial AA Program; Gen. Powell was considered for the National Security Advisor’s position when the list of Generals was EXPANDED by Presidential order. Expanding the pool of possibilities, IMHO, IS a conservative mantra……and that’s what AA did for minorities! If the Rooney Rule is good enough for the NFL……..
You DID imply that for some, education would not a requirement if you LIMIT the educational system to private education….for those segments of the population with language and cultural differences, not providing a public education would lessen the possibility of assimilation…and isn’t that key in people’s realization of the American Dream?? As I previously stated, the mantra between public and private education IS different….and the systems therein to educate said populations MUST be different!!
HDB`
February 22nd, 2010
11:46 am
@ Chuck: First, let me “Thank You” for your efforts; many don’t understand what you, as a teacher, must go through to educate our children.
As you’ve stated, there are some students that JUST are not good standardized test takers; this does NOT mean that they can NOT be educated!! Education, in its current form, is primarily TEACHING a TEST, not TEACHING for KNOWLEDGE! Prior to this cacaphony about testing, a student’s ability was measured on a composite level….which made some standardized testing easier for some….more difficult for others.
Private schools restrict themselves to certain teaching methods…Montessori, for example….and for some, it works: for others, NO!! Public schools MUST vary their teaching methods so that the preponderance of students receive an education! Add in cultural/language differences….and the corresponding techniques MUST vary!
Kyle Wingfield
February 22nd, 2010
11:49 am
HDB and others: The important thing here is not to think of alternatives to traditional public schools — i.e., private schools, parochial schools, charter schools, etc. — only as they exist currently. A robust voucher system would in all likelihood lead to a lot of new schools popping up, schools that don’t exist today because there’s no funding mechanism for them.
These schools would not have the element of exclusivity that we tend to associate with private schools today — I can imagine schools that cater to ESOL kids, to kids with learning disabilities who don’t fit well into traditional schools and often have behavior problems, and so on. There is a lot of social entrepreneurship these days in other areas; I don’t know why there wouldn’t be as much social entrepreneurship in education once a funding mechanism exists (since the kids in these groups tend to come from families that can’t afford other schools at present).
Can I guarantee that these schools will be created? No. But I can guarantee that they *won’t* be created unless something changes.
Kyle Wingfield
February 22nd, 2010
11:52 am
As for those who question spending tax dollars in this way from a conservative perspective:
The state of Georgia is constitutionally bound to provide an education for its children. This is money we have to spend, barring an unlikely constitutional change. Why do you care where the money gets spent, as long as the money is well-spent?
We have to stop thinking about money for *schools* and start thinking about money for *students*.
HDB`
February 22nd, 2010
12:04 pm
Kyle…the issue for many conservatives IS the abolition of public schools! Just sheer volume alone makes that idea impossible!! I agree that money WELL SPENT should be the focus…..but a voucher system won’t necessarily do that!! Since private/charter/parochial schools are geared to a certain mantra…what needs to be addressed is HOW to make the public schools better and more efficient in THEIR mantra!!
Prior to the 80s, public schools WERE comparable to many private schools; in many areas, however, the private schools were the outlet to prevent students from assimilating (as Chuck said!). In current time, not only is that true, but also, it “appears” that private schools are somewhat cost-effective…..but are we SURE?? We SHOULD care WHERE the money is spent in that the needs of the MANY outweigh the needs of the FEW!! If money is diverted to the private schools, it perpetuates the idea that the needs of the FEW outweigh the needs of the MANY!!!
Kyle Wingfield
February 22nd, 2010
12:20 pm
Answer this for me, HDB (or anyone else who thinks similarly): What do you like about public schools?
(Fwiw, I attended nothing but public schools, from kindergarten through college. My mother and other members of my and my wife’s families teach in public schools. I have every hope of being able to send my son to good public schools. So I’m not some sort of public schools hater.)
chuck
February 22nd, 2010
12:29 pm
Thanks for the acknowledgement HDB. We do have to be all things to all people so to speak.
Kyle, How many charter schools have been successful in accomplishing what they said they would accomplish? EVERYBODY thinks they can come up with an idea for a “perfect” school, but all of these ideas involve in some way the exclusion of students that don’t “fit”.
On the other hand, how many of these schools that you envision would end up just lining the pocket of some “entrepreneur” and how long might it take to figure out that a particular school is just a scam? I have nothing against private schools, but they are not real world. Also Kyle, let’s say that these schools of your come into being. Does it make economic sense to send students half way across the world to go to school? Who is going to bear the cost of transportation? How many of the parents of poor kids will be motivated or even able to transport students to a school on the other side of Atlanta? What about the gridlock? We need to go back to neighborhood schools, and we need to give every child a great basic public education.
Kyle, would you advocate doing away with public schools?
chuck
February 22nd, 2010
12:33 pm
Kyle, contrary to popular belief, MOST public schools offer a great basic education to every child. NOT a PERFECT Education, and not necessarily the BEST education, but frankly, we can’t afford to give every child the BEST education in either public or private schools. I do honestly believe that public schools offer a good basic education to every student in Georgia.
HDB`
February 22nd, 2010
12:42 pm
Kyle: Having been raised BY a teacher…educated in the Atlanta Public Schools AND Georgia State Colleges…this is what I liked about public schools:
1) Student diversity – I learned about different segments of society and learned how to interact
2) Teachers ACTUALLY CARED!! Teachers were available to work with students…and cared about their students’ progressing
3) Location: I had GOOD schools in my neighborhoods
4) Flexibility: I was able to take certain courses that were offered in one school that weren’t offered in others…..and maintaining the focus on achievement
5) Focus on a ROUNDED-curriculum…not just focusing on passing the tests!
6) Teachers allowed creative energy to be used
7) Teachers CHALLENGED ME!!
The DISADVANTAGES were distance and location….for in order for me to achieve this flexibility, I had to drive at LEAST 30 minutes a day……if I were on local transit, I MISSED classes…….
Local schools keep getting beat up….but there ARE some GREAT teachers in the public schools that are NOT getting acknowledged……
Kyle Wingfield
February 22nd, 2010
12:45 pm
Chuck, I’m not arguing that all public schools are bad or that every alternative is perfect. (See my note above about my personal history with public schools.)
What I am arguing is that there is plenty of room for us to improve education, and that something other than the traditional model may be what a substantial number of kids need. And while there are good public schools in Georgia, the track record of education in this state is not so good that we should avoid trying something else *in addition* to what we do now.