This year, there are 28,000 students enrolled in voucher schools in Milwaukee, and 75,000 in the public schools.
Governor Scott Walker and the Wisconsin legislature increased the number of students eligible to receive vouchers, expanding the voucher program to Racine and elsewhere in the state. This year, the voucher program will cost the state $245 million. The Milwaukee program alone will cost the state over $200 million.
Study after study has demonstrated that voucher schools do not outperform public schools, and in many cases, are far inferior to public schools.
The expansion of the voucher program proves nothing other than the failure of vouchers.
Even the 2016 state scores showed negligible differences among students in vouchers schools, charter schools, and public schools, often a percentage point. These results were hailed as a great victory for the choice schools, but the percentages of students passing state tests were low in all three sectors. And, the scores don’t take into account the very large number of students in the Milwaukee students with special needs who are not wanted by the vouchers or the charters. Twenty percent of the children in the Milwaukee Public Schools have disabilities, compared to less than 6% in voucher schools, and about 12% in charters. MPS, of course, has the children with the most severe disabilities. That has an effect on aggregate test scores.
Diane Ravitch's blog 
Reblogged this on David R. Taylor-Thoughts on Education and commented:
I’m not sure who is more destructive Scott Walker or Sam Brownback, it is a toss up. It’s like watching Jim Carey and Jeff Daniels lead their states.
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I expect this of the Republican right. That they are assisted in this assault by Democrats is an outrage. Time for a litmus test on the real issues.
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The real issue is a lack of common sense and finding a solution that helps the most people not the few privileged with deep pocket books.
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Scott Walker is a little twerp of a man just take a look. This is a man who walks around his little world in Wisconsin and tries to come off as your regular guy you know riding a motorcycle and wearing blue jeans. However, this little twerp of a man who in person is so frail you would swear he is suffering from some food depriving disease, is so stuck on breaking unions that he would sell his own mother up the river to break a union. How in the world the people of Wisconsin put up with this dick bag is beyond me. Further, this little jerk kisses the ass of the so called koch bros. who are also the scum of the earth. Scott Walker took a run at the republican run for president and did not last a month especially when he spoke of what he wanted as president and that was to break unions!! I think scott walker gets off or beats off whenever he can get a union to fold and when he does here comes little scott walker beating off to the drum like a possessed chucky doll… …vote hillary clinton in 2016 but please leave huma abedin off the card and away from the white house!!
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Never in my life did I expect to see such a concerted and determined effort ( lavishly funded by countless billionaires) to destroy our public schools. Here in NJ, Chris Cerf is renewing an effort to eliminate the LIFO (last in first out) rule. Cerf, who is chief of Newark schools, is lending his support to a new lawsuit against the state, which challenges the law protecting senior teachers from layoffs. From njspotlight: LIFO was targeted this week by the Partnership for Educational Justice, a New York educational reform group founded by former NBC anchorwoman Campbell Brown. Acting on behalf of several Newark parents, the group is challenging the constitutionality of LIFO, which it calls the “quality-blind layoff statute.” PEJ has filed similar complaints in New York and Minnesota. http://www.njspotlight.com/stories/16/11/03/newark-school-chief-urges-end-to-lifo/
In other words, the senior teachers with experience would have targets on their backs without LIFO.
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The senior teachers cost more, pure and simple. They want the young, cheaper teachers.
That, and it’s another way to try and break the teachers unions.
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Terd campbell brown has these lawsuits all over the country and if you search you will see that every court has turned down this ridiculous scum trash bag brown down. California courts recently sided with lifo as well as the case in Minnesota…do you research!!
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David Koch was on the Aspen Institute Board until recently. Aspen brags that its education agenda has been implemented. Gates funds Aspen’s education programs, like Pahara and the Senior Congressional Education Staff Network. Readers of this blog, would be surprised by Wisconsin except, Scott Walker is widely acknowledged, as Koch’s surrogate.
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Ideology “Trumps” evidence when wielded by the unscrupulous. Remember that on election day. Remember that and vote for Clinton. Then, don’t rest. That’s when the fight for equitable democratic education must be renewed without the threat of a racist authoritarian demagogue.
http://www.arthurcamins.com
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it has begun to feel that for long years, now, those trying to educate inside our district’s most test-score invaded schools are being allowed to teach less and less actual evidence…
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The “real” solution…
“Problems can be defined/described/explained in many ways. The choice
usually determines the nature of the problem’s resolution.” Rittel and Webber
A. Gramsci “The prevailing social explanation tends to perpetuate the
given social orders.”
Tests pretend to measure the un-measurable…OPT OUT
Test scores showed negligible differences among students in voucher, charter,
or public schools.
It will cost the “state”.
The “state” TRANSFERS funding, in line with it’s tax and transfer policies.
Appointed, non-elected, “heads” dictate policy.
Voter irresponsibility is to blame.
???
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Not only public schools but so much more that is worthwhile in Wisconsin. Would that his recall had succeeded.
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They’re in the process of winding down public schools while they replace them with a voucher system.
Ed reform never valued public schools. They have complete contempt for the schools and the people who work there.
It can be funny to read some of the gushing coverage of charter schools. One of the central themes in ed reform is charter leaders come out of elite colleges. The pieces are peppered with references to Stanford and Harvard and other elite colleges.
They’re snobs. It’s no more complicated than that. They’re convinced people in public schools are all “mediocre” and it’s up to graduates of certain selective colleges to lead the unwashed masses to the promised land.
Public school systems should stop hiring these people as consultants. It’s just dumb to hire people who hope to eradicate existing schools to “improve” existing schools.
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Some of the snobbiness is directed towards suburban schools.
They’re convinced kids in suburban schools are coddled and lazy – that was the subtext of Duncan’s nasty comment on “moms” in NY. He thinks they are provincial and small-minded- unable to see his grand vision due to their selfish concern for their own children.
If you read on the ed reform side it’s amazing how much of this grounded in absolute withering contempt for the US workforce. Low performers, all of us. Not the Best and Brightest.
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I’m continually flabbergasted by the fact that in Wisconsin, public teachers are punished for their years of experience. It’s like a penalty for developing proficiency in your chosen career. In that regard, Walker has created a real-life Bizarro world.
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