Oklahoma: Voucher Bill Dies

March 14, 2016 //

Big news from Oklahoma: the effort to enact vouchers failed in both houses of the legislature.
Much credit goes to PTAs, who were all over this attempt to spend public money on religious schools.
Even better, Republican parents sent multiple tweets to the governor saying, “I am a Republican and I oppose vouchers.”

Categories Education Reform, Oklahoma, Parents, Vouchers

11 Comments Post your own or leave a trackback: Trackback URL

reckeuph says:

March 14, 2016 at 9:29 pm

Concerned Parents began to form Parent Legislative Action Councils several years ago. They are focused on impacting education legislation (ONLY Education Legislation) by lobbying and by communication of all sorts. One of their skills has been developing talking points and strategies specifically targeted for our state situation. @OKCentralPLAC @TulsaAreaPLAC @WesternOKPLAC etc. These groups originally stared in Republican Communities and have made a huge impact already. Common Core standards and much of the testing is gone in Oklahoma. The voucher bill is the latest victory. These parents are becoming increasingly savvy about how to do what they do.

They have now began to encourage and recruit pro-education candidates in both parties. We still have huge funding problems, but a sleeping giant has been awakened in Oklahoma that is more concerned about public ed than about ideology.

This deserves more national attention since traditional lobbying groups have not always been effective.

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Karen Maitland says:

March 14, 2016 at 9:41 pm

reckeuph: Hurray for OK parents! I’ve been saying for years that the mess in education will turn around as soon as parents take back the schools from the legislators! Good job, people!

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Cesar Lardies says:

March 14, 2016 at 10:38 pm

Great news.

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B Horvath says:

March 16, 2016 at 11:49 am

It is definitely a victory for students in Oklahoma, however please watch what happens next with SB 1187. It passed the Oklahoma Senate last week and may be voted on in the House as early as next week. It is a devastating deregulation bill that would have terrible consequences for teachers, parents and students. It pushes public schools towards becoming charter schools. It is unbelievable that it has gotten this far. Groups are rallying to get it defeated but it is scary here. Please check it out. I don’t mind increasing local control over education but this bill is not the way to do it.

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Agents of Education says:

March 17, 2016 at 12:02 am

Agents of Education from all walks of life in Oklahoma have watched the children, teachers and school districts suffer through the worst budget cuts in history. It became evident that those in leadership had an agenda funded and fueled by ALEC. The systematic dismantling of Public Education became their purpose and thus our purpose shifted from taking what was given to “engaging on behalf of those who look up to us.” It is our mission to not only defend but to promote legislation that supports the efforts of education and to ensure that legislation that could harm our students is defeated! We promote #oklaed a hash tag know all over as a symbol of unity and purpose. It know longer is about ones job or position but rather every single child receiving the best chance at success no matter what it takes. Agents across Oklahomans continue to Stand Ready to stand in the gap for every child

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- dianeravitch says:
  
  March 17, 2016 at 3:00 pm
  
  Agents of Ed in Oklahoma: keep up the struggle against ALEC war on public schools
  
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joe says:

March 17, 2016 at 12:15 am

Awesome!

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dreamall says:

March 17, 2016 at 3:55 am

I think it is important to give low-income parents the ability to determine the best educational opportunities for their children.

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- dianeravitch says:
  
  March 17, 2016 at 2:58 pm
  
  Dreamall,
  
  Low income families don’t need “choices” that are worse than their current school. It helps no one when the while public school system is defended so a few kids get choice.
  
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- B Horvath says:
  
  March 17, 2016 at 4:42 pm
  
  Dreamall,
  As a teacher of students from low income families, I certainly agree that we need to find ways to help them. However, this particular voucher bill had a line in it specifying that students who qualified for free and reduced meals were ineligible for the vouchers. I think that was the straw that broke everyone’s back and caused an avalanche of phone calls to our representatives. They never intended to help anyone but themselves.
  
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reckeuph says:

March 17, 2016 at 11:03 pm

Dreamall,

We have had this discussion in Oklahoma and we already know that vouchers/choice is a failed concept. When the voucher schools in Milwaukee were finally forced to give their students the same tests as the public schools the results showed that, while parents were happy to be able to choose, the goal of increased student learning was not met. Even with so many students choosing to leave and with so many special ed students staying, the public schools out performed the charters.

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