The fraud of school choice continues.
“The Indiana State Board of Education approved four private schools with a history of low performance and academic failure to accept publicly funded vouchers to cover tuition for incoming students during a meeting Wednesday.
“The schools had lost their ability to enroll new students in the Choice Scholarship Program because they had been rated a D or F on the state’s accountability system for at least two consecutive years.
“A law recently signed by Gov. Eric Holcomb allows private schools in this situation to seek a one-year waiver from the standard rules that require years of academic improvements to again become eligible for vouchers.”
The members who voted for the approval said that if parents chose the schools, that was good enough for them.
The board voted 6-2 for each of the four schools’ requests – three from Indianapolis and one from Fort Wayne.
Diane Ravitch's blog 
When charter schools show “low performance and academic failure” you do all you can to defund them. When public schools show the same abysmal performance you fight to get them more money. What’s so repellant and unacceptable about letting parents vote with their feet?
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BT,
I fight for public schools. I fight to make them better and better funded.
I oppose privatization.
If a con man comes around and says, let me have public money, I can do a better job, he gets millions. If he can’t do a better job with the same kids, the school should be closed.
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EXACTLY. When one educational con is exposed, the game shouldn’t simply shift to the next con man standing in line…
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Because many students, including approximately 70% of the students where I teach do not have the ability, or the money, to “use their feet” to go somewhere else. So what this says is let the privileged choose and let all others be second class citizens.
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That’s right … FRAUD!
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The right to choose, includes the right to make bad choices. As long as the school’s performance characteristics are published openly, and out there for all the world to see, there is no problem.
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Charles,
If you had children, I think you would be better informed.
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Whether or not I have children, does not matter. We agree that schooling, whether public or private, should be transparent. If a school is not delivering a proper education, and receives a failing grade from the state education authority, then it should be plastered out for all the world to see.
I admit freely, that there are bad non-public schools out there. The state of Indiana determined that these schools are bad, and gave them the grade that they deserve.
Now that these schools are wearing the “scarlet letter”, they should be shunned, and children should be transferred to a school which can deliver.
The difference between a choice school, and a public school, is that parents are free to pull their children out of a choice school, and they are trapped in public schools.
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Charles,
When private schools fail, they should not receive any public money.
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By the way, Charles, I wanted to show you about a school that you have several times praised in Utah is under major warning for academic problems. Choice on the taxpayer dime is a joke; choice on the taxpayer dime for a school with terrible academics is a travesty. \
http://www.sltrib.com/news/5386412-155/vineyard-charter-school-upgraded-to-warning
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If any school is not producing, and not delivering a quality education, then it should be labelled as such. A failing school, should be declared ineligible for parents to redeem their voucher. This would “put the spur” to the institution, to shape up, or lose their student base. A no-brainer.
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Diane At best, we are watching state-sponsored carelessness, a kind of moral amnesia with an “R” stamped on its forehead, take over the administration of schools and, at worse, corruption-in-process.
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Not careless.
Money talks.
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Diane Well, that’s the “at worst.” As in “corruption in process.”
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Once we monetize our children corporate profiteers will do everything they can to hold on to the cash. Local communities need to be forewarned. Once you cede your democratic voice to corporations, they will fight and bribe representatives to keep the tax dollars flowing to ensure democracy is suppressed, even if it means sending children to under performing schools. Local communities should also realize they are sending their local taxes outside of their community. Locals are disinvesting in their own community.
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retired teacher Well-said. Once the fox is in the chicken house, you need to put a guard on each and every chicken. We end up playing whack-a-mole trying to beat down Orwellian moral problems dressed up like Grandma.
Also, and again, I think the issue is just complex-enough to render-difficult communicating a warning to parents. Certainly, however, they would understand “bend over, . . .you’re about the get screwed by rich people.” (Did I write that?)
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Customer choice has officially become the ultimate criterion for good-enough education. “Let the buyer beware” is the unstated governing principle for education under the regime of customer choice.
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If politicians restrict tax credit scholarship and voucher programs to reputable schools, the attraction to wealthy donors (and campaign contributors) is diminished. The only way for these tax avoidance programs to be scaled up is to allow as many “schools” as possible to participate since the schools themselves which students they will accept, unlike true public schools.
http://www.npr.org/sections/ed/2017/03/07/518352548/trump-s-favorite-school-choice-program-allows-wealthy-donors-to-turn-a-profit
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