Graig Meyer is a Democrat and a freshman representative in the North Carolina General Assembly. His wife is a teacher in a low-performing, high-poverty school. In this post, he concludes that the state court’s 4-3 decision to permit public funding of vouchers is decisive. He is throwing in the towel even though he knows that most of the students who use vouchers will attend schools that have unaccredited teachers and zero accountability. He knows that the voucher program will harm public education.
“Among my Democratic colleagues, there is broad agreement there are many problems with the current voucher program. There’s little to no accountability for the schools where vouchers are spent. The majority of voucher schools are unaccredited. Many use a curriculum that teaches that dinosaurs lived beside humans and that slaves were treated well. Some are home schools that were never before eligible to receive taxpayer funds. None of them have to participate in any type of testing or assessment that will tell us whether the voucher program is actually leading to better educational outcomes than the public schools.”
Despite all this, he seems ready to throw in the towel. After all, it is now “settled law,” by 4-3. Racial segregation was once settled law. But Graig has no fight in him.
Come on, Graig, stand up to the privatizers. Fight for the public good. Take back the towel. Don’t be a quitter.
Diane Ravitch's blog 
Well, so much for the “every child deserves an excellent education” arguments.
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These children might end up with quite a bit of misinformation in their heads, but the one positive is they won’t have to live with CC and the assessments hovering over them.
It’s too bad that is the tradeoff to avoid the disaster that the various governments have forced upon the public schools in our country.
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but I think Meyer’s point is that he wants vouchers to have to abide by the same standards. . .and even though NC dropped CC, we still have it for another seven years because teachers advised not changing the standards yet (until the normal 10 year period for standards is up)—-that is to say, the remaining teachers after the flight of 14,000 of them disgusted by CCSS.
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“until the normal 10 year period for standards is up”
What is that? I’ve never heard such a thing. Curriculum revision, yes, and most districts here in the Show Me State do that revision every seven years in order to “adopt” a new text/update the curriculum.
Again, using “standards” as the word plays right into the hands of the edudeformers. The better word to use is curriculum.
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I think it’s every ten years per our state board of ed protocol. And standards are what they call them. (that distinction is how CCSS slipped through, now isn’t it?)
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By 2020 Democrats will not only “throw the towel” in on vouchers, they’ll be telling voters it was their position all along and it’s very, very “progressive”. The Agnostics have folded on everything else. I don’t know why they would draw a line now. If people who support public schools want advocates in government they’re probably going to have to elect people who actually support existing public schools. I don’t think it’s that complicated. If we have zealous privatization advocates on one side and agnostics on the other, existing public schools don’t have an advocate in government and they will always lose.
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It’s already started. . . the talk that vouchers are progressive. I’ve been having that conversation all week trying to keep folks from bailing on the notion of public schools
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and you are right about the agnostic vs. anti-public
It seems like the PC movement ushered in the need for progressive people to qualify all viewpoints as non-judgemental. I’ve heard many leaders and supposed public ed folks say “I believe in choice. . .” ?
Now the notion of a neighborhood school might be negotiable if you can get a magnet system that works (Asheville has one that works)—-and to me that’s the choice that a public school district can offer in certain parameters.
Agnostic is a good word for those who want all options open all the time so people will like them.
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Rationalizing things we cannot control (and actually, he could work for some aspect of control, albeit Democrats are put in the corner in our General Assembly)—-but I was disappointed in this also.
What’s funny is I would imagine Democrats want to use the situation to say, “OK. . . if you want a voucher you have to do x,y,z” etc. etc. and the bureaucratic maze begins. And more expense.
Why not just offer good public schools?
Sadly, some minorities I know (frustrated by the dominant white culture in certain parts of our state) think Meyer is awesome that maybe vouchers will pave the way.
People aren’t thinking.
Bargaining is part of grieving and I’m choosing to believe that Meyer is just bargaining out loud. I hope so, anyway. Meanwhile, there are those who will continue to fight and support public schools.
But I must say. I watched a district have a back to school rally called “Call to Action.” And the strategic plan was presented. That language feels icky to me. It doesn’t feel child focused. It feels test score focused.
Like Swacker says: you live by the test score, you die by the test score.
Thoughtful language would go a long way in education policy. And it could have helped prevent some of our situation, I think.
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And, Involved Mom, (by the way, many thanks for being involved) as a corollary to that aphorism is:
Live by the edudeformers’ vocabulary, die by the edudeformers’ vocabulary.
I know it is hard not to use that discourse as it has become so completely embedded in our consciousness so that we have to make a conscious effort to not use words/phrases like “measure achievement” when we mean assessing student learning, “educational standards” when we mean curriculum, “student growth” when we mean changes in student learning, knowledge and abilities, etc. . . .
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I was a teacher. I come by it honestly
But I’m beginning to see the light. 🙂
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Unfortunately, most of the vouchers will probably be used by white parents at religious schools. How does this solve any problems while it is clearly in violation of the Constitution? Mr. Meyer should realize that the “go along, get along” position usually does not work in the long run.
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I’ve read that the Supreme Court ruled that it is acceptable for vouchers to be given to parents. They are the ones who choose what is best for their child and religious schools are a choice. Tax money is not directly being given to religious schools. This is a round about that doesn’t make sense.
Apparently, the separation of church and state is now blurred.
We have a Supreme Court that makes horrible decisions and we are stuck living with it. At least that will happen until the public gets upset enough to demand something better.
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“Despite all this, he seems ready to throw in the towel.”
I have one word for anyone who throws in the towel: Nuts!
“Nuts!” is what U.S. General Anthony McAuliffe said to the Germans when his 101st Airborne Division troops defending Bastogne in Belgian during World War II were surrounded by several divisions of Nazi troops when the German’s demands that McAuliffe surrender. He said, “Nuts” and was willing to fight to the last man before he surrendered.
In the Korean War, the 1st Marine Division was surrounded by several Communist divisions at the Chosen Reservoir and they refused to give up and fought back. At great sacrifice, they escaped the mess they were in and survived to fight another day.
>>>How long did it take to win the revolution against the British Empire and what was the cost in life? 1775 – 1783 = EIGHT years
The U.S. forces under George Washington lost 25,000 to 70,000 dead from all causes. The British empire lost at last 20,000 dead from all cases.
>>>How long did it take to end slavery in the Untied States?
1789 – 1861 = SEVENTY-TWO years and a Civil War that cost 620,000 dead.
How long did it take women to gain the vote, the right to work and the right to own property?
1789 – 1920 = One Hundred and Thirty-One years
How long did it take to pass laws that made it illegal to sell children as young as age seven into a form of slavery called servitude where these tiny children were denied the right to go to school and they worked 16 hour days in factories, coal mines and even as prostitutes?
1789 – 1938 = One Hundred and Forty-Nine years
How long did it take to overturn the Chinese Exclusion Act that was one of the most significant restrictions on free immigration in US history, prohibiting all immigration of Chinese laborers?
1882 – 1943 = Sixty-One years
How long did it take the U.S. Congress to repealing the 18th Amendment on Prohibition?
1920 – 1933 = Thirteen years
How long did McCarthyism spread its lies and fear across the country wrecking and destroying the innocent lives of American citizens who were only exercising their freedom to think and live as they want?
McCarthyism is the practice of making accusations of subversion or treason without proper regard for evidence. It also means “the practice of making unfair allegations or using unfair investigative techniques, especially in order to restrict dissent or political criticism
During the McCarthy era, thousands of Americans were accused of being communists or communist sympathizers and became the subject of aggressive investigations and questioning before government or private-industry panels, committees and agencies. The primary targets of such suspicions were government employees, those in the entertainment industry, educators and union activists.
1947 – 1954 = Seven years
It’s obvious tat we are still fighting for the civil rights of minorities, gay people and women to have the right to decide what to do with their own bodies and get paid the same wage men earn for the same job, so that struggle is not over yet and the fight against the forces of evil goes on.
Conclusion: If Graig Meyer gives up the fight to save the public schools against the forces of Greed, racism, segregation and corrupt use of power, then he does not deserve to call himself a citizen of the United States. He is a traitor.
In a true participatory republic where ALL the people have a voice and a vote that counts, it is never time to give up to GREED and fools who abuse their bought power represented by ALEC, and someone like Bill Gates, the Koch Brothers, The Walton family, Eli Broad, Hedge Funds—-the RheeFormers. You fight until your last breath and if all is lost, you take to the streets in peaceful protest and if that doesn’t work, you start counting your ammo. That is what the Founding Fathers did.
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Excellent perspectives, Lloyd, excellent. Gracias.
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I understand that this blog is about a crusade. And I can embrace many of the ideals that underpin opinions shared here. But the original question does raise the issue: What is best for our children, vouchers or public schools? I am disturbed to see that schools are offered as what is best for children. I would argue that this is another battle ground of the 21st century. Is education as we currently practice BEST for our children? A growing number says no, and it is not because those who disagree keep a pet dinosaur in their backyard. We have schools for reasons other than what is best for children. Of course, children without schooling are at a disadvantage. But I think we can admit that we are dealing with a construct, education as an institution, that obeys more than one interest. I am also disturbed to see public schools as the solution BECAUSE they are public. I have lived in different cultures every time dealing with another public system. As student and as parent it has never been easy to deal with “the system”. Systems are not neutral but informed by the dominant ideology. Depending on the public system war history is retold and reinterpreted. I am currently living in a place where neo-liberalism takes a sever bashing. I can understand that because of what has become of liberalism. Some parasite, greed, has locked onto the host idea of freedom. I am astonished by the irony of history. Liberalism was born as an effort to curtail power abuse by the state. Nazi Germany was not uneducated. And now liberalism’s offspring makes the state strike back.
The problem and the arguments are very old. How far should the state determine the individual’s fate? How far should/can education act in loco parentis?
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If the public school in the US continue to be democratic, then the states and/or the federal govenrment will not be able to brainwash our children because the public schools will be divided into more than 15,000 school districts and each one will be protected by elected school boards.
Finland offers a good model with standards that are not mandatory and teachers who are given the power to decide what standards to teach from the list and how to teach them.
And France offers a model of early childhood education that’s kept out of the hands of the greedy private sector.
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I am all for breaking down rather than scaling up. To me small is beautiful. But I think you somewhat prove the point in your earlier reference to the founding fathers that you have taken on a coloring of a specific worldview. Growing up French will definitively give you a specific set of glasses. It happens without knowing. I grew up in a Germanic culture. You can imagine that my schooling taught me differently about the world than did yours. In fact, when I moved to the US I celebrated the liberation of some of my more idiosyncratic views. I am now living in a country that needs to justify its history, 100 years back. My kids suffered studying this “objective view of what happened” for most of their school years. Until we took them out. Education is not neutral even when a board of neighbors elects teachers. I am Swiss.
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Regardless of our nationality, we are all human—keep that in mind, because humans as a species learn in specific ways and it doesn’t matter if you are Chinese, an Iranian or an American.
Suggesting that we look at how Finland deals with their standards and lets teachers make the decisions when it comes to what and how they teach, and looking at the French and their early childhood education program doesn’t mean we become French or a citizen of Finland. It means we learn what they are doing right and wrong and then come up with our own systems and methods based on what we learn.
And one thing that we’ve learned is that we MUST keep the oligarchs and the RheeFormers they fund out of the decision making loop when it comes to how are children are taught.
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Attending public school does not make the state loco parentis.
Public schools are cooperative, community schools.
Cooperative
Community
imagine that.
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A good thing is a good thing. I did not argue against community and cooperation. And if you are an involved mom I am sure you are with your children, fighting for her, protecting her, encouraging…when needed.. At the same time you might have seen cases where schooling is a way to delegate parental care. I have seen this. And I do not blame the parents. Families have to generate multiple incomes to get by. I have met with school principals who tell me how they are assuming more and more the roles and functions of what used to be family domain. The system, I guess, merely reflects social reality. I think this is a real tension, school “versus” family, and not just a personal fear; parenting has been weakened for various reasons. Poverty is just one factor that places kids in the care of an institutional solution. Another would be generation gaps, accelerated by tech driven change. What do parents have to teach their tech adolescent kids?
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Thom,
some might argue that all of what you described has to do with mothers in the work force.
If those are the realities we live with, I don’t understand how a voucher will change that. It would just be the state paying for someone else to offer the same loco parentis you describe, but without community voice. That’s the thing most people forget about charters and vouchers. . .the circumvent consensus in a democratic way.
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This answers your last reply.
I am trying to argue from the child’s perspective. Remember my original post takes issue with the title that, in my opinion, points to an overlooked issue. We take for granted that schooling, our version today, is good for kids. To me issues that deal with greed and arrogance, whatever form it takes, are off the map. This was my initial reaction. If you can get rid of charters that are in education for money only, do it. But, I would hazard a guess, you can find a school that actually embraces the philosophy of education/ or life, that you can identify with, and if you had the choice to join them, you would be asking yourself if it were in the interest of your child to enroll. This could be Montessori, or Steiner, or Mennonite, or Adventist….These groups have a particular worldview, and you can disagree..At the same time, rejecting, or leaving these communities aside, and this is another point I have tried to stress, public schools are not free of their own canon of beliefs.
I give you another thing to think about. Where I life…we are facing demographic decline. That means, in the not too distant future there will be lack of professionals to meet the needs of the local economy. I was present when a presidential candidate shared his program. He stated that were he elected president, he would strengthen education at pre-kinder stage. This is important because experts tell us that that’s when the cards are stacked. And, he would help young mothers to join the workforce. This was wasted potential and the only way the workforce could grow is, if more women were to pick up full time jobs.
Now to me, having worked in education for the last 20 years, this sounded like perfect hell. Somebody who thinks that young mothers being with their infant children is wasted potential shows in the most glaring way that he has no idea of what it is that helps people to grow up to become healthy, vibrant, enthusiastic people. The absurd thing is that many such ideas run under the banner of education, and that with the child’s best interest at heart.
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clarification: they circumvent democratic consensus
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Well said! The original post claimed that privatized education provides “no accountability.” The statement simplistically presumes that the state is the only one to whom education is accountable. Both private and “public” schools should be foremost accountable to parents.
That which a child should learn is defined differently by nearly every person with an opinion. Let our families and communities define a good education and hold their schools to their standards!
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Well said, Thom! The original post claimed that privatized education provides “no accountability.” The statement simplistically presumes that the state is the only one to whom education is accountable. Both private and “public” schools should be foremost accountable to the parents of attending children.
That which a child should learn is defined differently by nearly every person with an opinion. Let our families and communities define a good education and hold their schools to their standards! Some may say this already happens through the democratic process, but this is virtually meaningless under the dense secularism and bureaucratic control that defines our “local public schools.”
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Thom said: “I am disturbed to see that schools are offered as what is best for children.” I assume that you are referring to the district public schools. Vouchers and charter schools steal funds and resources from the district schools and this at a time when schools are being underfunded, tightening their own budgets and making cutbacks.
They don’t have public schools in Switzerland?
“In Switzerland, most children go to public schools. Private schools usually are expensive and people tend to think that students of private schools probably didn’t make it at the public school. Public schools include “Kindergarten”, “Volksschule” (elementary school), “Gymnasium” (secondary school) and “Universitäten” (universities). Most municipalities provide kindergarten, primary and secondary schools. Most cantons provide at least one secondary school. There are eleven universities in Switzerland, nine are run by cantons, two are run by the confederation.”
http://www.about.ch/education/index.html
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Hi Joe,
I understand that this blog is taking issue with private initiatives in education. I also know that the context is US, race to the top, no child left behind…Pearson, etc. I left Switzerland because the system effectively shut the doors for me at early age and i went to the US to a private university. Thanks to this I am who I am today (I am doing ok, :). And I understand the anger. As mentioned in a previous reply, a good thing is always a good thing, and I add, a bad thing is always a bad thing. If people take money, they are thieves. Be it private or public. And that is the point. There is no guarantee, that public institutions are immune to the lower instincts of human nature. Switzerland arguably does not have a big corruption issue. But the system used to be like a straight jacket. It has become more flexible. I would guess largely because internationalization issues. In other places, the state is a powerful instrument in the wrong hands.
I watched an interview with Dr. Gene Glass the other day. About 13 minutes into the interview he is asked about charters.
I think he says something interesting. Charters came about due to 3 reasons: money, cost of education, wish to isolate. Money answers the greed impulse; cost addresses the fact that education is becoming more and more expensive, and isolation…which, in my opinion, is the most important, stands for a Zeitgeist. Why is it that private schools have no chance to succeed in Switzerland? Because the Swiss do not mind to be in the same classroom with each other. I would think the same is true for Finland or Singapore.This is a somewhat naive assessment as I would think that pressure has been on the rise because of shift in student demographics. The US has a different track record. I come to think of “Bowling Alone” decrease of social capital, lack of trust, isolation, individualism….these things turn schools into ideological fortresses. They become symptomatic of much deeper conflicts in society.
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Thom,
Let me suggest a fourth reason for choice schools (both charter and magnet): allowing individual schools to differentiate themselves from each other. If school boards assign students to different schools based simply on street adress, the boards will have to 1) ensure relative uniformity across schools to justify their somewhat arbitrary decisions and 2) set educational policies that upset the fewest number of parents in the catchment area.
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Zero accountability? Don’t you think parents care more about the education of their children than does the state?
Mostly unaccredited teachers? Better check your sources before you make your claims – your info is over a generation old as applies to traditional private schools.
In regards to homeschool situations where parents are often not certified, it doesn’t seem to hurt them! Research shows that homeschool children outperform public school children regardless of their economic background, the education level of their parents, or whether their parents were “certified” – (see academic performance at http://www.nheri.org/research/research-facts-on-homeschooling.html)
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I guess craiger is unfamiliar with locally elected school boards and voting on school budgets. The tax payers and the parents can make their voices and concerns heard. Homeschooling is illegal in Germany and does not exist in Finland.
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exactly.
It all depends on how someone is interpreting accountability. Community life kept in check by elected folks is what keeps up accountable to one another.
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I don’t think of accountability like you seem to be interpreting it. I think of it more about relationships. We are accountable to those with whom we share life (such as our spouse or family members, those with whom we work), and we are also accountable to those with whom we share the world. If we all just take our ball and go home and carve out our own interpretations of the world without, at least, understanding there are differences out there, etc., then we are not accountable.
I think the accountability aspect is how we make sure new generations know the latest information and norms for functioning in the adult world, with writing, math, science and and understanding of history. I don’t think accountability means whether they are measuring up, I think it has to do with whether or not they are participating in a shared view of responsibility for life on earth and as a human.
The word got hijacked by those wanting to stick it to teachers, I think.
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“I don’t think accountability means whether they are measuring up, I think it has to do with whether or not they are participating in a shared view of responsibility for life on earth and as a human. ”
I was going to say I hate that word, “accountability.” I have a visceral reaction to the idea of some self important ideologue mandating how others shall perform their duties. I do not feel like they have “a shared view of responsibility for life on earth and as a human.”
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2old:
the idea is, though, that in democratic process elected folks do give voice to consensus on those things in a growing and organic way.
I don’t know who you mean by “they” here.
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I was quoting you, so if I understood you the “they” is your “they.” I was with agreeing you but apparently in a not very clear way. I like the idea of accountability as shared responsibility and as a natural part of being in community/relationship. I hate the way accountability has been turned into a weapon.
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I did a quick search and found that there are several voucher schools in NC using Abeka.
I will also note that other than two (Christian) schools, none of the top tier private schools in my area are accepting vouchers (not that it would matter at this point because these schools run $14,000 – $24,000 – it will be interesting if this changes once the income cap is raised)
https://www.abeka.com/AbekaDifference.aspx
Here’s a sampling of Abeka:
‘Unlike the “modern math” theorists, who believe that mathematics is a creation of man and thus arbitrary and relative, A Beka Book teaches that the laws of mathematics are a creation of God and thus absolute. Man’s task is to search out and make use of the laws of the universe, both scientific and mathematical.’
‘A Beka Book science texts teach that modern science is the product of Western man’s return to the Scriptures after the Protestant Reformation, leading to his desire to understand and subdue the earth, which he saw as the orderly, law-abiding creation of the God of the Bible.
The A Beka Book science and health program presents the universe as the direct creation of God and refutes the man-made idea of evolution. Further, the books present God as the Great Designer and Lawgiver, without Whom the evident design and laws of nature would be inexplicable. They give a solid foundation in all areas of science—a foundation firmly anchored to Scriptural truth.’
‘We present government as ordained by God for the maintenance of law and order’
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Why is consistently teaching the view that “everything is under God” worse than teaching from the perspective that “nothing is under God”? The latter is the general worldview of the current public school system.
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