Florida Republicans, aided by three rogue Democrats, rammed through voucher legislation in the closing day of the legislative session.
The vouchers are supposedly for the benefit of children with special needs.
The Republican legislators’ alleged concern for children with special needs is especially hypocritical in view of their failure to act on the Ethan Rediske legislation, would have exempted children in extreme medical distress to be exempted from state testing by local officials.
As we have seen time and again (and as ALEC urges), legislation for vouchers is targeted to children with special needs as a way to promote vouchers. Thus, children with special needs are cynically used by rightwing legislators whose real goal is to destroy public education.
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This from a reader in Florida:
This skullduggery just in from the last hours of the spring legislative session in Florida’s right wing Republican-controlled Legislature:
Tampa Bay Times, May 2, 2014: Lawmakers revive, then approve school voucher expansion
Quote:
TALLAHASSEE — A surprise procedural maneuver Friday helped Florida lawmakers pass one of the most controversial bills of the session.
Both the House and Senate gave final approval to a bill that would expand the school voucher program and create new scholarships for special-needs children.
The proposal will now head to Gov. Rick Scott, who is expected to sign it.
School choice advocates celebrated bill’s passage — an unexpected end to a roller-coaster session.
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Joanne McCall, vice president of the Florida Education Association, the statewide teachers’ union, said she was disappointed. “The members of FEA are chagrined by the continued march to expand voucher schools that are largely unregulated, don’t have to follow the state’s academic standards, don’t have to hire qualified teachers and don’t have to prove to the state that they are using public money wisely,” she said.
McCall said it was “especially galling that the voucher expansion was tacked on to an unrelated bill on the final day of the session.”
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“Public schools should not have a monopoly,” Senate Budget Chairman Joe Negron, R-Stuart, said in debate. “We have choices in everything else.”
——-end quote
With this development, Jeb Bush must be gleefully rubbing his hands together.
Just as certain as many people here in Florida were, that then-Governor Jeb Bush would leave no stone unturned in jamming his brother into the White House, many of us KNEW that these radical Republicans in Tallahassee would force this thievery of public education resources into law.
God willing, we will flush Rick Scott and as many of these thieves running the Florida legislature as we can this November, along with their micromanaging mentor, Jeb Bush.
Diane Ravitch's blog 
From what I have read, vouchers tend to go to “special needs” kids already enrolled in private schools.
With rare exceptions, private schools don’t give priority to special ed programs if they have them at all. There just aren’t many kids with special needs not getting served in public schools – except where programs have been gutted.
So vouchers and tax credits are not just a tool for privatizing; they are a way to funnel tax dollars up to those who need them least.
Yes, it’s all about the money. There’s more money attached to each special needs student than each regular ed student. But since voucher schools are private, they can’t be regulated to make sure that extra money is actually being spent on special needs services.
What gets me is just how disgruntled with the public school (where special needs students are required by law to receive appropriate services) does a parent have to be to send their kid to one of these voucher schools where they’re getting no services?
Your point about how disgruntled the parent must be rings true. For a parent of a special needs child to CHOOSE the voucher school, the school must be doing something right that the traditional public schools are not.
What they’re doing right is marketing and playing on the drummed-up fears of an ill-informed public.
Someone needs to inform Senator Negron how wrong he is.
We don’t have choice over the police force that arrests us
We don’t have a choice of the court that holds our trial
we don’t have a choice of prison to which we are sent if convicted, or the jail in which we are held awaiting trial
And unfortunately while we are in a state we have at most minimal choice over the legislature that makes such stupid laws
We don’t have a choice to refuse to pay our taxes – unless we are corporations that play games with their corporate profits
We don’t have a choice about which laws to follow
Oh, and by the way, we already have school choice – any parents can choose to send their children to the non-public school of their choice, provided they are willing to pay for it and the school is willing to accept the child. Or they can since the Pierce v Sisters case home school their child. But that does not free them from their obligation to support PUBLIC schools that benefit the entire society.
Most Americans are unaware of the fraud that is taking place in education, with the ultimate goal of siphoning public funds into private pockets. I predict that the politician who understands this and uses it to his advantage, will have a good chance to become the next President of the United States.
Naive? Maybe and maybe not.
Doesn’t Federal law PL 94-142 apply throughout the USA. ? Where are the lawsuits?
These Florida lawmakers are thumbing their noses and giving the finger to the Florida voters who shot down Jeb Bush’s voucher plan in 2012 by better t4 than 55% to 45%. — Edd Doerr (arlinc.org)
Hi everyone,
I’d like to share a talk I recently gave to the School Board of Palm Beach County, FL about the excessive testing going on in our public schools and who is profiting by it.