Burnt Orange Report

This seems like an issue that is so easy to resolve. Authorize vouchers in a few areas where they are most likely to make a difference and then track the results.
As a moderate I just want to know if it works and is it worth fighting for or against.
Just arguing about the theory or philosophy of vouchers has given this issue far more life and significance than it deserves. If it doesn't work lets move on. If it does work let's expand the program.

Sounds like a good idea. Unfortunately, you are operating in the world of logic and reason. Normal people would look at public schools and say "wow, for all this money we spend they sure are not passing a whole lot of kids that are ready for college." However, if you are a Democrat then kids exist to fund public schools rather than public schools existing to educate kids. Pretty simple really.

And if you're a Republican, then you continue to spend less and less money on public schools, then blame the public schools for underperforming. Also, you create education policy so that you have something in your platform when you run for President. Lastly, you want to give a tax credit to private school students for not attending public schools.

Paul - There is a good reason not to even run it as a pilot program... it doesn't work. It's kind of like the charter school nonsense. For three years they get a ride on having to conform to all the standards/requirements to which an ordinary public school has to conform. They also get 100% funding, which no public school in the state gets. Then they fail. Granted not always, but the performance number alone make it pretty clear.

THEN, you have the stupidity issue in the mix. Duplicating facilities and resources to service the same population makes no sense. In fact, it's really, really dumb.

There is just no reason to privatize the school system. What's needed is funding, effective instruction, good administration and oversight/accountability on the part of the state and local boards. If there's waste then root it out, don't act like privatization will be the end of all waste and corruption.

Anyone who thinks private industry can't be corrupted is fooling themselves. Just look at how many executives have functionally stolen from shareholders over the years and still managed to retain control.

Normal people would look at public schools and say "wow, for all this money we spend they sure are not passing a whole lot of kids that are ready for college."

Normal people would see 1) the average Texas teachers make $6K less than the national average 2) Texas was the only state in the Union to reduce per pupil spending last year 3) The cost of higher education has sky rocketed since 2003, more than trippling at the University of Houston.

Republicans like to compare government to business. Every statewide office and both Houses of the Texas Legislature are dominated by Republicans, and the only thing they have accomplished is . . . redistricting? If I ran a business like they run the state, I'd be fired.

Normal people are ready to fire the GOP leader$hip, just as Ben Bentzin.

Also Phil, rumor has it the Voucher King may be washing $50K for Bentzin - or maybe just part of it...

On the big issue, it is pretty simple, really. Leiniger pays for officeholders who would profit him - not to profit our children, because private schools, without the accountability we demand from public schools, don't educate kids any better than public schools. See the article below for evidence.

Study: Public school kids do as well or better in math than private school kids

New York Times News Service
Jan. 30, 2006 06:40 PM

WASHINGTON - A large-scale government-financed study has concluded that students in regular public schools do as well or significantly better in math than comparable students in private schools.

The study, by Christopher Lubianski and Sarah Theule Lubianski, of the University of Illinois at Champaign-Urbana, compared fourth- and eighth-grade math scores of more than 340,000 students in 13,000 regular public, charter and private schools on the 2003 National Assessment of Educational Progress. The 2003 test was given to 10 times more students than any previous test, giving researchers a trove of new data.

Though private school students have long scored higher on the national assessment, commonly referred to as "the nation's report card," the new study used advanced statistical techniques to adjust for the effects of income, school and home circumstances. The researchers compared math, not reading, scores because, they said, math is considered a clearer measure of a school's overall effectiveness.

When you pass kids out of school that are woefully unprepared for higher ed and far behind students in other countries, then you need to defend why the status quo is OK. Keep the same teachers, keep the same administrators, keep the same expectations, keep it all the same....just pay them more and expect different results. Why isn't Washington DC the best school system in America when they spend more than anyone else? Why is it that students across the US test behind students from other countries? Why is it that your zip code decides whether you get to attend a piece of shit school or a decent one? There will always be an excuse for the chronic underperformance.

If public schools are just as good then why not let parents decide where to send their kids to school? They shouldn't have anything to worry about.

Nice study Ed. 2+2= 5, but you're poor and you have it rough at home so we'll just say you got it right using our "advanced statistical techniques." Hopefully the employers of the world will adjust for that too.

The key thing to remember about vouchers is that are not going to be putting additional dollars into education here in Texas, they will be subtracted from the total education pot, leaving schools with less money per pupil. And, think of this - if just 15 kids left one school, it would take about 87K in funding from that school every year - which means about 2.5 teachers would have to be laid off. Which teachers would you like gone and not replaced in your school? I'll also bet you that in Texas, it would never be a football or basketball coach that gets laid off; but I 'll bet y'all a Larry Stallings for HD 122 bumper sticker it'll be the art teacher, the multimedia teacher, or the extra reading specialist that gets laid off. And if your kid has trouble reading, or has a gift for art, or needs to learn how to set up a website, your kid will be S. O. L. if Leininger's voucher plan gets passed.

Snrub, back the f* off this whole "concern for poor kids" nonsense. You care about low income families? Why do Republicans vote to cut CHIP? Why do they deregulate tuition and make it more expenseive for middle and low income families to afford college? Why do they cut student loans? Why do they want to increase taxes on 90% of families making less than $140k just to give a tax cut to the top tier of Texans. F***ing hypocrite.

It's going to be kids that can ALREADY AFFORD to go to private schools. You know that. If you honestly want to privatize schools, fine -- just say that. But don't say it's "for the kids." That's just a bunch of horsesh**.

DKS - excellent point.

Snrub - no one is happy with the status quo. The status quo is underfunding and that has to stop. It's not the end of education... parents are still going to have to get more involved. However, we have to start somewhere.

I saw a thing on 20/20 about this. John Stossel did his normal piss poor job of reporting. He took a kid to Sylvan and after 72 hours the kid could read better (according to their test) than he could after 12 years of public school. Gee... one on one instruction with more advanced aids and the kid could learn? Hell, why don't we try that in the public school instead of just throwing up our hands and giving up? The answer is they'd love to but they had to cut reading aid/tutoring years ago because it wasn't in the budget. Stossel never quite got around to that

If everyone in Dallas Metro could affford to send their kids to ESD, Hockaday or St. Marks, don't you think they would? Money's definitely the solution there, wouldn't you say? So why not put a little more in public schools, leave no one behind and start reaping the benefits of a better educated, and more prosperous, populace?

Snrub (I'll not use your real name), given that private schools perform no better than public schools (based on research using the same statistical techniques corporations use every day), then the whole status quo deserves indictment, not just the public schools. Unfortunately, our country gives education only lip service compared to many others, and that's a cultural matter that is much bigger than the school system itself.

I've never been a staus quo person. Nor have I been able to help change all the things that might need changing. I think every teacher should first earn a "suject area" degree and that the methods taught in colleges of education should be transmitted in a shorter post-grad curriculum combined with student teaching and on-going,periodic training - because neither knowledge nor the methods for its transmission are frozen at the time one leaves college.

But lo and behold, that would require us to treat and pay teachers like professionals - to make a job that can change lives forever as financially attractive as the job of a money-changer or lawyer or the like. It really is very simple, and it is a matter of cultural priorities more than the bogus "public schools are failing" line. Public schools will be only as good as the public demands, but they are the only way to provide educational opportunity for all, because in a private system, some children, despite their potential, would inevitably fall off the "margins."

Burns:
I want to privatize schools. And I want to do it for kids. There you go. And I'll be happy to distinguish between funding for primary education and funding for health insurance and higher ed any time.

DKS:
Not an excellent point. If 15 kids leave a school then they don't need the money to educate them. However, you did nail half the problem. Austin ISD continually sucks, but if you ask Austin parents they continually think it does not. I have no doubt that in Texas people would vote for the scoreboard before they vote to keep art teachers.

Ed:
I don't diasgree with most of what you write but how many children falling off the margins now? I don't care where a kid goes to school, our obligation needs to be to educate. This is an organized labor issue for Democrats, it has nada to do with education.

snrub,

We can address who fails off the margins in public schools if we have the will and good sense. In a private system, only cents, and big dollars, matter.

Ed

Snrub - That's right, people in Texas would keep sports programs at the expense of just about everything except basic instruction. However, the few successful charter schools in the country have completely done away with athletics and their results still aren't that much better or worse than comparable public schools with similar students per class and funding levels. So, why not pay for it all and fund it at a realistic level?

Part of the problem with per student numbers is that it disregards support and physical plant that has to be maintained even with slightly fewer students (not to mention transport). DKS's point is completely valid even though it may not conform to the way you want the world to be.

You advocate for privatization without really understanding that inserting the need for profit is actually going to be worse than the VERY limited amount of waste and inefficiecies in the current system (not to mention how wasteful for-profit corps can be). Would you turn every not-for-profit corp into a profit making concern? Some things are better when you leave profit out of it and education is one of them... less of an incentive to cut corners.

I've heard the arguments you are going to use ad nauseum. I think I probably know them better than you. I also know even the dumb counterpoints as well as the far more valid ones. I'm an old school capitalist and the idea of privatizing schools is not worthy of anything more than a thought exercise which would lead you to the inevitable conclusion that it's a bad idea.

If you want to think about the children you have to think about all the children in this state and provide equally for all.