Voucher Advocates: Here's Your Best Point

[5Reasons]

http://www.washtimes.com/national/20040922-122847-5968r.htm

"In Philadelphia, 44 percent of the teachers put their children in private schools; in Cincinnati, 41 percent; Chicago, 39 percent; Rochester, N.Y., 38 percent. The same trends showed up in the San Francisco-Oakland area, where 34 percent of public school teachers chose private schools for their children; 33 percent in New York City and New Jersey suburbs; and 29 percent in Milwaukee and New Orleans."

And remember, the sample here is ALL teachers. I bet that Abbott district teachers that still live in Abbott districts (although very few do at this point) that 75% of them send their kids to private schools.

[counterattack]

What they have excersized is true school choice you either send your kid to public schools or you pay for them out of your own pocket and not mine and send them to a private school.

[5Reasons]

School Choice advocates have always badly played the politics of this issue. Instead of trying to prove that private schools are superior to public schools (which will always meet resistence in some circles), they should go on the offensive and put the public schools on the defensive.

The slogan is simple - "Public school teachers teach in a system that they WOULD NEVER send their own children to." It's just that simple. In Newark, this hypocracy has been going on 30 years, and yet it goes unchallenged.

Let's be clear - I support public schools, but the teachers have to come correct. End the hypocracy or end the monopoly.

I guarantee you - if anyone conducted a study of Newark's teachers, that fewer than 5% of them attend an Abbott district school. First, more than 85% probably don't live anywhere near an Abbott district (out there in burbalandia). Second, those that do, keep the Catholic school system in business. That's why I always thought the NJEA was off it's rocker. Every few months they like to put out some screed against the private schools of NJ and yet it is the teachers that are keeping the private school system up and running and in the black.

In the end, vouchers in Newark would probably wind up adding more wealth to real Newarkers - especially black Newarkers. We could replace burbarian teachers by giving rise to Newark-based relgious schools.

[rice2006]

And the publi school teachers in Newark that send their kids to public schools probably do NOT send them to Newark public schools as they can afford to live in other towns with much better public school systems, so any poll would have to take that factor into account as well.

I am for a potential means tested voucher pilot program in Newark and if not here somewhere in NJ because I think it would lead to the creation of more independent and private Black and Latino schools and the support of existing ones that either exist barely or are tyring to offer a rigorous and challenging curriculum and education for all. Schools like Chad and St. James Prep, my church's school, suffer from lack of money even though their mission, goals and desire to offer a superior program are there. A voucher would empower those schools.

Remember when Bethany Baptist tried to open a school? It failed for lack of money and that was a school created by a progressive community church and started by US, but even US could not support it because the children that needed to go there do not have any money.

Any voucher should have tons more regulations and oversight than those that exist in other cities. But just because those cities have not gotten right does not mean the concept is not worth at least trying, especially when any authorizing or enabling legislation can look and say whatever we as the community want it to and we can learn from how other cities have gotten wrong.

Schools may not be making the progress envisioned in Milwaukee (and I will wait until the 10 year longitudinal study currently being done is completed for that school before I make up my mind on that point), but one thing we all know: NO urban public school district in America is doing much better and while charter schools and private schools can be closed down for failure, the public schools, in and of itself, go on in perpeituity no matter what their results are, bad or dismal.

[MrTim1955]

I am for a potential means tested voucher pilot program in Newark and if not here somewhere in NJ

This would be discriminatory to those of the middle class that pay taxes yet not make enough to afford private schools.

I think a better alternative pilot program would be to determine the worst school in the district and give every student in that school a voucher.

[5Reasons]

I get where Ron is coming from, but I agree with you, the means test idea won't fly (especially from those that would be your core constitutents - working middle and working class Newarkers).

In a state in which the NJEA can get over 80% of burbalandia to absorb property tax hikes on an annual basis, I doubt that vouchers are anywhere around the corner. However, I do think you can make hay by going on the offensive.

My main problem with NPS is that they offer no solutions, no performance measures and no timeline for when the problems of student performance will be fixed. Bolden conceded as much last spring that Newarkers were too stupid to pass the MINIMUM standards high school graduation exam. Again I'd like to see the NPS stand up and say by 2008 75% of kids will be passing at grade level (sort of like what Bloomberg has instituted). But I won't hold my breath.

We all know that if you had a nonbinding referendum on vouchers in Newark that it would pass by at least 60% of the vote.

Just two more thoughts. One, I would suggest that all schools (including high schools) go to school uniforms. Second, keep an eye on EOPS, since they appear to have one of the most innovative urban school systems in the area. If they can't turn it around there, then it is truly time to close up shop on urban public schools.