As the House of Representatives prepares to vote today on Speaker Boehner’s bill to revive the Washington D.C. Opportunity Scholarship Program that gives disadvantaged children a chance to escape failing public schools and to get a quality private education, the administration continued to advocate its defeat.
Among the arguments put forward by the White House yesterday was the claim that scholarship recipients don’t do any better than other students. But, as the Washington Post pointed out in a trenchant editorial, the evidence points in a different direction. There is, in fact, a wealth of evidence that students who take advantage of voucher programs do better in reading and have better graduation rates than other low-income inner city students.
Those who claim that using public funds for private and especially parochial schools is a violation of the principle of separating church and state are dead wrong. The funds in question go to the parents who may use them to choose the school that they think best serves their child’s interests. They are no different than the government aid that goes to veterans who may attend any college under the G.I. bill or the massive amount of money that is directed in grants that go to a host of universities, including those with a religious affiliation. And far from harming public schools, by creating the competition that the capital’s failing public system needs, vouchers can help make them better.
The reason why the president and other liberals oppose school choice is not based on the evidence of their utility or the Constitution but rather ideology and politics. Giving parents of poor children the ability to choose their child’s school is good for education but undermines the government education monopoly and the teachers unions.
During the last Congress, Democrats ignored the best interests of these children and killed the D.C. vouchers program. Doing so required not merely an ideological rigidity that enabled them to ignore the pleas of parents and students. It also took a degree of hypocrisy that is unusual even in politicians. President Obama, who sends his own two children to an elite private academy in the District, signed the bill killing scholarships that enabled poor children to attend the same school. As the current Congress seeks to undo the damage he did, the president still stands against this program. In addition to pointing out the evidence of the benefits of school choice, as the Washington Post did today, we must again ask the president whether he truly believes that all children, be they rich or poor, deserve a fair chance at a good education.
Among the arguments put forward by the White House yesterday was the claim that scholarship recipients don’t do any better than other students. But, as the Washington Post pointed out in a trenchant editorial, the evidence points in a different direction. There is, in fact, a wealth of evidence that students who take advantage of voucher programs do better in reading and have better graduation rates than other low-income inner city students.
Those who claim that using public funds for private and especially parochial schools is a violation of the principle of separating church and state are dead wrong. The funds in question go to the parents who may use them to choose the school that they think best serves their child’s interests. They are no different than the government aid that goes to veterans who may attend any college under the G.I. bill or the massive amount of money that is directed in grants that go to a host of universities, including those with a religious affiliation. And far from harming public schools, by creating the competition that the capital’s failing public system needs, vouchers can help make them better.
The reason why the president and other liberals oppose school choice is not based on the evidence of their utility or the Constitution but rather ideology and politics. Giving parents of poor children the ability to choose their child’s school is good for education but undermines the government education monopoly and the teachers unions.
During the last Congress, Democrats ignored the best interests of these children and killed the D.C. vouchers program. Doing so required not merely an ideological rigidity that enabled them to ignore the pleas of parents and students. It also took a degree of hypocrisy that is unusual even in politicians. President Obama, who sends his own two children to an elite private academy in the District, signed the bill killing scholarships that enabled poor children to attend the same school. As the current Congress seeks to undo the damage he did, the president still stands against this program. In addition to pointing out the evidence of the benefits of school choice, as the Washington Post did today, we must again ask the president whether he truly believes that all children, be they rich or poor, deserve a fair chance at a good education.
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