Skimming through recent comments, I ran into one from LexWolf (it’s the 147th on that post, so you’ll have to scroll down a bit) that began this way:
Confounding the anti-choicers’ constant bleating…
… and of course you can guess what I thought it was about. And my mind was just starting to figure out why LexWolf would be using such a term, thinking Well, he’s really libertarian, and abortion advocates are really libertarian… when I got to the next phrase:
… about who would build those private schools…
OK, so it was a different expression of libertarianism, one more characteristic of the "right" than the "left" and therefore more consistent with what we usually hear from that particular gentleman.
This got me to wondering, though: How many readers out there are, like me, consistently "anti-choice," to use the loaded language of our detractors? (If I can find enough of us, we might actually get that UnParty thing going.) For that matter, how many are consistently "pro-choice," on both abortion and education?
While the two issues are wildly different, and people can be for one and against the other for an almost unlimited number of reasons, they do have that one element in common: In both cases, advocates use the dodge of "choice," which to American ears sounds so nice and friendly, to avoid describing what they actually favor.
Why? Because "abortion" and "tax subsidies for private schools" both sound pretty awful to a neutral observers ear.
Thoughts?
Related Posts
THE TRUTH
The legislature voted against tax subsidies for public school students.
Thank you for providing us a new thread on school choice. That other one was getting a bit long in the tooth anyway. Instead of looking for post 147 which is rather difficult since posts on your blog are not numbered, it’s easier to look for the Apr 6, 2007 2:23:19 PM post.
I’m also grateful to you for providing a separate thread to demolish one of the anti-school-choicers’ key “arguments” against school choice: where would the school options come from? Clearly we can see from the article that it can’t be all that difficult to find space for a private school. It may not be one of those monstrous Taj Mahals to which the educrats seem so addicted but it will most likely do a better job at teaching our kids and that’s what’s most important. There are a number of old shopping centers and old office buildings which could easily be converted for use as an alternative to the failed status quo, at a tiny fraction of the money the educrats would use.
“Find some old building” is “demolishing” an argument? I guess the REPUBLICAN legislature and governor completely overlooked this key element.
Yes, the Dems and a few Republicans in the legislature did (but not the governor) but that doen’t make it any less of a key element. Obviously even some Republicans, like the deservedly-former state representative Ken Clark in my district, are still anti-school choice. IMO that will change as your educrats will once again fail to nudge us off our status at the bottom of the nation so don’t be too complacent. The educracy’s constant failure, the constant bogus reform plans, are wearing thin on more and more voters. Even having elitist legislators virtually parachute in to vote for keeping kids on your failed plantation (while sending their own kids to a private school) will not work forever. Neither will voters have much patience for public school teachers like you who oppose school choice while sending their own kids to private school.
There were less than 30 minority students in ALL SC private high schools who took an AP exam. MOST students at Heathwood Hall come from families who can afford the thousands of dollars for tuition.
Your blind faith that these homogeneous institutions serving middle and upper class students are capable of handling low performing poor minority students is not shared by those of us relying on common sense and data rather than ideology.
What the voters do not have patience for is your voucher scheme. The republican controlled SC state legislature won’t pass it. The republican controlled Utah legislature passed a whopping $3500 and government oversight for their voucher scheme – effectively passing nothing.
While common sense beats back these schemes, we lose time and energy to focus on real comprehensive reform. Even Lex W. olf admits there are students who will not be served by private schools (many in families who can’t afford to make up the difference between the $4500 and the actual cost). The notion that the only reform that we can consider is choice is short-sighted and ideologically driven.
Lex,
I share your frustration at the anemic academic performance of poor students. But I think you are misplacing blame and are naive in your devotion to vouchers as a solution.
I like to talk about people rather than ideas so let me tell you about a recent conversation I had with an elementary educator who works as a curriculum coordinator for 3-5th graders. She told me about three students she’s dealing with. One is a child who came to school and was obviously beaten. She initiated an investigation that determined the abuser was his father (who, ironically, was a police officer). The second was a 3rd grader who was discovered writing the most sexually explicit and violent note she had ever read by any school child of any age. The third was a child who would come to school hungry most days and would often face the prospect of going home to little or no supper in a single parent household with an unreliable mother. She makes this child “Triscuit sandwiches” and packs them in his backpack before he goes home.
This educator is a role model to me, the rest of the school district and the community as a whole. Her intellect and her love for children are unlimited. She is doing God’s work with all children, but especially poor children, in Marion’s schools.
But these children often come to her so disadvantaged and so far behind that there is no catching them up.
A voucher school couldn’t find anyone any better or any more committed than her and many of the other teachers who work in our district. And even if they did recreate a parallel school system, it is unlikely the results for poor children from unstable homes would be significantly different. But there certainly would be a motivation for voucher schools to cherry pick by attracting more stable middle class families. The poor and the difficult to educate would be avoided by the voucher schools (just as the sickest patients are avoided by private insurance companies) because they use so many resources.
I had a male high school student who had similar life experiences no one should suffer. His parents were separated and he lived with his mother when his paternal grandfather passed away. He was dressed and waiting for his father to pick him up for the funeral. The father never showed. The student was not interested in the least about his math course that semester.
I had another tell me to f-off because I told him to have a seat. A couple weeks later after school I heard a woman screaming obscenities in front of other students at this same boy for being late.
I guess Heathwood Hall has better resources and more experience to deal with this? This is why “letting the parents worry about it” is hardly a substantive defense of choice.
Paul, regarding the use of Virtual Schools in poor rural districts:
There is some online curriculum which allows students to work at their own pace and spend more time on content that troubles them most. I envision schools with a math teacher in a computer lab facilitating independent study. Some students may be working on honors or AP courses. Others may be low level kids. The math teacher can provide the individual and face to face assistance they will need.
A great example is a handful of kids I have now in a low level math class. I identified them as kids who could move up to the college prep track and take algebra 1 cp this summer on the virtual school. They entered their freshmen year in a low math course in the tech track. They may enter their sophomore year with algebra 1 cp under their belt and on the cp track.
My man Paul,
I certainly appreciate all that this teacher does for those children but you don’t provide any evidence that a private school wouldn’t do the same, especially given $12,000/year in taxpayer money? You assert the following:
“The poor and the difficult to educate would be avoided by the voucher schools (just as the sickest patients are avoided by private insurance companies) because they use so many resources.”
How many resources would that be, exactly? More than the standard $12K, I would assume? Don’t you think that if private schools are given the same $15K, $20K, $30K or whatever a public school gets for these extra-attention students they would do at least as good a job as the public schools? In any case, there is no evidence to support your assertion in the few areas (e.g. Milwaukee) that have managed to establish school choice so far.
In any case, what are you saying? That because some of the poor can’t or won’t get their act together you won’t allow everyone else to get a decent education for their kids? We can’t just play to the lowest denominator. There will always be a small number totally beyond hope, no matter what system, but we can’t let that determine the system for everyone else.
I don’t think school choice is a total solution, a panacea, a holy grail, but I do think it should be a full part of parents’ options for their children’s education. Your one-size-fits-all, top-down planning approach didn’t work in the USSR and it isn’t working here either, quite obviously.
What is so wrong with allowing parents, not educrats, to decide where to spend the money budgeted for their kids’ education? Clearly not all parents will be up to the task but the vast majority will be, certainly enough to produce a better overall outcome than a bunch of educrats. I have never in my entire life seen a bureaucrat make better decisions than the private sector. I simply don’t have
the semi-religious fervor you have that the educrats will do what’s best for our kids while parents won’t. With some pitiful exceptions like the 3 examples you cited, show me some functional parents who will care less about their kids than some educrats would.
Make the case to me: given that we spend $12,000 per kid now, what exactly makes an educrat’s judgement where to spend that money better than that of most parents (except your sadsack examples)?
In addition, surely you know that the poor and lower middle class are among those clamoring the most for school choice, simply because they have no other options to get off the failed educrat plantation. They know there is something deeply wrong with our current system but they can’t afford any alternatives. The well-to-do have always had school choice; all they had to do is move into a good school district. What choice do the not so well-to-do have to get a better education for their kids other than full school choice?
What’s with this cherry-picking accusation? Don’t we have a Governor’s School that cherry-picks? How many of those kids you cited would have a snowball’s chance to get into that school?
You and Brad are truly touching in your blind faith in the educracy’s ability to reform itself. Many others have long ago lost that faith after 40 years of uninterrupted failure and dozens of failed “reform” schemes. What makes you think your current scheme will do any better, other than maybe the fact that you are personally involved so it’s just gotta, gotta, gotta be better?!
Correction: Don’t you think that if private schools are given the same $15K, $20K, $30K or whatever a public school spends for these extra-attention students they would do at least as good a job as the public schools?
Some telling points from Lex W. olf:
you won’t allow everyone else to get a decent education for their kids?
this coming from the guy who suggested “let the Allendale parents figure out how to get their kids to private schools”.
$15K, $20K, $30K or whatever a public school gets for these extra-attention students
These kids with crappy home lives do NOT get “extra-attention” money. Again, Lex brushes aside the idea of these kids sitting in class with his daughter in Heathwood Hall.
surely you know that the poor and lower middle class are among those clamoring the most for school choice
Oh? What evidence do you have?
Many others have long ago lost that faith after 40 years of uninterrupted failure
40 years ago we had only recently attempted to integrate schools AND we had not yet passed IDEA, mandated mainstreaming in LRE etc. To suggest education is the same now as then is a gross mischaracterization.
Here’s a nice set of data to “Demolish” public school hater claim that education has not improved – median years of school completed of SC citizens from 1950 to 2000. Interesting how our stagnant educational system has not only integrated schools, provided for handicap and special needs students (well beyond almost any other country in the world) AND boosted the median # of years of schooling of SC cititzens from 8.7 to 12.7 over the past 40 years.
At the Feb Allendale-Fairfax board meeting. An elementary school teacher shared this:
a) Discipline problems are getting worse and this is making it hard for students to reach their goals; b) Teachers hands are tied because they spent a lot of time talking to students about how they should behave;
Paul shared some horror stories. I’m sure there are similar stories in Allendale. How will a private school, WITHOUT the so called “extra-attention” money deal with these social issues in addition to boosting test scores?
What are the positive aspects of Jim Rex’s new school choice plan?
What is the current feeling on Captain Smith’s seemingly hypocritical stance on public schools in light of his own child going to private school?
Can anyone defend either situation with facts and not resort to personal attacks?
Vouchers for Misbehavior
70% of black children in SC have NO HOMES,
because they were born out of wedlock. About 25% of black men are in jail or on probation at any given moment.
Liberals want to shirk responsibility for their failed socialist school system by blaming the “bad home life” of the students, but it was liberalism which created the culture of bastardy which plagues most of these children. Liberalism encourages promiscuity, glorifies alcohol and drug abuse, and pays cash and vouchers for having illegitimate children.
The public school apologists are probably right about education being limited in what can achieve with such sorry social situations, but liberalism has to admit its mistakes, and stop promoting those sorry social situations.
Doug, perhaps his child has special needs. Perhaps it’s a religious issue. Perhaps he IS a hypocrite. The guy is serving his country two different ways so I give him the benefit of the doubt. If he is pulling a John Edwards then I’ll be the first to take issue with him.
Personally, I don’t care for the Rex plan because it offers little in the way of meaningful comprehensive reform. I have seen similar problems in good and poor schools. I believe there are fundamental issues in education, like your observation about the PACT having no teeth. Another issue is how do kids graduating with straight As and attending Harvard or Yale receive the same diploma as a kid who makes Ds and failed several classes. Let’s address these issues.
LexWolf:
Was there something else you didn’t like about Ken Clark, other than his support of public education?
Claudia,
here’s what I wrote in the Ken Clark Column thread at the time Clark was defeated:
I’m in Clark’s district so I must be one of those moneyed, ideological, populist and apathetic (not to mention out-of-state) people who are descending on Clark. I can’t speak for other people in this district but I can tell you why I voted against him and will do so again on Tuesday:
1. This guy hasn’t spent a single day of his adult life in the private sector. He has no idea what it’s like to meet a payroll or to comply with all the nonsensical regulations imposed by our state. He is simply unable to see that our public schools are an utter disgrace and will never be improved or reformed by yet more educratic “solutions”, i.e the educrat fad-of-the-month. That approach has been tried for at least 4 decades, with dozens or hundreds of fads coming and going. All of them failed and despite spending about 8 times as much on education (adjusted for inflation) as we did 50 years ago we are right about where we were at the beginning. For anyone in favor of meaningful education reform, and government reform generally, Ken Clark is a dead loss.
2. I’ve seen those flyers sent out by his opposition. Far from giving no details as you mendaciously allege they did provide supporting information. I even checked some of it out and, guess what? Clark is guilty as charged! Yes he did vote to override Sanford to spend “the money for beach renourishment and the football game and the arts festivals and the 10 percent increase in spending”. He also voted for all the bloated budgets passed during his tenure. Then he compounded his big government folly by voting to override most of the governor’s vetoes. Cindi’s link to the SC Club For Growth site shows that Clark supported the governor’s vetoes only 13% of the time (that’s right down there where you start finding lots of Democrats!) I simply don’t vote for spendthrift, big government Republicans like Clark.
3. Here’s what the CIA says about the Clark-Spires contest. Can you honestly say they are wrong?
4. I no longer have those CIA flyers but I do have one of Clark’s, postmarked the 19th. Virtually all his bullet points involve throwing lots of money at the problem, even though his “solutions” are unlikely to be successful and in fact many are just the latest flavors of the educrat fads that have failed over and over.
Kit Spires may not be polished enough for your taste but I submit to you that he understands his district far better than Clark ever would. He knows and trusts the people while Clark seems to think that he and a bunch of bureaucrats know much better how the people should live their lives than those people themselves do. In other words, just another big government elitist. That’s why he’s losing! Rightfully so!
Posted by: LexWolf | Jun 25, 2006 11:53:09 AM
Claudia, I also talked with Ken Clark after voting against him and here is what I posted about that:
Ken Clark lost. When I voted for Spires this afternoon, Clark was actually at my precinct. To his credit, we talked for about 30 minutes and I’m grateful to him for taking the time. He is undoubtedly a nice man and seems sincere in his beliefs. If it weren’t for politics we would probably get along great.
But politics is what it’s all about in this race so that’s what we talked about. Since he was there, I thought it the decent thing to do to personally let him know why I voted against him. Ken clearly isn’t much of a listener but instead likes to hear himself talk. Although I told him that I had visited his website and read his bio, voting record and platform, he still basically gave me a somewhat edited one-listener version of his stump speech. Instead of letting me simply take 2 or 3 minutes to give him my reasons for voting against him, and then maybe an equal amount of time for him to reply as he wished, he insisted on basically telling me why he was right and I, the voter, was wrong. In other words, he was the “enlightened” one and I just didn’t know what was good for the state. Bottom line was that he probably talked close to 25 of the 30 minutes or so. You just don’t win many elections with that attitude. And this was after I had voted already! You would think that knowing that my vote couldn’t be changed would make him more inclined to listen than talk, in hopes of learning from his mistakes and do better next time. You would think wrong!
Some of the things that stood out:
– he told me of his son, who in the last days of segregation attended one of those private academies that were all the rage back then to keep white kids out of public schools. Everything he heard from the school (somewhere around Swansea) was great and he thought his kid was doing really well. Then he moved up to Virginia and a couple of weeks later the public school there told him how badly his son was doing and that he was way behind where he should have been. That to him was “proof” that private schools weren’t better than public schools. Never mind that this was around 40 years ago or so. For one year his son didn’t do well in a private school so public schools must be better. Then I told him about my son who graduated from a public school 5 years ago and did so well that he got a complete free ride from Clemson. Yet when he arrived at Clemson the first thing he had to do was complete several remedial courses learning stuff that the public school already should have taught him. Stuff you definitely would have expected a top student to have learned already, especially with the great grades he kept getting. Faced with this direct failure of the public school system Ken Clark was clearly at a loss for words for the only time during that 30 minutes.
– one other time he took a couple of seconds before continuing when I explained the most painless way we could have school choice. Simply issue each student a voucher for roughly the same amount the school district is spending per kid. Then if the parent is happy with the public school and wants to keep the kid there, the voucher would simply be attached to the registration paperwork. Cost to the district would be minimal. Just the fact that parents now would have a choice and could pull out their kids if the school doesn’t measure up would light a fire under the educrats’ fannies.
– when I mentioned that I didn’t appreciate the fact that he supported the governor on only 13% of the budget vetoes, he tried to tell me that the overridden vetoes amounted to “only” 0.5 percent of the budget. The overridden vetoes for 2005 actually amounted to about $90 million which out of a state budget of almost $6B is about 1.5%, 3 times as much as Clark claimed. ONLY $90 million! Even at Clark’s claimed 0.5% (=$30 million) that amounts to the entire income tax revenue from about 5,000 citizens paying the same amount I do – all flushed down the toilet for some crazy boondoggles.That’s what happens to people like Clark when they find themselves in a position of power and able to spend other people’s money on their pork projects. ONLY $90 million! The arrogance! The hubris! You know what they say: a few $million here and a few $million there and pretty soon you’re talking about real money. Clark has clearly long ago left the realm of what most of his constituents would consider “real money”. For most, even $1 million or half a million would set them for life (heck, Kit Spires would probably sell his pharmacy for $1 million) but for Clark $90 million is in “only” territory.
Simply out of touch with his district.
Posted by: LexWolf | Jun 27, 2006 7:17:15 PM
He is simply unable to see that our public schools are an utter disgrace and – Lex W. olf
Many others have long ago lost that faith after 40 years of uninterrupted failure – Lex W. olf
In the past 40 years of our stagnant educational system we have had the following outcomes:
*The schools have become integrated
*We have provided for handicap and special needs students (well beyond almost any other country in the world).
*The median # of years of schooling of SC cititzens has risen from 8.7 to 12.7.
Asked for any details of how the voucher scheme will work, Lex dodges the question.
When you’re an ideologue, you don’t need facts.
“*The schools have become integrated”
Have they really? Here are just 2 examples that they are anything but integrated. You can find many more schools with such lopsided numbers but these two are a start, picked at random: Forestbrook ES in Horry County is 87.2% white and only 8.2% black. Edith L Frierson ES in Charleston is 3.2% white and 91.8% black.
Define integrated school for us, please.
Somebody failed history – the term white only as in white only schools and black only schools is a foreign concept? Jim Crow? Separate but equal?
Your claim that education is the same as 40 years ago is ridiculous. Integration on a regular basis wasn’t STARTING until the 60s (civil rights movement…ring a bell?). When I was in elementary school, approximately 400 students, there were TWO black students. Lex, you don’t remember bussing?
Are there problems today? Yes, but is it the same as the 50s and 60s? Silly.
Approximate proportion of students who are white in various high schools:
Ridge View 45%
Dreher 44%
Airport 66%
West Florence 68%
Mauldin 65%
TL Hannah 64%
Spartanburg High 39%
Greenwood 51%
Myrtle Beach 67%
Wando 76%
Rock Hill 67%
and yes, we have very homogeneous situations:
Lexington High 85%
Lower Richland 11%
There are worse situations, especially in the poor rural areas so you can amend your broad brushed oversimplification if you want, but why let facts get in the way now?
Ask why all those dozens of public school programs failed, and Randy dodges the question.
One reason they continue to fail is that the public school administrators do not understand, or will not admit the reasons for their previous failures. They do not learn from their mistakes. That is where business is dramatically superior to government – in its management and culture of constant improvement.
why LexWolf would be using such a term, thinking Well, he’s really libertarian,
No, he’s really not. Anyone who supports a massive new government entitlement, as LexWolf does, is not really a libertarian. He wants the state to take money from me and give it to him. That’s as un-libertarian as you can get.
LexWolf is only libertarian when it comes to government programs that don’t directly benefit him.
I don’t think school choice is a total solution, a panacea, a holy grail, but I do think it should be a full part of parents’ options for their children’s education
It is. You have the option to send your kids to private school.
What you want is the state to force me to pay for it.
You also have the same option, of paying for your own children’s education at a private school.
What you want is the state to force the rest of us to pay $10,000 to 12,000 a year to send your child to a state school.
KC, the state is already taking YOUR money to pay for MY child’s education, just as it’s taking my money to pay for other kids’ education. The only question is who should decide where and how that money is spent: some educrat or the kid’s parents.
I guess lots of those dastardly “out-of-state special interests” are helping our kids but the Legislature can’t be bothered! Note to Randy and his ilk – this school is spending less than 1/3 of the public school tab and getting far superior results! Oh, and look at all the challenges those private school teachers face without making excuses for failure out of them! Instead they boast SAT scores of 1150 compared to the 788 the kids would be getting at the public schools they normally would be attending. Only five students at the school come from two-parent homes, and most of the students are African-American.
From the WSJ:
A School in South Carolina
Our readers come through with support, but the Legislature doesn’t.
Sunday, April 8, 2007 12:01 a.m. EDT
Last month our Brendan Miniter spotlighted the story of Faye Brown, a former public-school teacher who four years ago opened a private school to give low-income families an alternative to failing public schools. Most of them are African-American students in rural Johns Island, South Carolina. The article also featured 16-year-old Rontrell Matthews, who is working to pay his own tuition.
Two things have happened since the article appeared: an outpouring of financial support from Journal readers and a vote by the state Legislature that would undermine the school.
Like Rontrell Matthews, Ms. Brown’s little school–Capers Preparatory Christian Academy–was scraping to get by. Even as her students outperformed their public-school peers on the SATs by nearly 400 points, she dipped into her own retirement savings to keep the lights on.
That may change now. To date our readers have donated some $32,000. One couple in Austria sent $10,000; another person sent money asking that it be used to get each of the nearly 50 students something for Easter. Mr. Matthews now has his tuition paid through next year. And several people have already made a second donation to the school. There is also a gentleman who wants to use $100,000 he recently inherited as seed money for an endowment.
For the first time in the school’s history, it has all of its bills paid in full and it has $26,000 in reserve–not a small sum for a school with an annual budget of about $160,000. Ms. Brown told us she was often up late worrying where her students would end up if she were forced to close her doors. Now she knows she’s not the only one worried about her students.
Late last month the state Legislature voted against giving school vouchers to tens of thousands of poor kids in failing public schools. The bill would have helped many of the Capers kids pay their tuition.
Lexwolf, when the public schools get an increase in funding, as this Capers school did, the PS would use it to hire 2 new “assistant principals”, a curriculum coordinator, or a public relations specialist, and then go back to the legislature with a request for more funding. That is the PS formula and that is one of the main reasons they continue to deliver poor results. If they would use the funding they have to hire more Randys, they would improve results.
Sigh, according to Lex, Moby Dick was little more than a story about a guy fishing.
You cite a school with a whopping 43 students total in 1st – 9th grade as the panacea to the problems in education? Skim the cream off the top of any population and put them in a public school and you’ll get the same results. I’ve had a Rontell (kid paying his own tuition) in my class. This guy has to work late most nights to help support his family in addition to getting his diploma.
If you were making the case that SOME students may benefit from SOME private schools, then I agree. You’re not. You have repeatedly, ad nauseam, stated our public schools suck then bleat on about private schools. Cherry picking hardly provides a comprehensive approach to our problems.
We are responsible for the kids Paul described – who come to school hungry every day. The girl who is abused by her father. The boy whose mother cusses him out in front of students. The boy whose father left him waiting for a ride to his grandfather’s funeral. The kid who has to work 30+ hours to help support his single mother and his young siblings. The numerous kids being recruited for gangs etc.
Why don’t you work to reverse the liberal programs which put 70% of those children in “homes” with only one or no parent, usually in poverty, and often with drug and alcohol abuse?
Stop complaining about the lousy material your public schools have to work with, when it was some other parts of the liberal agenda which created those students you can’t teach.
I can’t swear to you WHAT Moby Dick was about, because I never read it.
But I got an A+ on the essay test on it. How? How could I not? The class TALKED and TALKED and TALKED about it for several weeks, after which I was even more sure I didn’t want to read it. In spite of myself, I learned all about the characters, the plot, the themes, the symbolism, yadda yadda, until I could spout it in my sleep.
Hey, you want to talk fiction? How about a story in which Lee responds to somebody by saying, you know, maybe you have a point there…
Would anyone believe it?
(Now I’m going to save everyone some time. Some wise guy is going to say, “When have YOU ever publicly changed your mind like that?” to which I will respond, “You know, maybe you have a point there.” Ba-da-BOOMP.)
Let me state again that I think Lex, Dave, and others make a lot of good points about the failures and corruption of government. I don’t see many points in being made to justify the same old corruption and failures.
Well, Brad, how about a fictional story about a heroic military man who overcame all manner of obstacles to board a chartered plane to vote against a voucher plan that would have given poor kids the same chance his own children? And then he gets lionized by a fawning press…
Or does that sound too unbelievable to be true?
For real fiction, I usually go and read Jim Rex’s press releases.
Still too busy to offer us some insight into how Rex’s plan will save our schools?
You know what’s amazing? That this post didn’t trail off into an acrimonious shouting match about abortion.
Congratulate yourselves.
C’mon, Brad, I’ll even save you some typing…
“Captain Smith, hero or hypocrite?”
An 1150 average for poor kids from single-family homes sounds pretty good. And, all the grads this year will attend college. Shall we examine some context?
For instance, how many Capers students actually took the SAT? IF the students were evenly distributed among grades (which I doubt) there would be less than four students with SAT scores to average.
So, four (maybe) kids who attended Capers between one year and five years will attend some college.
This is looking less impressive but, none-the-less, admirable.
Notice that the op-ed piece (that’s a fancy word for “slanted”) didn’t say what Rontrell actually scored.
Notice, also, that IF Rontrell enrolled at Capers (which I doubt) then he actually attended that “crummy” public school for over half his academic career.
What is the teacher to student ratio? Again, if we surmise that there is one teacher per grade-level then you’re looking at a situation closer to private tutoring.
And, what about the finances? Sure the founder is having trouble paying the $160,000 bills for 42 students if some students don’t pay tuition. What if ALL students paid the tuition?
Even paying (uncertified, most likely) teachers $8.00/hour; using donated equipment; occupying “some old building;” and supplementing paid staff with free labor; it still costs Capers over $3,800/student.
I doubt that you’ll find many private enterprises jumping at the chance to lose $300/product annually.
Now, the WSJ ideologues think that other SC taxpayers (grandparents, uncles, cousins etc.) might be able to pool their vouchers to supplement tuition costs for their favorite relative. If this was a feature of the bill that failed to be passed by a Republican legislature, then I haven’t heard of it.
Let’s be generous. Suppose that the state decided actually give a voucher for a more reasonable amount, say, $12,000. We’re still talking about no standards required and tax monies paying for religious instruction. (Remember the “Christian Academy” part of the school name.)
Just one small indicator of the religious problems: will Muslim schools be eligible? Mormon? Catholic? Hindu? Buddhist? Quaker? Will Quaker schools teaching pacifism be
eligible? Will Muslim schools referring to the U.S. as the “Great Satan” be excluded? What about Wiccan schools?
Correction:
“Notice, also, that IF Rontrell enrolled at Capers in 2003 when it first opened (which I doubt) then he actually attended that “crummy” public school for over half his academic career.”
A few thoughts:
1. Jim Rex’s choice plan may not be everything to everyone, and I doubt it’s intended to cure everything…..It would be simple-minded, I think, to think a choice plan could be the answer to all our education challenges.
But I do think there are some positives here. Open enrollment (or semi-open enrollment) in public schools CAN create some movement within the system for folks who aren’t satisfied with their neighborhood school or other assignment. And it can conceivably get public school systems looking at ways to innovate in order to keep their competitive edge. And the reason competition can help in this case is that public schools play on a level playing field in terms of admissions….they can’t “beat” one another by ruling out admittance of students who are challenging to teach, thereby using admission criteria as a way to make their school more attractive to top competition.
By the way, the places likely to experience the most competition, it would seem to me, are those counties with the most number of districts. Perhaps it’s ironic, then, that many want to force consolidation of those districts. I see pros and cons on both sides of that issue.
2. Rex’s plans for encouraging innovation in each district is right on, I think. If I’m not mistaken, he wants each district to have some sort of alternative program in place — a magnet school, a charter school, etc. I think this could be very valuable.
3. LexWolf has a point, of course (how do you like that, Brad?), about re-segregation in the public school system. Perhaps he’s for bussing!! If integration is his goal, it seems strange to me that he won’t push Heathwood Hall to diversify its student population by taking academically struggling students.
Either way, there may be troubling re-segregation in public schools. But to suggest that things are like they were before integration is just silly. As Randy noted, there are quite a few high schools in South Carolina that are very, very diverse.
Some guy,
You do understand that Rex’s plan does not go into effect until 2009-2010 and then for only one half of one percent of enrollment for districts that do not consider themselves overcrowded already. As an example, if Richland 2 were to go forward with this (which they can easily show evidence by way of the number of portables in place currently that they don’t have to),
they would have to open up about 100 slots.
That’s about four slots per school in the district.
And I haven’t seen how transportation is addressed in Rex’s bill either… has anyone else?
And why does it take two more full school years to pass before anything happens? Who else but a bureaucrat could justify that length of time to add a couple kids per school?
A cynic might say, “Hmmm… 2009-2010 will be just about the time Jim Rex will be starting his bid for re-election. Might be good PR to have this just starting then versus having actual results for voters to look at.”
Rex has pulled the old trick of hijacking reform.
In answer to Doug’s question above:
Hero.
Beyond that, it’s pretty damned hard to have a discussion with anyone who thinks he is NOT a hero. We wouldn’t be speaking the same language.
I guess that says it all. You’re a sucker for a man in uniform.
And I haven’t seen how transportation is addressed in Rex’s bill either… has anyone else? – Doug
The students will carpool just like they do in NE Columbia. Are you suggesting that 29 miles should keep kids from excellence? I hear some parents in NE Columbia drive 40 minutes every morning – where there’s a will, there’s a way.
I see. The idea was to USE the uniform in hopes of stopping criticism of the craven vote against poor children.
I guess we’re all bad guys for bringing up the very relevant facts omitted by The State’s propaganda piece – that Rep. Smith sends his son to a private school.
We’re not surprised. Almost 1/3 of public school teachers who have children in school, also send them to private school.
I just saw what Doug’s talking about, on another post. For those who don’t spend any more time on the blog than I do (a category that I’m afraid excludes some of my readers), he’s citing a report that one of James Smith’s kids goes to Heathwood. I don’t know whether that’s correct or not — it sounds vaguely familiar — but I wouldn’t bother James at Fort Riley to ask him.
I’ve had kids in private schools, too, as I’ve written in the past. For the past 19 years, they’ve been in public, but prior to 1988 my three oldest children were in a Catholic school.
I was just as big an advocate of public schools then as I am now. In fact, as a member of the school board of the Catholic school my kids attended back in the 80s, I voted against a resolution to support the tuition tax credit movement of that day. Why? Because I thought it just as wrong then as now for any citizen to ask the government to subsidize their decision to send their children somewhere other than the public schools.
I have to laugh when anyone characterizes the advocacy of tax credits as being FOR the poor, while opponents are characterized as being AGAINST the poor, and that experience in the 80s contributes to my attitude: It was presented to us purely as a matter of hey, this is costing us, so WE might as well get a tax break.
I thought it was obscene then, and I still do today. That’s why I raised such a fuss when my Bishop agreed to sign a letter of support for the anti-public school movement.
My attitude is this: If we Catholics want to make the blessings of Catholic education available to anyone regardless of the ability to pay, then we ought to be TITHING for a change, and actually supporting the scholarships ourselves. We should not ask taxpayers to do it for us.
And before you come up with the canard about it’s just returning the taxes people pay to them, the poor don’t pay those taxes. A family needs an income of about $60,000 to qualify for the kinds of tax credits we’ve been talking about in SC. That would only benefit the people who can already afford private school.
Vouchers are a different issue. They’re still a bad idea, for all the reasons I’ve cited over and over, primarily the fact that the market would NEVER provide the necessary opportunities for the rural poor to take advantage of vouchers — they would be meaningless.
But the voucher idea has never been as obscene as the tax credits. That’s what I thought and how I voted when my kids were in private school, and that’s what I think now.
Therefore it would be odd for me to be bothered by one of James’ kids attending Heathwood.
RTH does a nice job highlighting important missing details in a sketchy story. I bet you could take the top 3 or 4 kids from most failing schools and find they’ve been successful.
some guy brings up some interesting issues:
1. Doug or Lex are right about public choice, it will be severly limited by space issues – as would voucher schemes.
2. I think a charter school in most districts (maybe small districts can go in on one together Paul?) focused on low socio-economic students is a great idea. I’d like to see alternative schools for behavior problem students increased.
3. Yes, we have defacto segregation to some extent especially in elementary schools which cater to smaller communities. Lex 5 experienced trouble when they were rezoning a few years ago. Irmo went through the same changes of demographics that Spring Valley went through in the early 90s.
Lex’s continued unwillingness to promote choice involving his own private school reflects a huge problem with the problem with the voucher scheme – some schools simply won’t open their doors to the influx of poor minority kids.
Brad Warthen just admitted that “the poor don’t pay taxes”. Gasp!
In fact, only the top 50% of income tax filers pay any income taxes. The lower 50% is prevented by FICA taxes from saving money and raising themselves through education, starting businesses, and investing in common stocks.
So those seeking to South Carolinians poor and uneducated don’t like vouchers, don’t like tax credits, don’t like tax deductions, don’t like any reform.
If any of you object to your tax dollars being used for Lex’s children to attend school, or some poor black child in Allendale to attend the school of his choice, there are other alternatives.
Just let everyone pay for their own children’s education, food, clothing and entertainment. How novel! Since they won’t be needing public schools, and other programs, taxes can be reduced by the amount of those extinct programs.
Lee, it sounds like you’re saying that the poor can simply pay their own way….in your tax-cutting proposal it sounds like vouchers wouldn’t even be necessary. Is that right?
I’m just trying to get a handle on you actually think.
I didn’t say the poor don’t pay taxes. They pay a larger proportion of their incomes than the middle class does in sales taxes.
But we’re talking about the income tax, and we’re also talking about your income taxes being high enough for the full tax credit to be due to you.
Pretty much everybody in SC pays the maximum percentage on the income tax — 7 percent. I think it kicks in at around $12,000 a year, although the number keeps changing (I can check when I’m back at the office).
But 7 percent of $12,000, with the usual exemptions everyone takes, isn’t a lot of money. You have to be making about $60,000 to get the full amount — at least, that was the case in the PPIC version voted on last year. I haven’t seen it calculated for any of the other — as Karen Floyd counted them — 42 versions.
To say it again (hoping the governor notices), 7 percent isn’t a whole lot — unless you make a lot.
Oh, and to follow up on that … as we’ve said before, if the governor would like to lower the amount coming into state coffers from this particular levy, he could try making it truly progressive. The max kicks in at a ridiculously low income level.
Brad, SC Catholics just ante’d up $32 million dollars in a one time giving program for the Our Heritage Our Hope campaign. OHOH for short.. Anyway, the location hasnt been set yet to my knowledge but there will be a new Catholic high school in Columbia as a result of this generosity. Also one at the beach. And, Catholics are taxpayers too.
Our Heritage Our Hope does NOT include plans for a new Catholic High School in Columbia. It does include the following:
Parish needs
Restoration of the Cathedral
Conference and retreat center
Future high school on the coast in HH and/or MB
Land for athletics for Cardinal Newman HS
Outreach
Hispanic Ministry (Que Bueno!!)
Ministry needs
Brad, don’t forget the regressive tax called the Education Lottery – steal from the poor and give to the middle class or rich. Look at the school report cards and take a look at the proportion of students in poor districts qualifying for the Life Scholarships. The poor pay for the college education of the middle and upperclass – ingeneous.
If we truly wanted to use this funding to help poor students pull themselves up by the boot straps, limit the scholarships to poor students and use the extra money to help these students pull up their grades to qualify for the scholarship.
But that would miss the point, Randy. The point was to purchase votes for Jim Hodges’ re-election. It didn’t work.
So we’re stuck with a lottery — actually, those who can’t resist playing are stuck with it — when its purpose ceased to be in 2002.
Another bitter irony for a state that has more than its share, a state that deserves better.
You want to talk regressive? I actually had folks who favored the lottery — not Hodges, mind you, but some of the white voters he DID pull in from the “center” and “right” (at least for the purpose of voting in his lottery; I doubt they voted for him in ’02)– tell me that what they really wanted to see was no more taxes for schools, and let the lottery pay for public schools entirely.
Ignore the mathematical impossibility, since the lottery was projected to bring in about 2 percent of what we spend on education. What’s really striking about this line of thought is what one caller actually expressed to me when I was on a radio show back around that time: The poor blacks are the ones who use public schools, so let them pay for it with the lottery; everybody else can then take their tax cuts and send their kids to private schools. (That’s an approximation of what she said; I wish I’d thought ahead enough to ask for a recording of the show at the time.)
Heyyyy … that sounds kind of like another plan I’ve heard of.
Yeah, Dave, listen to Randy, my fellow parishioner.
As a Catholic, and as one with experience in trying to pull money out of fellow Catholics, I must say that we could learn a few things from the Baptists. THEY know how to give…
And yes, we Catholics are taxpayers. That means we pay taxes for public schools just like the 75 percent of households that don’t have school-aged children. Otherwise, there would be no public schools, any more than there would be police if only the people who actually called the cops paid for it.
It’s called being a citizen of a civilization. To avoid taxes, go to Somalia. But go heavily armed, and take a lot of khat with you for the personal army you’re going to need to watch your back.
Brad, I am not a zero tax advocate and furthermore no one wants to support and pay for the defense of this nation more than I do, so the cheap shot about leaving the country is just that, cheap. What I and some on this blog disagree about is confiscatory taxes where people are disincented to earn. And I do give charitably to the needy, both time and dollars. That is the way it should happen, not with big spenders who get elected and re-elected by confiscating earnings from workers so they can conduct more give-a-way programs. What we have seen happen in this nation more and more is replacement of the family unit, which by its nature is a social group, with government social units. The government socialists see every solution to every issue as a wealth transfer from those who work to those who need. That concept has been carried way too far. But again, the Catholics are doing it the right way, with voluntarily submitted charity, and this is a lesson you, Cindi, and some of the big government crowd could learn. And no, I will pass on the taxless paradise in Somalia.
Fine. That was not meant as a cheap shot; I was just making the point that THERE is a place where a man only has to pay for that which he uses. Why? Because it’s not civilized — not by our standards, and not by Somalian standards. That’s why I know people from Somalia living here. It’s a mess over there.
You raise another good example when you mention paying for national defense. Pacifists consider every penny spent on that wasted, and they sincerely shout their protests over the billions that we DO spend. But fortunately, we take their tax dollars to build a strong military anyway, and it protects them whether they want it or not.
Similarly, public schools form an inextricable part of the fabric of a strong, stable society, and therefore give value to the homes of the people who complain about their property taxes going to schools. The schools serve them whether they like it or not.
>Similarly, public schools form an
>inextricable part of the fabric of a
>strong, stable society,
But when the fabric is tattered and torn, is the best solution to apply more patches? Or maybe it’s time to buy some new clothes.
Also, is there no limit to the amount of taxes the government could impose that would even make YOU say “Enough!”? I guess I hit that point when my combined tax bill (income, property, sales) for SC alone reached about 15K. Combine that with a government that has no interest in efficiency or stewardship of other people’s money and that’s when I said “Enough!”
“Big government” Dave? Can you be more specific? What constitutes big government?
Is it supporting the military to the tune of half a trillion a year, not including the Iraq “War”?
Is it spending half the SC budget on education?
Is it government internvention into social issues like abortion, gay marriage, pornography, or indecency on TV and radio?
What we have seen happen in this nation more and more is replacement of the family unit, which by its nature is a social group, with government social units. – Dave
We can agree the erosion of the family unit. Unless you are offering a ridiculous suggestion that it is the government’s fault for teen pregnancies, births out of wedlock, or the divorce rates we can focus on the government’s response to these problems.
Either the government gets involved or they don’t. Because you used the perjorative term “big government” I take it you don’t want government involved. So what happens when a teenager is pregnant? What happens when you lose your job 3 weeks before Christmas, which happened to me once. What about children with unemployed parents who can’t afford health care and run to the emergency room because their child has a cold? If you’ve ever had to wait in an emergency room, you’ve experienced a bi-product of having a large population without health care.
Dave, is all government bad or do you have some criteria? If you want government to stop abortion, certainly you would want government to look after these lives being saved. Or, we make the upkeep of our society purely optional as you seem to suggest.
Brad, why are you such an apologist for mismanagement and waste of our taxes?
Instead of acknowledging the irrefutable fact that every year, lots of new wonder initiatives are put forward with much ballyhoo, while last year’s failed programs are quietly cancelled.
You apologists for the government school monopoly say we taxpayers should just suck it up, shut up and accept whatever expenses and taxes the politicians and teacher unions want to impose on us. That’s not how America was intended to work.
But when the fabric is tattered and torn, is the best solution to apply more patches? Or maybe it’s time to buy some new clothes. – Doug
Doug, what is your justification for this demogoguery? SAT scores? Drop out rate? Do you have any facts or simplistic ideology? Does low performance of the state as a whole really indicate the whole system is bad?
So your wife is part of a failed system and just wasting her time? Perhaps she’s the only one doing a good job? Your kids are getting a crappy education and you continue to allow this?
You’ve done little aside from spewing venom and carrying out a vendetta. If you want to talk about problems in the system, I’m open to dialogue. This simplistic bashing of schools as if the whole system is failing is misguided and useless, aside from letting you vent. Can you offer even a shred of constructive dialogue?
Brad did finally, belatedly admit that the top income tax bracket in SC kicks in at $12,000 a year. That’s because the inflation adjustments that are in the tax law have been “temporarily overridden” every year.
I have worked and paid taxes in SC, NC, IL, IN, NY, GA, MD, CA and VA, often two states in the same year. Only NY is as high as SC. That’s one reason entrepreneurs don’t locate their businesses here unless they get tax favors from the government. It’s also a primary reason SC suffers a brain drain of young talent.
Big government is the cradle-to-grave dependence mentality that creates a citizenry that EXPECTS something for nothing. It’s Halliburton and K3 programs. It’s a Social “Security” that has tricked people into thinking it is a retirement system when it is actually nothing more than a welfare system. It’s a completely broken Medicare system. It’s a military that must create and exaggerate threats in order to keep the BILLIONS of money flowing into the right pockets…
Peace = no profits. it’s farm subsidies… it’s do-nothing bureacrats who spend their lives making policies… it’s the FCC and Department of Education… it’s programs like NASA that spend billions looking for rocks on Mars while thousands of kids go hungry… it’s a federal tax code that is in a word, insane. Companies spend BILLIONS of dollars trying to avoid paying taxes rather than trying to be innovative and efficient.
I go back and read Atlas Shrugged occasionally just to get a reminder of what we’re headed for. The country is comprised of three types of people: moochers, looters, and do-ers. Someday enough of the do-ers say “I quit” and then we’ll see what happens.
So based on Doug’s take:
pornography is allowed on public television because the FCC is pointless.
Our farmers should have no support as they compete with other countries which have great government support.
So the “completely broken” medicare system is a useless system. Those receiving such aid would be better off with some private accounts?
No State department of education – so programs like providing poor rural schools with access to online courses is a waste of time.
Bureaucrats like those who run the fire department or police are wasting tax payer dollars.
Discoveries From Shuttle Experiments Could Have Great Impact is a little different than “looking for rocks”.
NASA scientists and engineers helped create entire new industries and transferred more than 10,000 NASA-developed technologies to the private sector. More stupid rocks.
NASA was brought up as a diversion from the waste, graft and failure of SC government schools, but I’ll address it for a moment.
I have worked for NASA and can tell you many detailed episodes of the egomania and waste caused by scientists playing around to build things as a novelty for their own curiosity which they could just purchase as Commercial Off The Shelf (COTS) items.
When you spend a trillion research dollars, there is bound to be plenty of beneficial fallout, but that does not justify the original expense. Research has to be justified based on its INTENDED purpose. The primary purpose of the space programs is military superiority.
Randy,
According to the SC Department of Education’s own measurement system, there are plenty of failing schools in this state. I didn’t come up with the measurement system – they did. The question is what to do about it. Spend more money is the only answer they can come up with. Status quo, more of the same…
If you think Allendale students are being well-served by the public education system, what else can I say to convince you otherwise? If you think having a third of high school students drop out is fine, then how am I supposed to reverse your soft bigotry of low expectations? If you think pushing illiterate kids along through public school is acceptable, then don’t complain about the quality of students who show up in your classroom. If you accept your district administration’s policies of wrist-slaps for bad behavior, don’t whine the next time a student tells you to f-off.
I point out SPECIFIC issues in public schools and offer solutions. You spend your time analyzing single words out of
context.. and when I write something about public education in general, you somehow feel like it’s your responsibility as the blog hall monitor to chastise me. Stick to facts… and try and understand that your opinion of me doesn’t register. (Although the fact that my son plays baseball with one of your colleague’s sons makes for interesting conversations in the stands)
some guy, having everyone pay their own way in this world is the starting point. If that is not working for everyone, then we need to see why not. Is it their own fault which makes them unable to earn enough income, or are they being forced to purchase overpriced, mediocre services from a government monopoly?
In a country as advanced and prosperous as America, where market competition has fostered more technological advancements and cost reductions than in the entire previous history of mankind, the only people unable to live comfortably off their own work should be a tiny percentage of physically or mentally handicapped people.
Instead, we have the majority of people crippled by a corrupt conspiracy which calls itself “government”.
You spend your time analyzing single words out of context… – Doug
You mean reminding you that you used the word “ALL” as in “ALL education awards are little more than rec hall trophies” as opposed to many or most. Words matter Doug, and the context was taken into account.
Similarly, are ALL schools bad? If not, the system is not a complete waste as you repeatedly suggest. Again, why are you kids in such a “torn and tattered system”? Your wife is part of this system?
Regarding your specific “solutions”, when you aren’t trashing your our profession, what have you suggested other than fire teachers based on PACT scores?
What constructive or positive post have you offered? Identify just ONE remark you’ve made that has been positive.
If you GovCo school defenders didn’t think vouchers would work, you wouldn’t be so afraid of them.
Dreher High School is rated one of the best schools in the nation, yet 50% of its students are blacks from lower income working class homes in the neighborhood. Somem of them drop and fail, but many do not. Its feeder school, Hand Middle, is also one of the top schools in the nation.
Why can’t the public schools learn from what succeeds? Could it be management or teaching skills that the other schools lack?
Why do they have to keep throwing away millions on academic schemes which pay huge fees to crony former school teachers and educrats posing as consultants? Oooops! I think that question answers itself.
Randy, Think about what the founding fathers would say if they came back to life, after writing our charter where a small, limited, restricted government would provide security for our citizens. They would find the government giving methadone to sick demented drug addicts, rewarding promiscous teens and yes prostitutes who get pregnant and put the baby’s costs on the backs of other citizens. And they would find highway department workers finding places to hide and sleep on backroads as they get paid higher and higher compensation. Legislators and school officials flying to Hawaii to study some abstract subject on municipal sewer systems or school innovations while wasting thousands of dollars on booze, hotels, and travel. Worst of all they would find that the recipients of so-called American generosity have no respect for what they are getting for free and no gratitude (with some few exceptions). In fact, if they had watched the Katrina “refugees” complaining how they weren’t given enough after that natural disaster, I wonder if they would have said maybe we should have stayed under the repressive King George. Government to me needs to get out of the nanny business. On abortion, I have said it before as I am against it except in rare instances of incest or confirmed rape. But, we taxpayers should not be paying for it in any case. And public education, can you imagine the private school educated Ben Franklin watching the government force kids into schools who dont want to be there so headcounts can be maintained to get per pupil funding. I think the founders may be sick mentally and physically. Then again, we still have the best nation and civilization that was ever known, but in time the socialists will destroy our way of life as they have managed to do in most of Europe. Some of us will fight to keep that from happening but time will tell.
Dave, you skirt the issue by focusing on abuses and not the root question – government intervention. Some SIMPLE yes or no questions.
You oppose abortion. Do you support government intervention in this matter?
So SOME highway department workers sleep so we shouldn’t have government overseeing the construction of highways?
So there are flaws in the use of government money to help those in need, so the government shouldn’t reach out to the needy?
You suggest that the reason educators want kids in school is for money? What evidence do you have to support this?
Regarding education:
It is highly interesting to our country, and it is the duty of its functionaries, to provide that every citizen in it should receive an education proportioned to the condition and pursuits of his life.
–Thomas Jefferson to Peter Carr, 1814.
Are you really suggesting we shouldn’t make education mandatory?
I’m quite sure RTH will have more to say regarding our founding fathers.
Dave,
My guess is that the Founding Fathers would indeed have been very surprised if they heard about people “flying to Hawaii.” I think they’d have found that to be quite strange!!
In all seriousness, it’s a different time we’re living in now. The economy is so different. The expectations of freedom and opportunity….after all, they considered it legal for slavery to exist — a big change! We can argue all day long about the role of government and what functions are appropriate or not, but I think this business of claiming what the Founding Fathers would or would not have thought about what’s going on today is pretty silly. Had they lived DURING these times, with the realities of modern life, their own thinking might have been very different.
And this, Dave, is just plain wrong: “And public education, can you imagine the private school educated Ben Franklin watching the government force kids into schools who dont want to be there so headcounts can be maintained to get per pupil funding.”
LAWMAKERS write the rules on compulsory education, not teachers or superintendents. Your assertion that it’s the educators trying “to get per pupil funding” is simply incorrect.
Sounds like Lee, meanwhile, is fine with the notion that people can’t or won’t pay for education. That says a lot….Lee’s apparently not concerned if children don’t have access to schooling. That’s his deal, but the fact is that the LAW provides that children must have access to a free education…..and that’s totally aside from the voucher/tax credit issue.
It is the white middle class socialists here who are thankful one Hypocrite Smith blocked access to education for children in failing government schools.
Of course schools are reimbursed by the state based on the number of students. That’s why you don’t see any principals or administrators tossing out the illegal aliens. They don’t care how they fill the seats.
The Founders would have flown — figuratively, of course, in the sense of traveling in a fast ship — to the Sandwich Islands.
Of course, without the Panama Canal, that would have taken awhile, so maybe “flown” doesn’t even work in the figurative sense.
Didn’t some of the Founding Fathers fly the coop when the British landed?
Some of them failed to escape, too.
Now, try to focus on justifying the $12,000 per pupil cost of government schools, vs $4,500 vouchers for private school.
That would save the state $7,500 for every student who left public school.
Lee — I thought you said we didn’t need to fund education….Now, we only need $4,500 to fund vouchers for poor kids to go to private school?
I don’t think even your boy LexWolf would stand beside your latest h ere.
I think Lee is Lex’s peep.
Randy, TJ is the best source for a Founder who had the foresight to understand that a well-educated populace is essential to the functioning of a democratic republic.
some guy, that is one of your straw men you are confusing with me.
Let’s summarize the objections to diversity in education put forth here:
* We need a complete budget, curriculum and business plan from every private school that might be created in the future, before approving vouchers. You know, the same details the public schools still can’t provide.
* The poor children have no way to get to these private schools. Hmmmm. Busses, maybe?
* $4,500 is too expensive. But $12,000 for each public school desk is fine.
* It’s not fair for liberals to have their tax dollars pay to educate some poor child who wants out of their crummy school. Liberals want all that money coming to their upscale suburban Taj Mahals, and they want as much as they can get from the real taxpayers.
“TJ is the best source for a Founder who had the foresight to understand that a well-educated populace is essential to the functioning of a democratic republic.”
So true, and that’s exactly why we need school choice because the public schools aren’t providing that good education!
OK, Lee….I realize it’s no sense talking in a reasonable way with you. I think it’s pretty apparent that you’re not here to in any way further legitimate converstation, and that’s fine — people get their kicks in different ways. Or, it could be that you’re being paid by the SCEA to make the private school choice movement look truly wacky.
Still, here’s a few thoughts, for whoever might be interested:
— Lee talks about liberals in their suburban schools. We all know how liberal the SC suburbs are, don’t we? I mean, there are Democrats getting elected routinely in nearly all them…..I mean, the SC Statehouse is just dominated by them.
— One liberal solution might be to bus suburban kids into the downtowns for school and to send the poor inner city kids out to Dutch Fork or wherever….I doubt your suburban “liberals” would favor that. So, indeed, there’s some degree of re-segregation, which was discussed earlier, but I don’t think that’s a liberal ploy by any stretch. And, yeah, the public system needs to give this phenomenon attention, I think….Indeed, I’ve said here that if vouchers targeted just for the poor students is a way to get at the problem, then I think it might be worth trying in some cases.
— Of course, Lee’s assertion is that it would only take $4,500 per student to pull it off (when he’s not saying that families ought to have the pay the whole ticket on their own….not sure what he really thinks on this). Maybe, MAYBE, some kids could into some classes in the run-down strip malls where LexWolf thinks they could go, but if you’re going to add bus transportation, I think the expenses would be far too great.
At the same time, $4,500 certainly won’t buy a family in to Heathwood Hall. Of course, LexWolf has refused, if I’m not mistaken, to help get academically struggling students he says are “suffering” in the public system into Heathwood Hall, anyway.
— Finally, just one note of fact: I think Lee is simply incorrect in charging that public schools don’t provide records of curriculum or budget.
The public schools can’t even build schools of the right size. Some are half empty, while others have overpriced trailers out back. I have been asking for long-term construction plans and life-cycle costs from Richland One since 1988. They still haven’t gotten them done, but claim to be “working on it”. Yeah, sure they are.
And what about the post-mortem analyses of all those failed and discarded wonder programs of the last 35 years? Non-existent. No wonder the educators can’t learn from their mistakes, much less from the mistakes and successes of other educators.
$4,500 was the amount in the bill shot down by Hypocrite Smith and his buddies, to the cheers of Business-As-Usual Warthen.
Is $4,500 enough to educate a student for one year? I think so. We won’t know if we keep spending $12,000 a year.
I have yet to see any GovCo apologist break down that $12,000 and demonstrate the necessity of each expenditure. Maybe there isn’t $4,500 of actual education in there.
I remember back when Australia hosted the Summer Olympics. Some American tourists arrived in Sydney and later tried to rent a car to go to New Zealand, so maybe the founders could rent a car to get to Hawaii. You never know nowadays.
The government is so thoroughly entwined and controlling of the education system that it would take a revolution to change it. I dont predict that will happen in my lifetime but the same way that WalMart serves the public best in regard to retail sales, ultimately private for profit or Not for profit schools will also supply education to citizens in the most efficient and cost effective manner. How that will come about I am not sure but it will happen incrementally, and has begun already. it is all about results and while many many people work very hard in the public schools to make it work, the improvements are not coming fast enough. My opinion in general.
Dave, justify your statements about the problems in education. What data do you have or is this mere parrotting?
Drop out rates? SAT scores? What?
Step up to the plate.
Randy — You seem to me like a very sincere and generally well informed guy.
But, in all honesty, I don’t understand your last line of questioning there. Why get into that?
I think the fact is that there’s ample evidence that there are lots of problems in public education. SAT scores, graduation rates, grades, all that. Not that you’re disputing all that….so maybe I’m missing something.
But the point, I think, is that there are realities of society that have to do with how kids fare in school. And solutions, consequently, are not simple and go beyond the walls of schools. I imagine that you know this well as a teacher.
So, why not stick to that basic reality instead of challenging these people to come up with data or whatever? And why not talk about sensible solutions (which I know you have done) vs. the more wacked-out versions of “choice” (promoted by some folks who won’t work to help “suffering” students get into their own kids’ schools)?
Anyway, it’s not my business, really, but I was just curious.
If he had any answers, he wouldn’t spend all his time blowing smoke and trying to stop any real reforms from being given a chance.
Only 38% of students in South Carolina graduate from high school.
– SC Dept of Education, 2001
some guy, if you’re a blogger on here so it is your business – the whole point of the blog is to chime in.
Here’s my beef: the rhetoric about SC education is, I believe, largely parrotting what others have said. Ask some of these parrots to justify their statement and you find a shallow understanding of the issue.
Yes we have the lowest SAT scores. Is that a reflection of our entire education system? There are 9th graders who make 1100s on the SAT. Does this mean they can skip the rest of high school because they have all the education they need?
The only other figure offered by the parrots is the drop out rate. Since when is that merely a function of education? The fact that a student won’t get on the bus to get to school is solely the fault of the school? I suggest that is largely a cultural and community issue. BTW, I posted data that shows from 1970 to 2000, the median # of years of schooling for SC residents has increased from 8.7 to 12.6. Think about that, 50% of our residents didn’t even get to high school a generation or two ago.
Identify one other piece of evidence used to justify this typical schtick about our schools. There are 15 states with lower passing rates on AP tests. In 2004, on 5 of 8 NAEP tests we scored at or above the median. We have some of the highest standards for graduation – exit exam and # of courses required for a diploma. Our education accountability reform started in the late 90s before NCLB. Many states waited until around 2002 to create their standards. They saw the heat other states took for tough standards and low-balled us.
I am in no way suggesting that our system is where it should be. My point is to challenge people to offer a realistic analysis as opposed to simplistic demogoguery.
The Failure of US Education to Provide Technical Graduates
by Tom Rogers, a teacher in Greenville, SC
http://www.swampfox.ws/tom-rogers-the-failure-of-the-us-education-system-to-provide-technically-trained-graduates/
“…simplistic demogoguery.”
My favorite is Lee’s “School Finance for Simpletons” explanation.
Not even a hint of understanding any enterprise, much less schools.
Do the terms “overhead, payroll and indirect costs” ring any distant bells, Lee? (That’s a rhetorical question, BTW, we can guess the answer.)
Randy, everyone recognizes that by any measure we want to use public school results are not acceptable. I believe that Rex himself thinks the current status quo is not acceptable. So some guy is correct, let’s bypass the nitpicking of numbers that almost universally show serious problems. The real difference between all of us is that there are those who are happy to wait ten more years for change and improvement, and then there are some of us who want much faster implementation of solutions. For example, the public relations ploy to allow half of one percent of students to have “any school” transfer starting in 2009 is exactly the problem. So you are a teacher. What are the solutions that will take effect quickly?
If the teachers are so underpaid, why wouldn’t they prefer to leave state schools and start their own school where they can earn $90,000 for $4,500 x 20 pupils?
I rent a very nice office with two rooms, the larger one larger and nicer than any classroom in Richland One, for $9,000 a year, including utilities. A copy machine and computer costs $2,000. That leaves $79,000 for a few other expenses, so let’s say the teacher nets $75,000.
Could it be that state school teachers actually make more than $75,000 when you include all the benefits? Or could it be that educrats fear the best teachers would leave and go in business for themselves?
let’s bypass the nitpicking of numbers that almost universally show serious problems – Dave
Universal? Numbers? What numbers Dave? You don’t have anything other than SAT and drop out rates. That’s my point, the debate relies on word of mouth – parrotting.
Data is used to make decisions in all aspects of life; business plans, engineering, auto safety, buying and selling homes, budgets, market research, creating new medicines etc.
I am constantly astounded by the hypocrisy of the pro-voucher mob who want schools to be subjected to the market model, but refuse to subject their scheme to the practices of private business. This would include empirical analysis, business plans, and budgets.
I understand it’s easier to speak in platitudes and generalizations with abundant use of pejorative terms and demogoguery.
There are hundreds of market solutions to the one-size-fits-few model of state schools.
Entrepreneurs have no obligation to justify their business to the government, only to their customers, the parents and students.
Where is the business model for Ridge View High School or any other school? Where is their plan and metrics of quality? How did they do? Who was fired or punished for failure?
I filed a Freedom of Information request for PACT scores by teacher for my kids’ elementary school about five years ago. I was invited into down to the district office where I met in a conference room with four people (three of whom said nothing during the entire meeting and appeared to be there solely to outnumber me)… The excuse I was given as to why I couldn’t see the teacher PACT scores was that I might be able to determine individual students scores from the raw scores. They either are ignorant (and may need a refresher course on statistics from Randy) or thought I was an idiot (jury still out on that one).
That’s like saying you could figure out Barry Bonds batting average from knowing what the team batting average was…
Needless to say, my request was denied.
That was one event that spurred me on to run for school board.
Randy, I asked you for proposed solutions. How about forgoing the nitpicking and finger pointing and propose what you think are solutions. If you dont propose solutions, be default you are supporting the status quo and no changes. It’s time to be positive and forward thinking.
If you ran the public schools, wouldn’t you hide information from the public, too?
If I ran the public schools and thought like the liberals do, I would say the heck with this so let me run for Senate and abandon this mess. Do I hear Inez here? I have seen business people who are failing right now try to get shareholders to focus on a “ten year plan”. That usually gets them fired very quickly, but that isnt the case with the establishment in education.
Doug, what are the steps to file a freedom of information request? If you had a lawyer with you, I bet the results would have been different.
It’s time to be positive and forward thinking. – Dave
LOL, talk about “pot calling the kettle black”. So in the business world they idenify problems and craft solutions without data, just positive forward thinking?
Clearly, you have no evidence and are doing a little dance to avoid admitting this.
Some of the data I use is the relationship between ecomomic status and academic indicators. SAT scores of districts are strongly associated with poverty level. The same is true between % passing the HSAP exit exam and poverty. The same is true between % passing state end of course exams and poverty level.
Once again, I’ll state that the only public figure I have seen address this issue in detail is Campbell. Taking this approach makes more sense than blindly throwing out choice as a solution.
Here’s the South Carolina Code of Laws related to Freedom of Information Requests.
http://www.scstatehouse.net/code/t30c004.htm
Here’s some excerpts:
“Toward this end, provisions of this chapter must be construed so as to make it possible for citizens, or their representatives, to learn and report fully the activities of their public officials at a minimum cost or delay to the persons seeking access to public documents or meetings. ”
“”Public body” means any department of the State, … any state board, commission, agency, and authority, any public or governmental body or political subdivision of the State, including counties, municipalities, townships, school districts, and special purpose districts, ”
” “Public record” includes all books, papers, maps, photographs, cards, tapes, recordings, or other documentary materials regardless of physical form or characteristics prepared, owned, used, in the possession of, or retained by a public body.”
“Any person has a right to inspect or copy any public record of a public body, except as otherwise provided by Section 30-4-40,…”
Bottom line, there is very little information held within OUR government which should not be visible to the public.
Reality is that government agencies will use all means to NOT comply with requests.
Try it sometime… see if you can find out what the district spends on technology. When I ran for school board, I made the request and got a high level summary that left out all sorts of obvious expenses. Ignorance or deception? Form your own opinion…
We’ve had our battles, but I do respect your insight. When you channel it on specific issues like the PACT, you bring to light some problems to which most are oblivious.
I absolutely agree that we need much greater accountability. What I find a huge obstacle for reform is the lack of information to evaluate our schools and educators. And as you’ve pointed out, what’s the use of PACT scores if there’s no accountability?
If Paul’s still lurking around, I’d like his take on this.
Randy,
If Jim Rex announced tomorrow that PACT testing was cancelled for this year, he would GUARANTEE his re-election. Parents, teachers, and principals would all breathe a sigh of relief and maybe teachers could get back to doing what they are trained (more than most professions) to do. The only people who would be bothered would be the people who process the tests (an out of state contractor, I believe) and those who create reams of meaningless statistics.
School kids might think they lucked out initially until they realized that there would be no more pre-PACT homework-free weeks and post-PACT recovery weeks. It would give teachers three more actual weeks of TEACHING.
Three extra weeks of teaching won’t do any good until you know why a so many expensive new teaching schemes failed to generate any improvements. PACT may not be the answer, but the previous 30 years certainly never provided many answers, either.
Randy, you keep asking me for data but you know that reams of specific data have already been posted on this blog. You want me to recap it all? And from what Doug writes, the schools are hiding key data that would help citizens to formulate opinions anyway. Here is a business story that may be relevant. About 20 years ago, IBM was on the ropes. They hired Lou Gerstner as ceo and he reviewed the company and saw that a vast number of workers were back office support. Sort of like the admin people in public education. He got rid of many of them, took the good ones and put them into customer direct contact roles, and with this basic maneuver turned the whole company around and it has thrived ever since. Now, is this needed in public education? You tell me or I ask anyone to weigh in.
One idea that might help public education would be to change the pay structure for teachers and principals. It would probably be difficult, but try to move away from the teacher pay structure that is based on years of service and degrees granted. If a school district finds a rising star in the classroom, why should
she be paid less than a colleague with ten years experience who may not be as effective. Personal observation: The feedback I get from my kids has generally been the teachers with Dr. in front of their name have not been the best teachers yet they are paid more for that title.
Also, great schools have great principals. But the career path for great principals seems to be a move from within the school into the district administration. I haven’t researched it, but I’m guessing it may be due to higher salary potential. In my opinion, the only person in the school district who should be paid more than the best principals would be the superintendent… and the gap between them should be no more than 10%.
I’m frequently accused of being against public schools… but I’m not. I’m against the execessive spending that would be better spent on teacher salaries (assuming a true pay for performance structure). Increase the pay for teachers and remove the barriers that prevent them from focusing on their jobs and we’ll see improvement in the public schools that you won’t need a test to measure.
The best and quickest way to make pay for based more on their actual worth to the students is to privatize education and put it all in the open market, where there is more daylight and accountability than in the state schools.
Doug, great points. A major problem, I believe, is the shortage of teachers, let alone quality teachers. Go the the SC teacher recruitment site in the MIDDLE of a school year and you’ll see a ton of open positions.
Another related issue is tying salary to demand. Teachers in content areas that are underpopulated are already being offered signing bonuses in some areas – special ed, math and science are in great demand.
The problem with administrators is magnified. I have been underwhelmed by many with whom I have worked. They can undermine the effectiveness of teachers. I have first hand knowledge of Richland 1 making many decisions in this area that has caused many teachers to transfer out.
Let me say I like PACT scores because the data it provides. The key is how they use it, which is your big point. I also like the end of course exams. Let’s measure performance of teachers and students and hold them accountable.
reams of specific data have already been posted on this blog. – Dave
So you should have no trouble citing 1 set of data aside from SAT or drop out rates.
Business leaders looking to apply some of Gerstner’s medicine to their own companies’ ills will be disappointed. The author says that IBM’s problems, challenges, complexity and culture are unique, and the fixes he applied are unlikely to be easily transferred. – Forbes article on Gerstner