Our educational system needs to have competition just like the private sector. The better schools will draw the most students and they should be able to bring their vouchers with them! The unions fight against merit pay because mediocre teachers want to keep their jobs. Higher pay should go to the better teachers and be an incentive to do better and bring in the best candidates. Votes: +1

A good friend of mine put the voucher issue this way:

"The wealthy argue vouchers will give parents choice to send their children to better schools. Two problems: should this happen, there won't be space enough in the better schools, but the reason people are living in poverty is frequently the fact that they have not learned to make good choices in the past, so the people most likely to benefit from vouchers are the wealthy." Votes: +0

Richard-

I appreciate the analogy you're offering but I think you've got the roles wrong. I don't think of the government or administrators as firemen responding to a house on fire. They're standing behind the barricade watching. It's the members of the community that need to run into the blaze carrying buckets of water and working to save the children. Government and administration are just the score keepers. It's up to us to turn around failing schools, together with the teachers. Abandoning the schools by redirecting funding only shifts the burdens and puts more children at risk.

Somebody correct me if I've got this wrong, but I believe that the NCLB legislation has a mechanism tied to AYP results that allows parents to move their kids to a higher performing school within the district and receive supplemental education services for their kids.

Isn't that a more meaningful response than the privatization of our K-12 infrastructure?


Votes: +1

I suppose if the house is on fire (Public Schools) and the vehicle that transports the firemen (Administration, government, policy makers, etc) who put out the fire has a flat tire, I have to wait for the tire to be fixed before I can get my child. And if my child perishes, then it is my fault because I allowed him to perish.
Parents should have a choice for better education for their children, vouchers or not. Bureaucracy and prejudices created the schools that need the most help and it is the bureaucracy that we are waiting for to fix the problem. Well what do parents do in the mean time. Educators blame parents, parents blame educators and the student suffers. If there is an opportunity for a child to experience a better educational experience then shouldn't they or is that only for the privileged. I suppose our tax money should be used to further mis-educate and under-educate another graduating class.

Vouchers may take away money now, but then maybe it will encourage districts to get on there job and offer a comparable education or better. I know, where will the funds come from, try the bureaucracy.
BTW: I teach at a private school where two of my children attend, I have a child in charter school and one in public school. Parents want a choice and to not be penalized or criticized for wanting the best opportunities for their children. Votes: +0

Failing schools in urban communities are destructive to the students, communities and the staff. There is no quick remedy or solution to slow the process or reverse the condition. Sure, increasing the educational dollars can buffer the impact of poverty but who decides where the money is spent and the duration of the program? Remedial programs are costly yet urban schools are deficient in all areas. Vouchers offer an alternative to an otherwise dismal situation.
Private schools can maintain the option of selecting students with vouchers based on academic ability while allowing donors and benevolent contributors to assist with educational expenses. Most parent who consider vouchers are seeking an alternative to the failing schools. Votes: +1

Bah-humbug...Parents need to take a more active roll in their childs schooling..alot of the problems that i have experienced has been behavioral...just basic manners adn consideration for other human beings. Votes: +2

I couldn't agree with you more. Your comments are right on. Disinvesting in the urban schools is detrimental. Charter schools are not working. Votes: +0

ur right edward Votes: -1

I don't think that the vouchers help any at all. If anything it makes it difficult for Private Schools that are struggling to keep their doors open to consider kids that they would never want to accept just for financial help. Also I do not feel that it would be fair to the regular private pay parents that invest their hard earned money for their child to receive a private school education and have to be placed with public school students. Votes: +0

If those who favor vouchers would think for a minute - vouchers would kill both public and private schools as we know them. First of all, private schools do not HAVE to take all comers, so they would drain off the best and brightest from public schools. The playing field is simply not level.

Secondly: do those who favor vouchers think there will not be any strings attached? In order to receive public money, private schools will have to adhere to the myriad of regulations and miles of red tape that public schools have to follow now - such as having to take the kind of student that most private schools wouldn't normally take.
So, in the end, either the private school will not accept the public money, or they will accept it and be no different than any public school.

When private schools point to their higher graduation rates and higher test scores, it is almost always that way because of the kind of student they accept, and the fact that they have far more control over class size and individual instruction. I know, because when I taught at a private school my average class size was 12, whereas in the public school it is 28. At the private school my proportion of "resource" students was about 1%, but at the public school it is around 15%.

So, tell me how will vouchers improve anything? Votes: +0

I agree, I have worked briefly in these schools that are placed in the more urban areas and I simply do not understand why funding cannot be distributed evenly in a large community. All public schools should receive the same amount of funding but, they don't and it isn't right. You are right, vouchers would only hurt these underpriveleged schools more than they are already suffering. Votes: +0