Free Republic

SAT Rap (Video) Bethany Stotts, November 23, 2009 Can the SAT be cool? The makers of this motivational video certainly try. “Relax” by Charta Squad [Video at link] YouTube user “Elka131” writes that the video is “created by teachers at the Believe High Schools in Brooklyn, NY.” Nancy Griesemer at The Examiner and Eric Hoover at Tweed attribute it to Williamsburg Charter High School (WCHS), which is part of a network of three charters in Brooklyn, NY. WCHS serves a low-income community (79% of students were eligible for a free lunch in the 2005-06 academic year)....

More city kids are graduating from high school, but that doesn't mean they can do college math. Basic algebra involving fractions and decimals stumped a group of City University of New York freshmen - suggesting city schools aren't preparing them... "These results are shocking," ... "They show that a disturbing proportion of New York City high school graduates lack basic skills." During their first math class at one of CUNY's four-year colleges, 90% of 200 students tested couldn't solve a simple algebra problem... Only a third could convert a fraction into a decimal. The lack of math skills means the...

D.C. Exports School Choice Bethany Stotts, November 3, 2009 This week Virginia Walden-Ford, executive director of D.C. Parents for School Choice, will be traveling to Kentucky to a rally supporting state legislation for charter schools. “Ford brings her message the ‘parents deserve a choice so kids can have a chance’ to Louisville this Friday,” states the Bluegrass Institute press release. “She will speak at a rally on Friday at 7p.m. in the multipurpose facility at Midwest Church of Christ, 2115 Garland Ave…..” Walden-Ford has fought hard for the Washington Opportunity Scholarship Program, which provided vouchers for underprivileged students attending the...

Attorney General Eric Holder tries to kill a TV ad supporting D.C. school vouchers. President Obama isn't taking kindly to a television ad that criticizes his opposition to a popular scholarship program for poor children, and his administration wants the ad pulled. Former D.C. Councilmember Kevin Chavous of D.C. Children First said October 16 that U.S. Attorney General Eric Holder had recently approached him and told him to kill the ad. The 30-second ad, which has been airing on FOX News, CNN, MSNBC, and News Channel 8 to viewers in D.C., Maryland, and Virginia, urges the president to reauthorize the...

A Charter for Achievement Allie Winegar Duzett, October 20, 2009 While bureaucrats everywhere puzzle over how to make public school test scores look good, one charter school principal has figured out how to make them go up without score keeping gimmicks. Ben Chavis is a unique man with an uncommon background: he grew up as a sharecropper on a Native American reservation in North Carolina, and today he leads and operates an impressive charter school—for fun. Every year, Chavis donates his salary back to the school, and uses the money to take the oldest class of children to visit Washington,...

Education and Taxation (video at link) by: Sarah Carlsruh, October 02, 2009 This week’s Conservative Bloggers Briefing at the Heritage Foundation highlighted two hot topics: school choice and taxes. Virginia Walden-Ford, executive director of the D.C. Black Alliance for Educational Options, spoke to bloggers this Tuesday about the D.C. Opportunity Scholarship Program, which, she insinuated, the Obama administration would like to end. This scholarship program, argued Walden-Ford, provides kids the chance to escape the violence at D.C. public schools, adding that “These families come from some of the worst schools in D.C.” Walden-Ford told bloggers that President Barack Obama...

Choosing Schools in Nebraska by: Allie Winegar Duzett, October 01, 2009 School choice has long been a topic of debate among those concerned with American education. Should the government have a monopoly over education? Or should Americans instead be allowed to use vouchers to send their children to schools that could compete with the government’s public school system? Paul DiPerna of the Friedman Foundation for Educational Choice recently interviewed 1,200 “likely” Nebraskan voters to see how residents of the state feel about issues with education, including school choice. The study has a 95% confidence level. DiPerna’s study found that Nebraska’s...

Bluegrass Blues by: Sarah Carlsruh, September 10, 2009 It turns out that not many parents in the Bluegrass state want their children to attend public school. Paul DiPerna, author of School Choice Survey in the State: Kentucky’s Opinion on K-12 Education and School Choice, found that people are not happy with the current public school system. This August 2009 study is of Kentucky voters’ opinions on their state’s school system. Strategic Vision, a public relations agency, conducted this survey by making live phone calls to a random sample of 1,200 likely Kentucky voters. Its screening questions were such as to...

Community Organizes for Vouchers by: Anthony Kang, August 25, 2009 On August 20th, dozens of elementary students and parents gathered in front of the U.S. Department of Education (DOE) in a daytime vigil organized by D.C. Parents for School Choice as part of their SaveThe216 campaign to save the D.C. Opportunity Scholarship Program (OSP). The D.C. OSP is part of a three-sector education initiative for public schools, charters schools, and OSP participants. The program, which provides low-income children with scholarships of up to $7,500 allowing parents to choose the education they believe is best for their children, was passed...

Members of the activist homosexual community have decided to advance their cultural revolution, in spite of the rights of parents, by using children and the willing administration in some school systems. The Pacific Justice Institute is representing the parents in that area, free of charge. Rather than deal with the specific incident, I want to address the broader problem, the growing failure in some public school districts to respect parental rights. I also want to affirm the Catholic teaching on the primary role of parents in the lives of their children and in education. The Church is in favor of...

Education: Barack Obama's choice for education secretary tried to run Chicago schools like a business. As with most monopolies without competition, the result was an inferior product at high cost.Arne Duncan, CEO of the Chicago Public Schools since 2001, has garnered much praise for his efforts to improve them. But his efforts have largely amounted to pouring new wine into old bottles with little to show for them. Duncan holds a degree in sociology, not education. He supports higher teacher pay and more training but has done little to loosen the teachers' unions' grip on education. Like the UAW, these...

Democrats have promised to make college education another taxpayer-financed entitlement, but some post-secondary schools appear to be more favored than others. Specifically, for-profit institutions are becoming political targets, notwithstanding their generally strong educational record. Often called career colleges, for-profit schools don’t rank with the Ivies for prestige. But schools like Devry or Kaplan that specialize in computer technology, physical therapy and other tangible skills provide a valuable service in training young and even not-so-young people to compete in our information economy.

June 25, 2009 Dear xxxxxx, As we decide which gubernatorial candidate to support, the fact that Deeds and McDonnell have voting records is significant. Kaine, having come to the Mansion by the way of local government, had no state level voting record to back his words. Deeds and McDonnell have shown their true stripes as they have voted over many years and many session in the Virginia General Assembly. The VEA Fund (formerly known as VEA-PAC) has not recommended a candidate, so I find myself in the delightful position of being able to discuss the positions the candidates are taking...

School of Future Shock by: Alana Goodman, June 05, 2009 At Philadelphia’s School of the Future (SOF), textbooks have been replaced with laptops and high schoolers are taught core curriculum through technology-based programs like YouTube and instant messenger. SOF is a charter school in the Philadelphia School District serving mostly low-income students, and was created through a 2006 partnership with the Microsoft Corporation. But the school, once hailed as “the next big thing” by National Public Radio, is struggling to live up to these high expectations. SOF’s original goals were to supply each student with a laptop computer that he...

Milwaukee is home to America’s most vibrant school-choice program: More than 20,000 students participate, almost all of them minorities. They have made academic gains and boast higher graduation rates than their peers in public schools. They even save money for taxpayers. Inevitably, Democrats in the state capital are trying to eviscerate the Milwaukee Parental Choice Program. They’ve wanted to gut school choice for years, at the behest of teacher-union patrons who believe education should be a government monopoly. Until recently, Republicans have stood in the way. That changed following last year’s elections. Now, for the first time since the advent...

TWO VIDEOS: http://anchorsnews.com/2009/05/shock-parents-outraged-as-obama-cuts-scholarship-recipients-for-african-americans/President Obama said that he would allow students currently enrolled in the program to finish up through high school, but that no new students would be allowed to enter the program. Thus, a president who exercises school choice himself, has consigned thousands of low-income students to attend massively underperforming D.C. public schools.

DC Vouchers Rhee-Visited by: Bethany Stotts, May 15, 2009 On May 5, D.C. Schools Chancellor Michelle Rhee told a symposium on innovation in education that she doesn’t care whether education providers earn a profit if they are effective. “Textbook companies, food service companies, they all don’t do a whole lot of great stuff but they all make a ton of money off of kids,” she argued. Rhee later added that for her the “bottom line” for her is a) “what is this organization going to deliver,” b) “what guarantees are they going to make,” and c) “how are they going...

Fighting to save the District's popular school-voucher program, some 1,000 parents, pupils and politicians gathered near Mayor Adrian Fenty's office on Wednesday to protest Congress' plans to end school choice in Washington. That same day, the Senate approved a $4,500 voucher for cars, encouraging citizens to trade in their old automobiles for newer ones that burn less fuel. So, Congress thinks that vouchers for schools are bad, but vouchers for cars are good. Slashing school vouchers spares teachers' unions from competition. On the other hand, car vouchers are supposed to boost demand for cars built by the United Auto Workers....

I celebrated too soon. I heard that the President had changed his mind about school vouchers in D.C. and I was all set to cheer a great "change." Then of course, I hear that he has only suggested that the children already in the program continue to be covered until they graduate high school.*sigh*  Not the ringing endorsement I had hoped for, and wrote about in March. ( http://www.lovehateoprah.com/lovehateoprah/2009/03/is-the-president-getting-wise-to-school-choice.html )But not all hope is lost, I think. After all, Barack Obama has promised to "fund what works." Yes, I can be an eternal optimist in some respects. Here is my latest pie-in-the-sky...

"This afternoon, more than 1,000 students, parents, and concerned citizens gathered across from city hall to rally in support of the D.C. Opportunity Scholarship program. A number of prominent D.C. leaders spoke, including former mayor Anthony Williams and former councilmember Kevin Chavous....."

President Obama will seek to extend the controversial D.C. school voucher program until all 1,716 participants have graduated from high school, although no new students will be accepted, according to an administration official who has reviewed budget details scheduled for release tomorrow. The budget documents, which expand on the fiscal 2010 blueprint that Congress approved last month by outlining Obama's priorities in detail, would provide $12.2 million for the Opportunity Scholarship Program for the 2009-2010 school year. The new language also would revise current law that makes further funding for existing students contingent on Congress's reauthorization of the program beyond...

Supporters of a celebrated school voucher program in Washington rallied near the mayor's office Wednesday to save the scholarships from being slashed by Congress -- nearly 40 percent of whose members send their own children to private schools. An estimated 1,000 parents, children and community leaders attended the afternoon protest in Washington's Freedom Plaza, where they called on D.C. politicians to help preserve a federal school choice program that currently assists more than 1,700 students with scholarships worth up to $7,500. "Several years ago many of us in this good city worked very hard to get a program going with...

In this 'must see' and very 'powerful' video, Obama voters slam Obama for destroying a very successful school choice program in the name of politics. The parents are furious and plan to ask Obama he is doing this when they marched for him... can he take this wonderful program away. Watch, http://www.butasforme.com/2009/05/05/scholarship-students-nail-obama/

Washington, D.C.'s school voucher program for low-income kids isn't dead yet. But the Obama Administration seems awfully eager to expedite its demise. About 1,700 kids currently receive $7,500 vouchers to attend private schools under the Opportunity Scholarship Program, and 99% of them are black or Hispanic. The program is a huge hit with parents -- there are four applicants for every available scholarship -- and the latest Department of Education evaluation showed significant academic gains. Nevertheless, Congress voted in March to phase out the program after the 2009-10 school year unless it is reauthorized by Congress and the D.C. City...

In the recently passed Omnibus Spending Bill, there was a lot of spending and little cutting. Not much cutting, but one important cut that affects the poorest families in Washington, DC. Why would liberals, who claim to be the party of the working poor and the party of social justice, be against a program that only helps the poorest kids in the worst schools? That’s a good question. Why Mr. President?

We have learned a few things from this presidential campaign season and Barack Obama's first 100 days in office.  First, and to our untold horror, we have discovered that Barack Obama can in fact successfully hide who he is and his vision for our country.  Prior to the election, any person of good judgment could readily understand who this man was and where he would likely take this country.  The signs were all there.  Now in power, he enacts his socialist policies in plain sight with little concern that the American public will strenuously object.  So why is it that...

I haven't posted about this until now because I'm still trying to get over the idea that the Obama administration would deliberately victimize minority school kids in Washington, DC over partisan politics. Outrage is simply to mild a term for what was done here. In case our readers have missed this, during the previous administration a pilot voucher program was set up in DC to offer "scholarships" (vouchers) to some 1,700 public-school students in the District of Columbia so they could attend the private schools of their schoice. The program cost just $15 million, which came out to $7,500 per...

President Obama has never been a champion of school choice. Although he committed himself to be known as the Education President, he has never been shy about showing disdain for voucher programs that put parents, especially poor parents, in greater control of their children's education. D.C. has always been the exception, at least to some degree. Upon taking office, Obama made it clear that he would not take any action to end the D.C. voucher system. Facing incontrovertible statistics that demonstrate just how successful the voucher program has been in the Nation's Capital, he could not afford to take a...

About 3,000 have gathered at the State House decrying government spending. BY JOHN O'CONNOR U.S. Sen. Jim DeMint told a crowd of tax protesters gathered at the State House they need to continue their back-to-basics push for more individual freedom. "What works in America is always and has always been freedom," DeMint said. "The only way we're going to stop our...spending is to do these (rallies) all over the country as long as it takes to take back our government." DeMint urged support for proposals such as school-choice and private health care over reforms that give government greater control. DeMint...

Before the Door Closed by: Daniel Allen, April 02, 2009 The District of Columbia School Choice Incentive Act was signed by President Bush in January, 2004, allocating $14 million for the DC Opportunity Scholarship Program (OSP). This money gave low-income families, chosen by lottery, the opportunity to send their children to private schools of their choice, with the understanding that private schools would be safer and more conducive to learning. The University of Arkansas’s School Choice Demonstration Project (SCDP) studied this program and released a report, with the intent “to document the experiences of a small group of families and...

If only the children in the Washington D.C. school choice program were Wall Street money changers or a "shovel-ready" project in West Virginia Robert Byrd could put his name on. If they were, then perhaps the 1,700 children currently realizing the benefits of school choice in Washington D.C. would have made the recipients list for the $1.2 trillion worth of other people's money President Obama and Congressional Democrats have spent in the last month alone. I suppose $1.2 trillion just doesn't go as far as it once did, particularly when the federal government is buying up unsold PT Cruisers and...

Small glimpses of insight from the new administration lately are getting my hopes up, if only slightly, about effective changes in education. First was the appointment of Arne Duncan as Secretary of Education. He's no Michelle Rhee, but Duncan has shown a willingness to stand up to the unions. He has been open to reforms the unions are totally against, including school choice, pay-for-performance and closing failing schools. And Duncan may have more influence than the average cabinet member -- he and the president are friends and have common bonds in Hyde Park in Chicago. So BO might be listening...

Real change in American politics can seem impossible. Historically, some of our most desperately needed changes have faced the longest odds. Those of us who grew up during the civil-rights era can appreciate the importance of courage and persistence in facing the biggest challenges. Imagine how different our country would be today if the marchers in Selma had stopped in their tracks — knowing the opposition that awaited them on the bridge to Montgomery — or if Mrs. Parks had given up her seat. Every generation owes a debt of gratitude to those who came before and fought to make...

DC Vouchers at Crossroads by: Bethany Stotts, March 09, 2009 Funding for the Washington Scholarship Fund (WSF), more commonly referred to as the DC voucher program, is likely to run out at the end of next academic year due to a sunset provision designed by Illinois Senator Dick Durbin (D). DC Vouchers were established by Congress in 2003 and serve around 2,000 local low-income students. Speaking at this year’s Conservative Political Action Conference (CPAC) the Executive Director of DC Parents for School Choice expressed her intention to fight for continued funding of the scholarship program. “I got a call last...

The parents of Harlem have been given the wonderful benefit of school choice-and they're taking full advantage of the ability to select the best educations for their children. Long trapped in dead-zone local schools,Harlem's mothers and fathers are figuring out that they now have a remarkable range of options.That's because charter schools have blossomed in the community,making the neighborhood a national epicenter for reform. The demand for better was on full display over the weekend, when 5,000 people turned out for the first Harlem Education Fair, an event at which parents got to consider the merits of 50 schools. And...

Democrats are once again proving that "choice" as it relates to children applies only to killing them, not to parents choosing where to educate them. Sorry, but for pro-choice politicians to argue against school choice shows that they care only about the teachers unions that elect them, and not for the lives of the people they represent. The Washington Post called congressional democrats on their hypocrisy in an editorial today: REP. DAVID R. Obey (Wis.) and other congressional Democrats should spare us their phony concern about the children participating in the District's school voucher program. If they cared for the...

THE CAL RIPKEN PRESIDENTFebruary 25, 2009 As Obama prepared to deliver his address to Congress on Tuesday, the Republican House Minority Leader John Boehner, Fox News' Bret Baier and Charles Krauthammer all gushed that history was being made as the first African-American president appeared before Congress. Even Gov. Bobby Jindal, whom I suppose I should note was the first Indian-American to give the Republican response to a president's speech, began with an encomium to the first black president. (Wasn't Bobby great in "Slumdog Millionaire"?) Are we going to have to hear about this for the next four years? Obama is...

Thursday is the 200th birthday of Charles Darwin, the British naturalist whose theory of evolution has been at the center of American public school wars for almost a century. But Darwin's not to blame for all the fighting—it's the backward system that governs our public schools. The granddaddy of battles on this issue is the 1925 "Scopes Monkey Trial," when Clarence Darrow and William Jennings Bryan feuded over a Tennessee law prohibiting any instruction in public institutions that even questioned "the story of Divine Creation." A few years ago, Dover, Pennsylvania was ground zero, as the town tore itself apart...

  'The mayor is like Noah, he is throwing out a life preserver and I'm going to grab it,' Bishop Nicholas DiMarzio of the Brooklyn Diocese said at City Hall Saturday. In attempt to keep cash-starved Catholic schools in Brooklyn and Queens from closing, the city may convert them into charter schools, Mayor Bloomberg announced Saturday. "We are in a flood," Bishop Nicholas DiMarzio of the Brooklyn Diocese said at a City Hall press conference. "The mayor is like Noah, he is throwing out a life preserver and I'm going to grab it." The diocese has identified four schools in...

Economically disadvantaged African-American students in public charter secondary schools are twice as likely to score advanced or proficient in math and reading as their peers in the city-run schools.

New Jersey is in deep financial trouble, and government estimates keep get ting worse. The most recent budget deficit prediction tripled the last one, concluding that the state might be $1.2 billion in the hole. The bad news doesn't end there. The economic slowdown is prompting many families who can no longer afford both taxes and private school tuition to move their children into public schools. Catholic elementary schools in the Diocese of Camden, for instance, have lost almost 1,000 students, about 10 percent of their enrollment from last year. And those declining enrollment figures came before the worst of...

Homeschool Bound by: Bethany Stotts, December 17, 2008 Homeschooling is catering to new, more diverse demographics, according to Messiah College associate professor Milton Gaither. The author of Homeschool: An American History, Professor Gaither writes in his Education Next (EN) article that “Growth in home schooling can be spotted among other ethnic and religious groups as well,” including “Native Americans in Virginia and North Carolina,” “Hawaiian natives,” Orthodox Jews, and Muslims, joining with an already strong Catholic and conservative Christian homeschooling movement. A 2006 report by the National Center for Education Statistics (the most recent data available), finds that in 2003...

The state saves millions of dollars through a program that diverts corporate income taxes to private school vouchers for low-income students, the Florida Legislature's watchdog agency said in a report released Tuesday. Florida's statewide teachers union and Democratic lawmakers questioned that conclusion, but the study was hailed by school choice advocates as affirmation of what they've been saying all along. "We certainly want taxpayers to know we are saving them money, and we hope that our partners in public education benefit from our savings," said Tampa businessman John Kirtley, chairman of the private Florida School Choice Fund, which helps administer...

Students in the District's charter schools have opened a solid academic lead over those in its traditional public schools, adding momentum to a movement that is recasting public education in the city...

Obama’s Time for Choosing by: Bethany Stotts, December 09, 2008 Proponents of school choice typically hail from two groups: free marketers and civil rights advocates. Marquette University professor Howard Fuller hails from the latter persuasion. “I just think it just borders on criminality what we have allowed to happen to poor children in this country and to me to sit around tables discussing whether or not they ought to have this option or that option, in the light of their reality, is to me insane,” he argued at a recent American Enterprise Institute (AEI) lecture, saying that for him school...

"Let's not kid ourselves." "Barack Obama isn't the first (and he certainly won't be the last) Washington politician to send his children to exclusive private schools." "In fact, Sidwell Friends – the elite private academy chosen by the Obamas for their two young daughters – was also selected by Bill and Hillary Clinton for their daughter, Chelsea, while they lived in the White House." "But you won't hear me – or any other true educational choice advocate – condemning either family for selecting the educational environment that best fits the needs of their children."

Obamas Choose Elite Private School for Kids Friday, November 21, 2008 8:04 PM WASHINGTON – President-elect Barack Obama and his wife have chosen Sidwell Friends School for their two daughters, opting for a private institution that another White House child, Chelsea Clinton, attended a decade ago. "A number of great schools were considered," said Katie McCormick Lelyveld, a spokeswoman for Michelle Obama. "In the end, the Obamas selected the school that was the best fit for what their daughters need right now." She said Sidwell can provide the security and privacy that Malia, 10, and Sasha, 7, will need as...

Can Barack Obama bring change to American education? The answer is: Yes he can. The question, however, is whether he actually will. Our president-elect has the potential to be an extraordinary leader, and that's why I've supported him since the beginning of his campaign. But on public education, he and the Democrats are faced with a dilemma that has boxed in the party for decades. Democrats are fervent supporters of public education, and the party genuinely wants to help disadvantaged kids stuck in bad schools. But it resists bold action. It is immobilized. Impotent. The explanation lies in its longstanding...

Michelle and Barack Obama have settled on a Washington, D.C., school for their daughters, and you will not be surprised to learn it is not a public institution. Malia, age 10, and seven-year-old Sasha will attend the Sidwell Friends School, the private academy that educates the children of much of Washington's elite. Vice-President-elect Joe Biden's grandchildren attend Sidwell -- as did Chelsea Clinton -- where tuition is close to $30,000 a year. The Obama girls have been students at the private University of Chicago Laboratory Schools, where tuition runs above $21,000. "A number of great schools were considered," said Katie...

Now that Barack Obama has won the Presidential election, he has some personal choices to make when he moves his family to Washington DC. One of the most important choices they will face is where to send their daughters to be educated. However, the liberal hawks have already swarmed in: Bobb and Lord have ludicrously urged Obama to send his daughters into the “trenches” of D.C.’s public school system. They write that “no private option offers President-elect Obama a personal reality check on the No Child Left Behind mandates he campaigned to reform. Public school parents see test-prep squeezing out...