Episode 14: Is School Choice the Best Choice?

Are you doing these critical things to help your child succeed academically? Take the quiz now to find out the important actions you can take to enhance your child's education. Go to my website, liberationthrougheducation.com quiz and take the quiz today. Foreign welcome to another episode of K12 Education Untangled. My name is Dr. Kim Fields, former corporate manager turned education researcher and advocate, and I'm the host of this podcast. I got into the space after dealing with some frustrating interactions with school educators and administrators, as well as the microdiscriminations that I faced while raising my two kids who were in the public school system. I really wanted to understand how teachers were trained and what the research provided about the challenges of the public education system. If you're looking to find out more about current topics in education that could affect you or your children, then you're in the right place. In today's episode, I will be discussing the benefits and downsides of school choice, especially the implications for students of color and their families. Some people believe that school choice provided a great opportunity opportunity for all students to get the best education that they could in the best environments. But is this true? Let's dive into this to explore what the research revealed. School choice policies have been noted throughout the history of American education. Prior to the Civil Rights act of 1964, some school districts implemented so called freedom of choice and tuition voucher programs specifically to assure that schools remained racially segregated. When desegregation entered into the picture, school choice programs including magnet schools and voluntary transfer plans were created to do the exact opposite, namely to promote racial integration and more diverse schools. More recently, school choice involves programs like vouchers and education savings accounts. The fallout from the COVID 19 pandemic provided state lawmakers around the country, as well as advocates for private school choice the opportunity to tout vouchers, tax credit scholarships and education savings plans. These closures and difficulties with online learning from the pandemic left children in educational peril and made school choice programs more appealing. The advocates suggested that allowing more families to choose which schools were best for their child would help accelerate educational covering. National groups that promote private school choice pointed to Paris frustration with district shifting plans for in person and hybrid learning during the 20202021 school year. Although groups that oppose voucher and tax credit scholarship programs said that linking school choice to the effects of the pandemic is just a red herring, other factors such as inadequate staffing, outdated buildings, and poor ventilation systems were more realistic hurdles to in person learning. Vouchers provide families with state scholarships to send children to private schools through tax credit scholarships, states provide private donors credits, typically dollar for dollar, in exchange for contributions to private scholarship funds. Education Savings Accounts allow families to spend those funds more broadly, paying for things like tutoring services and homeschool materials in addition to to private school tuition. While states have typically targeted vouchers in other private school scholarships at smaller populations like students with disabilities and students from low income households, more states adopted broad programs in 2021 or expanded eligibility for those already in place. For example, West Virginia created the most expansive Education Savings Account program in the country, making most of the state students eligible for the HOPE Scholarship Program, which provides up to $4,600 in state funds per student. Some states, like Florida and South Dakota, removed requirements that students had to have previously attended public school in order to qualify for a voucher or a scholarship. Opponents of school choice indicate that the narrative surrounding school choice is just an extension of old patterns of systematically underfunding public education and then creating a false message about the failing and underperforming public schools and using that as a justification to send public funds to private schools. Polls, however, indicated an increasing level of parent support for school choice programs throughout the pandemic. It's important to note that every dollar that leaves the public school system will leave behind a system with fewer resources to educate the remaining students. It's funneling taxpayer money into largely unaccountable private schools. Private schools aren't held to the same performance or reporting standards as public school systems, and many of these private school choice programs have less oversight to ensure that they meet the needs of students with special needs. Montana, like many other states, helps some students pay for tuition at private schools, but the rules for the schools that participate in in its Tax Credit Scholarship program are scant. They don't have to hire teachers with college degrees or conduct criminal background checks on their employees. The schools in Montana don't have to publicly report graduation rates or demonstrate that they are of sound financial footing. Additionally, they are not required to track and report basic demographic data on students who are who use the program. And Montana is hardly an outlier. Although Montana's program is at the center of potentially pivotal supreme court case, nearly 30 states have private school choice programs that either directly pay students tuition at private schools or provide generous tax credits to incentivize businesses and and individuals to do so. Only a few of these states require private schools to follow standards and policies that are used to ensure transparency and accountability in the nation's public schools. According to an Int Week Research center survey of states on how private school voucher and other closely related programs are regulated. Some of the highlights from that NWEEK survey include only 11 states require that all teachers in participating private schools have a Bachelor's degree 14 states mandate that schools conduct criminal background checks on all staff who are accepting tuition paid with the help of state aid and only six states require schools to publicly report their graduation rates. These findings demonstrate the relatively thin state state oversight that the programs operate under. School choice is a small but growing sector of the K12 educational system and to better understand the governance and accountability of the sector and we continue to conduct research on the statutes in 29 states that have at least one of three types of private school choice programs, including vouchers, tax credit scholarships, and education savings accounts. Findings included Five states required that all teachers and participating private schools be licensed 8 states required all participating private schools to publicly report the results of state and national tests 4 states required public reporting of the demographic data on participating students five of the 29 states explicitly required all participating private schools to admit students with disabilities and 14 of the 29 states mandated that participating private schools prove that they are fiscally sound through audits and other measures. What this analysis didn't focus on was curriculum requirements. In their analysis for private schools that accept public funds and public aid, private schools are not subject to the same educational standards as public schools even when they accept public funding through vouchers. This means that the taxpayer ends up paying for curricula that are deeply troubling and that run counter to recommended and legitimate educational practices. The lack of public information on private schools participating in quality as well as test scores may not be the sole metrics of concern for many parents. Some parents may place an equal or greater value on school safety and moral education. Most parents and families learn about private school options and programs through social networks like friends, church, and the Internet. And it may be because of religious rights that states may be hesitant to more thoroughly regulate private schools in choice programs because many of them are affiliated with the church. There are a lot of gray areas from a legal perspective that have not been hammered out yet when it comes to what states can tell private religious schools to do, even when the participating in a state sponsored school choice program. Nowhere has private school choice been embraced as much as in Florida. With 140,000 students using vouchers or tax credit scholarships, the state has more children attend private schools there with the help of the state's three private school choice programs than in any other state the vast majority of Florida's private schools are not accredited. Of the 2,124 private schools participating in Florida's private school Choice programs, only 629 that is less than 30% are accredited, according to studies and research analysis. The findings from a number of recent studies in Indiana, Louisiana, and Ohio show that students who attend private schools with the help of public money may end up doing worse after they leave their public schools. Indiana gives grades to private schools receiving taxpayer money based on test scores, which is the criterion that is used for public school accountability. Schools that perform poorly get booted from the voucher program. When families use a voucher to enroll in private school, they give up, knowingly or not, most of the protections that federal law requires for special education students. If a private school decides not to admit a student or ask the student to leave, there is little legal recourse for parents to challenge those decisions. David Figlio, who is the dean of Northwestern University's School of Education and Social Policy, conducted a study in 2017 of Ohio vouchers for low income children in low performing schools and found that they performed significantly worse on state tests than peers who were eligible for vouchers and stayed in public schools. Charter schools are another component of the education reform or school choice discussion. Charter schools are schools of choice that are funded by public money but are self governing, operating outside the traditional system of public school governance under a quasi contract or charter issued by a governmental agency such as the school district or the state education authority. Vouchers and charters challenge the common school model that has been the basis for American public education system for most of the nation's history. Opponents of school choice and charter schools fear that privatizing the government governance and operation of schools will undermine their public purposes. Whereas supporters believe that autonomously operated voucher and school charters can serve the public purposes of the education system even though they are not owned and operated by the government. A growing body of research on school choice has shown that when school choice policies are not designed to racially or socioeconomically integrate schools, they generally managed to do the opposite, creating greater stratification and separation of students by race and ethnicity across schools and programs. The newer school choice policies are not designed to specifically address issues of racial segregation. Interestingly, a growing body of research has documented a strong positive corporate correlation between increasing racial and ethnic segregation in public schools and the growth in the current popular market based school choice policies which do not explicitly promote racial integration in a society with an increasingly diverse school age population which is now only 54% white non Hispanic A Pattern of School Choice Racial segregation occurs even when a growing number of parents say they want their children to attend racially diverse schools. The number of students participating in these market based school choice plans like vouchers and charter schools is growing with roughly more than 2 million children enrolled in these programs. If you're evaluating school choice options for your child, consider the the quality of the teachers, transparency of the metrics of school success, whether free transportation is available to and from far reaching racially isolated neighborhoods, and the fiscal accountability of the school. Ultimately, the final decision rests with you and your family as to what's best for for the academic achievement of your child. Here are this episode's takeaways. School choice policies may be successful in creating diverse and high quality public schools and a more balanced and equal educational system. Attending racially and socioeconomically diverse schools benefits all students, including white students, and tends to result in in higher academic achievement and attainment and foster other short and long term social benefits. Private schools are not subject to the same educational standards as public schools, even when they accept public funding through vouchers. This means that the taxpayer ends up paying for curricula that are deeply troubling and that run counter to a recommended and legitimate education Educational Practices it's important to note that every dollar that leaves the public school system will leave behind a system with few resources to educate the remaining students. It's like funneling taxpayer money into largely unaccountable private schools, and private schools aren't held to the same performance or reporting standards as public school systems. Many of these private school choice programs have less oversight to ensure that they meet the needs of students with special needs. Worth considering is the fact that there are standards in place and governing oversights for schools in the public school system. Quality education can be obtained with quality staff, active parental and community involvement, and equitable curriculum. One of the invaluable experiences that children gain while being in the public school system is not all about the learning that goes on in the classroom. It is about the social learning that occurs outside of the classroom. If this is the type of subject matter and discussion that resonates with you, please subscribe to my podcast on whatever service you're listening to this. Also, I'd love to hear from you, so please leave me a comment or a review you and share this episode with anyone that you think would find it valuable. Be sure to tell your friends, family and community about my podcast. Thanks for listening today. I hope you'll come back for more K12 educational discussions with even more exciting topics to untangle. By the way, if you have a burning question about a current issue or a specific topic that you'd like for me to explore and discuss, shoot me a quick email@kimliberationthrougheducation.com to let me know what your question is. And be sure to stay tuned for the next episode, in which I'll be discussing why our children seem to be suspended much more than other children. Until next time, aim to learn something new every day. Love my show. Consider being a regular subscriber. You can subscribe for as little as $3 per month. Just go to forward/forward/tinyurl.com podcast support there's no contractual obligation. You can cancel at any time. If you choose to subscribe, I'll give you a special shout out thanking you in an upcoming episode. Remember, that's HTTPs://forward/tinyurl.com forward/podcast support to subscribe.