Gov. Bill Lee of Tennessee is promoting education vouchers in TN. It will change the public education system. Here is an article on the voucher program in Tennessee, and vouchers generally.
Posted Dec 8, 2023, 4:37 AM UTC
Here is why vouchers are inequitable.
The vouchers will be for about $7000 per year. The problem will be that no school will only charge $7000 per year. Private schools will charge much more than that. This means that the only people who will be able to choose school vouchers are wealthy families who can afford the offset.
And here is the real hypocrisy. Vouchers are supposed to give parents a choice of something other than “failing schools”. But if a successful school costs more than $7000 per student to run, how can public schools go from “failing” to “successful” without the same amount of money per student? And how will they be able to do it when the end result of vouchers will be to pull even more money out of education?
This will make education worse, and the proof will be everywhere? But they won’t change it because it is cash giveaway to the wealthy and upper middle class. That’s what Republicans are all about. Help those that don’t need it and”good luck” to those who do.
Not sure I understand your comment. Are you saying you know what private school tuitions will be in the future? Aren't they set by the market, like other prices, and don't they vary by school and area?
Also, if I'm a low income parent, how will a $7k voucher not help me to afford a school for my kid? Even if it doesn't cover the entire amount, it certainly is a huge help.
Finally, if I move my kid from a public school to a private one, why shouldn't the child's share of funding follow the child? Why should the government school retain the money to educate a child that's no longer at that school?
Thanks in advance.
First, if you’re a poor family living paycheck to paycheck and can’t afford any money for school, getting $7000 to attend a school that even costs $8000 a year won’t help. You can’t make up the gap. No choice for you, you’re stuck with whatever the government gives you. (Average tuition in Tennessee private schools is $11k). It’s not equitable for the poor.
Also, private schools can cherry pick their students. No English Language learners. No kids with certain disabilities. They may even get away with racial discrimination and segregation. This is also fundamentally unequal treatment. Private schools can simply pop up only in wealthy neighborhoods, white neighborhoods, and not provide any form of transportation. And that’s fine - that is their choice, but it’s not one that should be funded by taxpayers.
What happens when the private schools are full? Which kids get to go and which ones don’t? The practical answer will is, “rich white kids with good test scores are in, everyone else is out.” This is already a problem at charter schools who routinely expel students with low test scores because they look better on paper when everyone is a high achiever.
Another argument is “Well that’s my tax money.” No, no it isn’t. It isn’t your tax money anymore than my federal income tax money is mine. I can’t decide I’d rather have my own private security force instead of the United States Army for national defense. Even if I hire my own security force, I am still under that blanket of protection, so I just pay for it.
People without children also pay taxes. Can they choose only to have their tax money go only to public schools and not voucher programs? Or how about this… Should we offer only the property tax that a person pays themselves as the maximum benefit for their family? If you only paid $1600 in property tax, shouldn’t that be the max limit of your benefit? Why not? Why should a family of five children living in an apartment receive $35,000 to school their children privately when they pay ZERO in property taxes (school funding) for their community?
The propose of government should not be funneling tax money to private organizations. It ought to be providing desperately needed public services, like education.
Important question:
Does the government have the responsibility to provide every child a quality education?
If you answer “no” to this, the conversation is over. There is no middle ground. If the answer is “yes, they should provide a quality education for all children” then we can move on.
Vouchers are Republicans saying, “We refuse to do what’s necessary to fund schools properly and provide a quality education, but at least the wealthy people that vote for us can have one for their children.” That’s the wrong way to go about things. Republicans control absolutely everything in Tennessee. Why is the educational system there so bad? (I taught I rural East Tennessee for two years - extremely red county).
I think there is a better argument for vouchers if you’re providing a quality education to all students. If you’re just grinding the system into the ground, it’s unethical to wave the white flag and simply turn over money to the rich.
Republican leadership in Tennessee / if you’re serious about wanting a better education for kids in your state, then GIVE THEM ONE. Find the money, and pay for it! It’s your most important job. You have both chambers of the legislature and the governors office. You can do whatever you want. Why does your education system still suck, even in those counties where you win 95% of the vote?
“Give every kid a quality education” sounds great, but the truth is that we don’t know how to do that. Throwing money at the educators unions for years hasn’t worked. I favor letting parents choose whether to stay with the existing government school system or to spend their share of the public funding on the resources that work best for them. This is working in other states and it can work in Tennessee.
Except then you start making the choice for all parents because the public system can't operate on shaky funding like that. The same with proposals to take social security private. Sure now you have a "choice." You have to give you money to hedge funds etc. that don't have to have your interest at heart. The money gets elected to go to something with less transparency, oversight, with unqualified promises of being better. Feel free to look up Argentina's voucher program. This has already been done, and it doesn't go well.
Look where you will land before you leap.
Throwing money at educators and unions? With all due respect…. WTF are you talking about? Who the F threw money at teachers? How much money was “thrown” and who threw it? If your entire premise is that we are, to use your words, throwing money and teachers and unions, then (and I am trying to say so as respectfully as possible) you you don’t have tue foggiest idea what you’re talking about. Let me explain.
Funding for education hasn’t increased proportional to even a modest inflation rate for the last quarter century. And no profession has seen slower pay growth than teachers who have, in fact, seen NEGATIVE pay growth when accounting for inflation over the past two decades. No other profession in America can say that. None.
I was paid very well in IT for 20+ years before becoming a teacher. I didn’t make a career switch for the money. But even if I get a PHD and work 3@ more years, I still won’t even make 60% of what I made in my last IT position which I left in 2020. Tell me again how we are “throwing money at teachers”.
When was finishing my teacher certification in Tennessee, the pandemic hit. I left my job to take a paraprofessional job at a local school as a behavioral specialist. I made $9 an hour. After I paid for my health benefits (During COVID, so I really needed them), I took home less than $110 a week. After I became a teacher, I got a huge raise all the way up to $27,000 a year. You know how I loved on that? Well, I didn’t. Luckily I made all my money in the years previous in IT, so I could afford to live on what I had saved.
Throwing money at teachers? Really? I would have done better letting people toss coins at me on the highway.
And teachers unions… you know who throws money at them? TEACHERS! OUT OF OUR MEAGER SALARIES! You don’t pay a dime for them. We choose to do it voluntarily.
And if you say that the reason education sucks is that the government doesn’t know squat about education, then why would we trust them to get it right with vouchers. Isn’t that just one more bad idea after a litany of bad ideas?
The median income for a college educated professional is $74,000 a year nationally. The median income for the average teacher is $60,000. We don’t have the best and brightest trying to become teachers because we aren’t willing to pay for it.
I used to think all kinds of stupid stuff about the education system. I thought it was broken because the system was broken. Becoming an educator has opened my eyes. The system isn’t broken. Rich people simply don’t want to pay for a fictional education system. That’s the facts. If you u don’t believe it, quit your job, become a teacher, see how it runs, and prove me wrong. Find all those wasted dollars you’re talking about. There are none. I make twice as much money at a different district in Colorado now, but it’s still less than half of what college educated people in my metro area make. My budget is good for 4 dry erase markers and one roll of scotch tape per year - I wish that was a joke or an exaggeration, but it’s not. If your kid is lucky enough to get me as a teacher, you win because I buy all my own classroom supplies and everything I need to help my students learn. I don’t know any other teacher that can afford to do that. Here’s hoping I don’t run out of money or patience.
I know that none of this will change your mind. The only thing that will is getting you into a classroom in front of students and working with parents, administrators, and the district on spending few dollars we have at our disposal.
I know extremely conservative teachers, extremely liberal teachers, and centrist teachers. Not one of them believes we are spending what we should on education. Not one of them thinks we are throwing away millions of tax dollars somewhere. I dont know who is crafting that narrative, but it simply isn’t true. There are individual stories of theft and corruption - that doesn’t mean there is a systemic and widespread problem in education any more so than it does in any other industry. By and large schools and teachers both are dramatically underfunded.
Good news for Tennessee.
Feel free to look at the story that just broke in PA. Their subsidized schools who get to discriminate against children for the upbringing, religion, and disabilities... and are surprised that it's happening. And somehow, scores also aren't improving.
That’s important information for parents to have. Ultimately, it’s up to parents to decide how important those stories are and then make decisions about their kids’ education. It’s not up to you, me or the state of PA.
Because these measures are happening by referendum votes? No, these laws are getting put in by reps who got financing from supporters with interests in privitizing education for profit.
Then they do what? Vote it back to no vouchers? This info is important. If it is important, then you need that info before anyone installs vouchers. Educated electorate is essential. Nobody assumes their child won't be good enough for the theoretical wonder school. And by then, it's too late.
The small number of Jewish schools in the state currently have significant, in some cases majority, non-Jewish enrollment.
Not too many Muslim schools and no Hindu schools yet.
No Satanic schools either yet but that will change soon as the Church of Satan loves legal test cases.
We do have some schools affiliated with obscure religions no one has heard of, all which mind their own business at present. Maybe vouchers will ruin that.
As far as atheist being a concern, that is 99% of schools. If anyone had a concern about that I'm sure they'd have complained already.
Article seems hysterical and clueless, which is unfortunate since I think these vouchers will lead to problems and do little if any good.