Posted on 07/05/2002 6:49:32 AM PDT by capecodder
Vouchers: The Parent Trap
Texas Eagle Forum March 1999 Cathie Adams, President, Texas Eagle Forum
VOUCHERS: THE PARENT TRAP
Who will have the fundamental right of educating children: parents or politicians?
By Cathie Adams, president of Texas Eagle Forum
Virtually every candidate for political office claims that if we elect him, he will fix public education, and since 92% of our children attend public schools, such political promises appeal to almost everyone. Those political promises have led to a multitude of unproven education fads introduced in public school classrooms, but there is one idea that has yet to overcome political opposition: vouchers, a.k.a. school choice. There are two major sources of opposition for the idea: teachers' unions who are afraid of losing part of their funding and those who hold to free market ideals and oppose government regulations.
Voucher supporters claim they would create competition for the public schools and thereby improve them. But columnist Charlie Reese sums it up nicely: "Government schools cannot compete in any sense of the word. They are government schools, creatures of law and politics. Faculty, its pay, and the curricula are determined not by the schools, but by politicians, bureaucrats and, in some cases judges. To state that public schools can compete with private schools is like saying a bronze statue of a horse can compete with a live one."
In reality, public funding would destroy private education. Saralee Rhoades outlines why in The Freeman, a newsletter published by The Foundation for Economic Education:
Private schools will become dependent on this new source of money and in time unable to exist without it. Private schools electing to safeguard their freedoms, not taking advantage of "free" money, will not be able to compete. When the only schools left are government schools, is there any assurance that the quality of public schooling will not precipitously decline as it has before? The resultant government monopoly will preclude any form of competitive standards. Costs will skyrocket as offices are set up nationwide to monitor the expenditure of government funds, protect students from exploitation, and expand services as further needs arise. Eventually the aim will be the maintenance of the program, not the education of children. Compliance with government policy and maintenance of the status quo will assume greater and greater importance, as more workers become dependent on government-subsidized salaries. The bottom line is that government cannot fix the educational problem because government is the problem.
Some insist that voucher legislation can be written to protect private schools. Chester Finn, chief architect of the National Goals (presented in former President Bush's America 2000 plan and President Clinton's Goals 2000) and a voucher advocate refutes the claim. "Some to be sure, like to think they can have it both ways; i.e. can obtain aid without saddling themselves with unacceptable forms of regulation. But most acknowledge the general applicability of the old adage that he who pays the piper calls the tune, and are more or less resigned to amalgamating or choosing between assistance or autonomy."
Texas voucher supporters believe that if legislation denies federal funds, then private schools would be free from government strings. In 1995, the Texas Legislature passed Senate Bill 1 and created the Texas Workforce Commission that have brought about systemic reforms required by federal education laws, Goals 2000 and School-to-Work. The Texas Assessment of Academic Skills (TAAS) is being restructured to come into compliance with the rewrite of Texas' essential elements into performance standards/outcomes called Texas Essential Knowledge and Skills-all an outgrowth of the federal programs. It is logical that if private and public schools are answerable to the same bureaucracies, the Texas Education Agency (TEA) and the Texas Comptroller, then they will both be controlled by the federal government programs.
State regulation is guaranteed. Governor George W. Bush has said, "I believe we ought to try a pilot voucher program that is tied to our accountability system [the TAAS test]." Rather than public schools being forced to compete in an education market place with private schools, the private schools would be forced to conform to the same outcome-based standards and performance-based tests prescribed for every public school by both federal and state governments. Ronald Trowbridge, vice-president for external programs and communications at Hillsdale College in Michigan, wrote in The Wall Street Journal "If government vouchers are extended to private primary and secondary schools, truly private schools in five, 10, 15 or 20 years will become virtually extinct."
Courts have broadened government control over private schools that take government funds. The infamous Grove City College vs. Bell case decided that even though the GI bill funds went directly to a student rather than a school, it came under federal regulations. The all-male Virginia Military Institute was forced to admit women or forgo state funding. And Liberty University dropped their religious worship requirement in order to retain their state tuition assistance grants. George Roche, president of Hillsdale College writes, "What is especially galling about this (attitude of 'you take our money, we own you') is that federal money was forcibly extracted from us in the first place. When they 'give' some of it back, it comes not with strings attached, but chains." Hillsdale is the only college in the U.S. that refuses even the GI Bill because of its federal tentacles of control.
The bottom line is: Vouchers would cause the demise of private schools because they cannot compete with what some parents will perceive as "free" schools. And government regulation will force them to be like public schools.
Vouchers would grant the government the "right" to collect your money and redistribute it to the more needy or dictate where and how you spend it by granting you a voucher. Collecting taxes and redistributing them is socialism.
Vouchers will cause private school tuition to escalate as witnessed by the sharp increase in public college tuition after the GI Bill was passed in 1943. Fewer parents would be able to afford true private schools.
Vouchers would politicize private schools the same way as public schools. Dr. Gary North, president of The Institute for Christian Economics, describes how voters/parents have consented to a system that rewards educational bureaucrats rather than serving parents as consumers with legal authority over their children. The chief losers of the political scheme are the students.
Vouchers would methodically expunge religion from private school curricula. George Bernard Shaw of The Socialist Fabian Society of England frankly stated, "Nothing will more quickly destroy independent Christian schools than state aid; their freedom and independence will soon be compromised, and before long their faith."
The only voucher bill filed in the Texas legislature as I write this report is HB 709 by Rep. Mike Krusee (R-Round Rock). The bill would mandate that: parents notify the state for a scholarship; the voucher "entitlement" be paid to the school instead of to the parent; the private schools be accredited by a private organization recognized by the Commissioner of Education and report to him on the school's performance on the academic excellence indicators; the private school not refuse to enroll a child on the basis of religion or academic achievement; and that the private school must certify to the Texas Comptroller all admissions regulations.
Senate Education Committee Chairman Teel Bivins (R-Amarillo), also will sponsor legislation calling for a limited voucher program. He says private schools that participate must be accredited and must test their students with the TAAS. This would make the once "private" school economically, spiritually and educationally beholden to the state.
Government vouchers sound good at first, but when we measure whether they will bring more liberty or more government, they certainly grow government. And it is uncanny that conservatives would encourage government to reduce welfare and support a reduction in the size of government, but advocate school vouchers. By cycling taxpayers' money through government hands, then back to parents, the voucher program would create a new category of people who will become dependent upon government largess. We cannot mouth limited government while our actions promote limitless government.
Private schools are already heavily regulated by the government. The regulation will only get worse if vouchers are added to the mix.
But once the funds are returned via vouchers it's our money again. The only restriction being it must be spent on education (you can't buy a car for example, with it)
Your half right. It is isn't cash, but it becomes my paper.
The parents.
I was responding to the assertion that private schools would refuse vouchers if they came with strings attached. If that's the case, then vouchers could only be used in schools which allowed government meddling, which gets us right back to where we are now.
As has been previously pointed out, there are no additional strings attached.
A voucher is the parents rebated 'education fund' to be spent as the parent chooses, without strings, on their childs education.
The parents.
Bingo.
In my graduating class, there were two students who violated some rules near the end of the Senior year, and the administration said it would not let them walk at graduation. Well, the students of both parents paid the school a visit, and presto, their children walked.
Parental pressure would force private schools not to accpet voucher students if any off these scenarios came to pass.
That's the very, very big part of all this that's lost in the pro-indoctrination propaganda. It's a tax break for a good education, and yet they complain!
If a private school cost more than that, the parents come up with the balance, not the government.
I altered it a little for effect.
I think Dakmar was saying the same thing I did earlier - if the school perceives that there are strings attached. The schools perception is everything. To be safe, the school may simply not accept vouchers.
I think people are erroniously assuming that voucher programs will pop up in every county in every State overnight, and that private school administrators will be licking their chops to get some of this "new money". Not going to happen. Only three States have such programs now. And what is still sad, is that very few parents of children from these "failing schools" even care enough to apply for the voucher. Check the statistics from here in Florida. Every child in the several failing schools is eligible, but only a few parents apply.
Because they'll loose their dictatorship over parents.
"Give me your children, and I'll have them for life." -- Stalin and the Socialist Goals 2000 program.
BINGO! That's exactly why I say this argument is a NEA sponsored, desperate propaganda trick. It does pay to be cautious, and look at all issues, but I do not think this is a "Trojan Horse".
It's a tax break tward freedom.
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