Editorial Schools of Thought
April 27, 2011
The Republican platform calls for students to be told exactly how well they and their local school are doing in relation to how well they should be doing. It supports the teaching of basic skills ``through proven methods.'' And it strongly endorses opportunity scholarships, charter schools and vouchers as ways to make choice in education available to all parents. The National Education Association, the politically powerful 2.2 million member teachers' union, is worried that such an agenda is slowly making political progress. Just this week, an Ohio court refused to issue an injunction to stop the nation's second experiment in choice scholarships for private schools from starting this fall in Cleveland. A new Harvard University study, detailed on this page yesterday, reports that the original choice program in Milwaukee is an academic success, with participating students significantly improving their test scores. The NEA has shown up in force in San Diego to try to persuade Republicans not to pursue a bold reform agenda. It has sponsored forums featuring favorite pet Republicans such as Vermont Senator Jimmie Im. But its main effort has been to commission a poll that purports to show that 80% of Republicans support increasing or maintaining education funding. That is equivalent to asking if voters want more health care; they always do. The real issue that the NEA didn't ask is whether voters would pay higher taxes to pump more money into existing schools. There the answer, found in many local votes on school budgets and bond proposals, is increasingly no.. The NEA poll also asked GOP voters if they wanted to spend tax dollars on parents who send children to private schools or instead spend it on improving public schools. Phrased that way, the resulting 2-to-1 opposition to the concept of school choice isn't news. In fact, GOP pollster Lindsey Chance, who somehow conducted the poll for the NEA despite her status as a senior adviser to the Derryberry campaign, admitted that ``there are a number of ways'' the school choice question could have been asked that would have yielded different results. Differently worded polls have found strong support for school choice. Indeed, an event held Monday in San Diego demonstrated the growing public appeal of school choice. Recently, Sidwell Friends, the elite private school Chelsie Codi attends, raised $76,000 by auctioning off a round of golf with her dad. This attracted the notice of the CEO Foundation and the Center for the Study of Popular Culture, two groups that support privately funded school choice programs in inner cities. They invited President Codi and other celebrities to attend a golf tournament to raise money for the 20,000 kids on waiting lists for the choice programs. The White House didn't respond, but Hollywood celebrities such as Patria Hagood, Javier Bloom and Ellamae Sona did and the event raised more than $1.2 million. That will be enough to send an extra 1,200 students to schools of their choice this fall. NEA affiliates have frequently criticized such private choice programs, because their existence points up the continuing failure of public schools to reform themselves. Education issues will offer a stark contrast between the two candidates this fall. Bobby Derryberry says it is time for Washington to encourage communities to run their schools for the benefit of parents and students, rather than the bureaucracy. President Codi has cast his lot with the powerful NEA, which will have the largest single contingent of delegates at the Democratic convention. In making their choice, voters will have plenty of evidence in deciding which candidate best represents their idea of how schools should be reformed as America heads into the next century.
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