In our country, we love to customize, whether it’s a new addition to the house or the colors and fonts surrounding our text messages. We choose everything, from our line of work to our preferred place to grab lunch (where we probably customize our lunch order). So it’s easy to understand why parents want more choices in their children’s education.
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From its inception a decade ago (yes, it’s been that long), this website has argued strenuously on behalf of expanded parental choice in the Palmetto State – and across the nation, for that matter.
Unfortunately, these arguments have been categorically dismissed by South Carolina’s elected officials. Rather than empowering parents and engaging the power of the marketplace, these “leaders” have chosen to pump billions of dollars into a demonstrably failed government-run school system – with predictable results (and predictable consequences).
The refrain of these politicians is that school choice programs “siphon taxpayer money from traditional public schools” (to borrow the language of a recent editorial published by The Wall Street Journal).
“That’s rarely true because choice schools typically spend less per child,” the editorial pointed out. That’s true. But there’s another benefit – one addressed in a landmark new study out of Milwaukee, Wisconsin.
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Democrats opposed to school choice often claim that charter schools and vouchers siphon taxpayer money from traditional public schools. That’s rarely true because choice schools typically spend less per child. And now a study shows that Milwaukee’s landmark voucher program will save taxpayers hundreds of millions of dollars.
Readers may recall the story of St. Marcus Lutheran, one of Milwaukee’s top schools, which graduates about 90% of its students, more than 90% of whom come from low-income families. St. Marcus participates in the Milwaukee Parental Choice Program and is in high demand. So when an empty public-school building came on the market in 2014 for an appraised value of $880,000, St. Marcus saw it as a chance to add a second campus for as many as 600 more students.
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Someone needs to give Susan Dynarski a primer in how to read survey results.
The University of Michigan professor of education, public policy and economics managed to twist a survey to say the exact opposite of its results in her New York Times“Upshot” column Friday, titled “Free Market for Education? Economists Generally Don’t Buy It.”
Dynarski doesn’t like school vouchers, and it leads her to con readers into thinking economists don’t, either. She cited a 2011 survey of elite university economists by the University of Chicago school of business...
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To say the least, 2017 promises to be an interesting year for K-12 education. The incoming administration of President-elect Donald Trump and impending implementation of the Every Student Succeeds Act alone promise to keep educators' hands full, to say nothing of ongoing tech challenges.
As educators and students gear up to finish out the latter half of the 2016-17 school year, we reached out to four district tech chiefs and thought leaders for their thoughts on ed tech predictions, concerns and trends facing administrators in the new year.
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For most Americans, school choice is an undisputed right.
Millions of parents choose to send their children to parochial or other private schools. Millions more decide where to rent or buy a home based on the quality of the local public schools.
The only people who do not enjoy this right are those who are too poor to move out of neighborhoods where public schools are failing. A disproportionate number of these are people of color.
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PANAMA CITY - The release of the federal graduation rates last week brought good news for Bay District Schools, which saw a 10-point increase over last year to put them ahead of the state's average.
The district's graduation rate climbed from 70.6 percent in the 2014-15 school year to a projected 81 percent for 2015-16 year, while the state's rate is 80.7 percent. Superintendent Bill Husfelt attributed the "significant" jump to a number of factors, including more accurate data recording and a renewed emphasis on credit recovery with a bolstered Bay Virtual School program.
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While his movie is shown on a big screen at the Gateway Film Center, Meshach Malley might be peeking between his fingers.
“I’m scared,” Malley said. “I’ve been talking to the visual-effect guys, and I think I’m going to see all the flaws. I’m terrified but excited.”
His audience will undoubtedly be understanding — if they even notice anything amiss.
Malley, 16, and his cast of young filmmakers will watch their feature-length film, “The Red Crystal,” on Monday night during a public screening.
The home-schooled 11th-grader, who lives in Columbus and is taking classes at Columbus State Community College, began making films about seven years ago.
“We started out doing stop-motion animation stuff,” Malley said, “then we started doing live-action stuff, like ‘The Red Crystal.’”
He began developing the story for the film in 2013. The plot was based on a novel he had written about a boy on magical journey to save a fantasy land from destruction by an evil dictator.
Check out more of their story here.
In 2014, facing high demand from parents, St. Marcus Lutheran School decided to expand by adding a second school. As a private K-8 school in the Milwaukee Parental Choice Program, St. Marcus alumni graduate from high school at rates averaging around 90%, even though more than 90% of its students are from low-income families.
St. Marcus made an offer to the City of Milwaukee about purchasing former Lee Elementary, an empty Milwaukee Public Schools building, for $880,000. But the city said no unless St. Marcus paid an additional $1.3 million because, in the city’s opinion, Milwaukee taxpayers would be hurt by the expansion of St. Marcus and the voucher program. The exorbitant cost helped end the negotiations.
The city’s analysis and tactics are not new. The problem is that city officials do not take into account the enormous positive impact a high performing school can have on the city and state. If there are more children at St. Marcus, then there are more children who will graduate from high school. These graduates are more likely to be employed and stay out of prison, and less likely to depend on welfare and other government services.
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Carlos and Calvin Battle grew up in the poorest neighborhood of Washington, D.C., where nearly two-thirds of children are living in poverty. In 2016, only 42 percent of students attending the local public high school graduated.
In an attempt to get her sons a better education, their mother, Pam Battle, enrolled Calvin and Carlos in the D.C. Opportunity Scholarship Program.
The program provides low-income families vouchers to send their children to private schools, and has shown a promising ability to increase graduation rates. However, many—including teachers unions, the Obama administration, and the education establishment—have worked to shut down the program.
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