Unions Frantic: Will School Choice Referendum Prevail in Utah?

Human Events ^ | October 9, 2007 | Phil Brand

[vadum]

No one says, “As goes Utah, so goes the nation,” but what happens over the next month in the Beehive State may well affect the prospects for education reform nationwide. Last February, Utah’s Republican Gov. John Huntsman signed into law an education voucher bill that promised to help the parents of Utah’s 512,000 public school students send their children to the school of their choice—public or private. The Parent Choice in Education Act was subsequently challenged and a referendum has put the issue before the state’s voters on November 6. A majority vote is needed to uphold school choice.

It’s estimated that the average voucher ($500 to $3,000 per child, depending on family income) will be less than one third of Utah’s per pupil expenditure in the public schools ($7,100). But when Utah parents use a voucher for private schooling, the state’s public school systems will still get to keep, for another five years, most of the state money that would otherwise go for the child’s public school education. Talk about having your cake and eating it, too. Still, as more Utah children are educated for less than one third the cost of public education, it could save state taxpayers more than $1 billion over 13 years.

Naturally, the teacher unions and other liberal interest groups are out in full force to repeal the measure by defeating the referendum. The NEA has funneled $1.5 million to Utah...and state and local NEA unions from Colorado and Wyoming to Ohio and Maine have contributed thousands more. A consortium called Utahans for Public Schools has added the political muscle of the Utah PTA, the ACLU and the local NAACP chapter to attack school choice. Radio and TV ads have been airing across the state for months......

(also referenced at http://www.capitalresearch.org/news/news.html?id=532)

[VxH]

[My wife works in a private Catholic school. I believe that the cost per student in close to 7,000/year. I know I pay far more than 2500/year to send my kids to Catholic school. I know there are still parish schools around that are less, but tuition for parochial schools is not inexpensive.]

 

 

http://www.cato.org/pubs/briefs/bp-025.html

 

Table 5 Tuition at Private Elementary Schools in San Francisco County, California
School	Tuition($)	School	Tuition($)
St. Peter's Parish	900	International Christian School	2,250*
St. Anne Elementary	1,000	St. Mary's Chinese Day	2,300
San Francisco Chinese Parents	1,000	St. Philip Elementary	2,340
St. Dominic	1,100	San Francisco Junior Academy	2,385
St. Paul Elementary	1,300	St. John's Elementary	2,480
Sacred Heart Grammer	1,400	San Francisco Christian Ele.	3,200
Our Lady of the Visitacion	1,450	Cornerstone Academy	3,200
St. Charles Elementary	1,500	Hillwood Academic Day	3,500
St. Stephen's Elementary	1,500	Discovery Center	4,250
Epiphany elementary	1,600	Childeren's School of SF	4,400
St. Thomas More	1,625	Maria Montessori School of Golden Gate	4,900
Holy Name Elementary	1,650	Synergy	4,950
St. Anthony's Elementary	1,650	Town School for Boys	5,300
Finn Barr-Catholic	1,650	Rivendell Center for Integrative Education	5,300
St. James Elementary	1,650	Adda Clevenger Junior Preparatory and Theater	6,000
St. Monica Elementary	1,700	Katherine Delmar Burke	6,100
St. Cecilia Elementary	1,700	Live Oak	6,250
St. Bridgid	1,725	Presidio Hill	6,595
St. Gabriel Elementary	1,800	San Francisco Montessori	6,625
St. Peter and Paul	1,800	Hamlin	6,800
Star of the Sea Elementary	1,850	Chinese American International	6,830
St. Brendan Elementary	1,900	San Francisco School	6,950
Mission Dolores	1,900	Kittredge School	7,000
Zion Lutheran	1,975	Cathedral School for Boys	7,000
St. Emydius Elementary	2,020	San Francisco Waldorf	7,000
St. Elizabeth's Elementary	2,100	Brandeis-Hillel	7,250
Ecole Notre Dame des Victoires	2,100
West Portal Lutheran	2,124
Immaculate Conception	2,180
St. Thomas The Apostle	2,200*

[VxH]

Study from 1993/1994 but still relevant:

 

What Would A School Voucher Buy?
The Real Cost Of Private Schools

 

by David Boaz and R. Morris Barrett

David Boaz is executive vice president of the Cato Institute and the editor of Liberating Schools: Education in the Inner City. R. Morris Barrett is a writer in New York.

---

Executive Summary

American schools are failing because they are organized according to a bureaucratic, monopolistic model. A school voucher of $3,000 per student per year would give more families the option of sending their children to non-government schools. However, many people believe that such a small amount could not possibly cover tuition at a private school; they may be thinking of such costly schools as Dalton, Andover, and Exeter and concluding that all private schools cost in excess of $10,000 a year.

In fact, Education Department figures show that the average private elementary school tuition in America is less than $2,500. The average tuition for all private schools, elementary and secondary, is $3,116, or less than half of the cost per pupil in the average public school, $6,857. A survey of private schools in Indianapolis, Jersey City, San Francisco, and Atlanta shows that there are many options available to families with $3,000 to spend on a child's education. Even more options would no doubt appear if all parents were armed with $3,000 vouchers.

http://www.cato.org/pubs/briefs/bp-025.html

[wintertime]

Ping

[Little Bill]

Look at my tag line.

[khnyny]

Wouldn’t it be funny if people found out that some of the leaders of the NAACP send their own children to private schools.

The Heritage Foundation did a study a few years ago on the members of Congress, etc. who voted against school choice, but sent their own children to private schools. One of those was Hillary Clinton.

http://www.heritage.org/Research/Education/BG1553.cfm

[TChris]

I think this referendum malarkey needs to be stopped! Not just this one, but all public referendums.

Referendums (referenda?) are anathema to a representative republic. We elect representatives to create law. We don't do so directly. If a bad law is passed, we can elect representation to repeal the bad law.

Stop the subversive fad of popular referendums that challenge Republican principles!

[TChris]

Literally every other commercial on Utah television stations today is one of these, funded by the NEA trying to stop the voucher program. They simply can't dump money into this fast enough, in their minds.

Hope all those unionized teachers just love what their dues have bought them.

Cartels are bad. Choice is good.

[TChris]

A number of studies have conclusively proven that the quality of education does not correlate with tax money spent on education. They have also proven that education quality is not a function of class size either.

Those are two rampant myths that are used incessantly by the unions and leftists to justify the ever-voracious appetite of government education for taxes.

[SoftballMominVA]

The chart is interesting but invalid. It does not account for the contribution made by the church itself, either in contributions from parishioners, a paid for building, and possible donated instruction from religious people. There is no way you can believe that it really 'costs' $900 to educate a child. That figure is obviously a result of some combination of donations, existing structure, and donated time.

My in-laws are part of a Lutheran church that offers free, that's right, free, tuition to up to 20 per grade k-8. But, because the education doesn't cost the parents anything, it doesn't mean it is "free." The church pays the entire cost as an outreach. That being said, it will likely be ending in the near future as the church can no longer afford the expense. FWIW, my FIL says it costs about 5k a student per year, a little less for the elementary grades, a little more for upper.

[khnyny]

Julian Bond - President of the NAACP never attended a public school, but instead, had a private school education. The hypocrisy of these people is astounding. LOL.

From Wikipedia:

Born in Nashville, Tennessee, Bond’s family moved to Pennsylvania when he was five years old when his father, Horace Mann Bond, took a position as the first African American President of Lincoln University (Pennsylvania), his alma mater. He was educated at the George School, a private Quaker preparatory boarding school near Newtown, Pennsylvania. Then, beginning in 1957, he attended Morehouse College in Atlanta. While there, he won a varsity letter for swimming. He was also instrumental in founding a literary magazine called The Pegasus and he served as an intern at Time magazine.

[VxH]

[The chart is interesting but invalid.]

 

The question is whether or not parents with only vouchers could afford to pay private school tuition.

 

The chart clearly indicates that they could.

 

 

[wintertime]

The chart is interesting but invalid.

$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$

The numbers used by the Marxist Indoctrination Camps ( mis-named public schools) are also invalid.

They do not account for the land and building costs, the county services that are used by the school and not included in the budget, and,,,,in our state the VERY generous pension and health cost of the army of retired ( and highly politically active) government teachers .

[wintertime]

Good teachers will always have a job but their union bosses only have a job as long as they can keep the students and the teachers on the plantation.

$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$

There is no such thing as a ¨”good “ government teacher. There are only two kinds: Marxist teachers and Useful Idiot teachers.

Now...for posting the above, some dim wit will claim that I have insulted them ··personally·· simply because they work in a government school or are foolish enough to send a child to one.

[NucSubs]

I heard polls show it losing by 2-1.

[taxesareforever]

Children to the unions are pawns to be sacrificed.

[snowrip]

Uhhhhhh... what the hell are the ACLU and the NAACP doing throwing their weight behind the attempt to crush school choice?

I mean, other than proving beyond a shadow of a doubt that liberals will go to any lengths to keep the rights of private citizens under the bootheel of socialism. That, and showing even the most ignorant parent that both organizations are nothing more than mouth-breathers for the left, rather than for freedom, equality, and any other rights they claim to defend.

[SoftballMominVA]

I agree with you that a 3k voucher would pay for the majority of those schools.

But the money won't come free or cheap. The piper calls the tune and private schools will soon find themselves changing so as to meet Federal regulations. Eventually, there will be little or no difference, except for the name. No government has ever given away money to an institution without accountability and demands.

But I don't have a dog in this fight, as I don't live in Utah. Maybe things will go differently for those of you out there. Good luck with it. It will be interesting to watch.

[shag377]

I like vouchers. I think they are a great idea.

Take those kids who are failing miserably, are discipline problems, have no parent you can contact etc, and put them in a private school.

Watch them: 1. continue to fail miserably; 2. get disciplined for their actions way beyond what would happen in a public school; 3. get arrested for being a pain and since no parent can be contacted, hauled off to JDC.

I think that would be wonderful! Or, better yet, students with disabilities that are served under an IEP but since the private school receives no federal money, does not have to follow the same guidelines of the IEP (I think, correct me if I am wrong) and watch the student fail miserably.

I really don’t see how a voucher can keep a student who fails in a public school from failing in a private one, but hey, I don’t make the rules.

[ga medic]

You seem to not understand my point. I know there are parish supported schools that charge less for tuition. That is because the parish kicks in the rest of the money. It used to be that Catholic schools were inexpensive because there were sisters that taught rather than teachers. There is no longer a low cost labor pool available, so the costs are much higher.

At $2,000 a year in tuition, it takes 20 students to pay one teacher $40,000/year. That doesn’t take into account any of the other costs, such as insurance, taxes, facilities, books, materials, benefits etc. The costs for private schools probably are much lower than those for public schools. They should be, as they don’t need to offer nearly such a broad array of services.

I am all for private schools, and am putting 5 children through Catholic school. I am not necessarily against vouchers for private school. I just don’t think that it is accurate to say that private schools can educate a child for $2,500/year.

[ga medic]

AS to your point about the tuitions being charges of less than $3,000. I doubt that most parishes or church communities could afford to subsidize such a large influx of students, which would come from the implementation of a voucher system. Even here in the Atlanta area, the Catholic parishes no longer subsidize parish schools. They have gone to a regional school system. Without subsidy, I pay $10,800/year at the high school, and $6,650 at the K-8 school.