OT: Latest (July 2022) county population estimates are out

[Ranchdawg]

I'll probably regret this but I want to weigh on the school choice debate. And I want to try to do so without pointing fingers at any individual posters here - because I believe you sincerely just want the best possible education for your children.

The problem with school vouchers is that some of the ideas for (or reasons behind) them mentioned by people on this board don't actually line up with how school voucher legislation is typically written. For example, some of the proponents here have suggested that if private schools do get public funds, they shouldn't be allowed to discriminate when picking students. The reality, however, is that voucher legislation is typically written so that private schools can continue to discriminate based on any factor they want (race, sex, belief, etc...). It's also written so that private schools can teach whatever they want to teach, without any sort oversight or consistency.

Similarly, some proponents on the board have suggested that if a private school does receive public funds, then we should be able to audit them. But again, voucher legislation is written in such a way that those schools can't actually be audited. Which, again, means those private schools are spending our tax dollars without any sort of oversight.

Proponents also like to point to the idea that vouchers can help low income students attend better schools. But that argument is disingenuous at best. Voucher legislation is written in such a way that it's never really fully funded. And that's intentional. It means low income students can't actually take advantage of the program. If Private School A costs $10,000 a year and the voucher is only for $4,000 a year, those lower income families can't cover the difference. But a middle or upper class family, who can probably already afford the tuition anyway, would be happy to have the tax payer give them a discount.

Voucher laws are written as basically one-way traffic - taxpayer money flows away from public schools, through middle and upper class families, to private schools but the private schools don't face any obligations about who they teach or what they teach, etc. And there aren't any regulations about who they hire as teachers. As mentioned a few times before, public schools don't have that luxury. They have to follow state curriculums and accept anyone in their district.

Somebody mentioned Newt Gingrich above. He has said publicly that his goal is to abolish the public school system in this country. The truth is that the voucher system - as it is actually written in legislative form - is design to starve the public school system of resources so that it eventually collapses. That then puts the cost of educating children on individuals (and not on the community as a whole), which obviously means that students from lower income families are going to be left further behind.

Whoever said above that calls for more funding for education in this day and age are less about giving schools more money and more about keeping their budgets from getting smaller is right. At least here in Mississippi anyway. Someone feel free to correct me if I'm wrong, but I believe we have the lowest funding for education in the entire country (at least on a per student basis). So people saying that "giving more money to public education here won't help" don't actually know that. We've never fully funded education in this state so we don't know how outcomes would improve if we did spend more money on it.

There are legitimate criticisms of the educational system in this country (and certainly of the system here in Mississippi), plenty of which I agree with. I definitely sympathize with people who are in poorer performing school districts with no easy way out. And the "well just pick up and move" approach is a bit callous because that's obviously not possible for a lot of people.

I'm not an educator so I'm not going to pretend I know how to make public education in this state or this country better. But I do believe that public education - like police and fire and roads and the military and plenty of other tax payer-funded things - is a public good and should be supported by the community as a whole. If for no other reason than "A rising tide lifts all boats." And so anything - like a voucher program - that diminishes public schools is a bad idea.

Thanks for coming to my Ted Talk.

Here's what Newt had to say about one school district. He comes from an education background and has an excellent understanding of what is going on. The main stream media hates him and make false statements like, "Newt Gingrich said Social Security is dying on the vine". What he actually said was, "If we don't do something to shore up Social Security it will be dying on the vine".

Newt from Twitter:
When 41% of Baltimore City School students earn BELOW a 1.0 grade point average we face a moral, humanitarian and national security crisis. Morally how can you exercise your right to “pursue happiness” if your school fails to educate you?

Any legislator against the voucher system will insure it fails. Democrats "we want to insure that kids receive our message". Republicans and Democrats "we don't want anyone going to our private schools that can't afford it".

 

[johnson86-1]

These are some of the best points dealing with this issue that I have read in this entire thread and, I must say that golfer and PRA are really hitting the nail on the head:
Point #1 It's also written so that private schools can teach whatever they want to teach, without any sort oversight or consistency.

That's a fine approach. Parents aren't generally going to forgo their kid getting a decent education. Some will choose off the wall or even terrible stuff, but it will be fewer than the number of students stuck in ****** schools now. But it's also a fine approach to require schools accepting vouchers to be accredited. Or to do something in between, where you don't require accreditation but do require that they take a state test so parents have easily reviewable feedback. Not liking the way some states have done vouchers is not a reason to be against vouchers generally.

Point #2 Which, again, means those private schools are spending our tax dollars without any sort of oversight.

I would say parents provide plenty of oversight. The reason you need public procurement rules and auditing of public schools is that they don't have to provide a decent education to keep getting money. But again, if you want to have a state test and require a certain pass rate to stay eligible for vouchers, that's an ok approach too. The downside is that you strongly incentivize teaching to a test, but it wouldn't be worse than what we are doing now.

Point #3 But a middle or upper class family, who can probably already afford the tuition anyway, would be happy to have the tax payer give them a discount.

Sure, and why shouldn't they? I'm paying taxes to educate other people's children, I want to maximize the chance that the education is good. Why do I care whether they get educated in a government run school?

Point #4 We've never fully funded education in this state so we don't know how outcomes would improve if we did spend more money on it.

There are plenty of places that provide good education for the amount of money we spend per pupil now. Our worst schools are not generally bad because of a lack of money. It's because of a combination of not holding school operators accountable while at the same time limiting how they can operate and micromanaging them in some respects.

Point #5 The truth is that the voucher system - as it is actually written in legislative form - is design to starve the public school system of resources so that it eventually collapses.

There is no "voucher system". There are voucher programs. And they aren't designed to starve public schools. THey are designed to give poorer parents some of the choice that richer parents have. They are generally indifferent to how kids get educated. They don't revere government operated schools just because they are operated by the government. That said, plenty of people do revere government operated schools and would not utilize vouchers (or would utilize vouchers to go to a government run school where they don't live in the area feeding that school). .

I could not agree with these five points more. The reality is proponents of the school choice voucher system as proposed are looking to shut down the public education system. Some might think this is a great idea but many others including myself do not. The bashing of the public school system by politicians and others that have never set foot in a classroom make it seem like this is a viable option, but as we can see from the points above it is not really viable. Not only that but it would only make the situation for poor kids worse unless the money comes with oversight this is a really just another power grab by the wealthy. I can not believe I am agreeing with golfer but his analysis is spot on in terms of accountability. As long as private schools are allowed to play by their own set of rules then they should never receive any kind of public funds.

That would be hard to do in a lot of places. Lots of poor students would be better off if they just went to a ****** school that is safe.

I swear, if people held government operated schools to the same standards they hold vouchers, they would prosecute proponents of government run schools as war criminals.

 

[Perd Hapley]

Here's what Newt had to say about one school district. He comes from an education background and has an excellent understanding of what is going on. The main stream media hates him and make false statements like, "Newt Gingrich said Social Security is dying on the vine". What he actually said was, "If we don't do something to shore up Social Security it will be dying on the vine".

Newt from Twitter:
When 41% of Baltimore City School students earn BELOW a 1.0 grade point average we face a moral, humanitarian and national security crisis. Morally how can you exercise your right to “pursue happiness” if your school fails to educate you?

Any legislator against the voucher system will insure it fails. Democrats "we want to insure that kids receive our message". Republicans and Democrats "we don't want anyone going to our private schools that can't afford it".

Agree with the 2nd paragraph. On the first paragraph, I think its pretty naive to think that the inner city Baltimore schools are “failing to educate” at that clip, and that there are no other factors in play. Everyone knows that’s not true. Even the dumbest of the dumb can easily achieve a 2.0 in the average American public school, K-12, simply from showing up, behaving well enough to not get suspended / expelled, and knowing how to read.

I’ll now ask you to take a wild guess on what are the 3 biggest problems that Baltimore educators face for students in elementary school and beyond…..and who is to blame for those problems.

 

[johnson86-1]

No. Vouchers, dollar for dollar, all expenses paid, but only for high achieving students to leave for better schools, or for older public school students to leave failing schools.

I'm not necessarily opposed to making more opportunities available to high achieving students but I also don't think being poor and of average intelligence means you don't deserve the opportunity to go to a safe and decent school.

It gives you what you say you want, while not destroying the public school system. Again, my (extra) tax dollars shouldn't go to a family that just doesn't want to use a good public school, or to idiot kids.

I just don't get the reverence for government run schools or the disdain for people that aren't above average intelligence. I'm paying the money, I just want the money to be used to educate kids. I have relatives who send two of their kids to a big *** public school and the other they send to a small private school. One of them would thrive anywhere, one of them needs the big *** school to have a peer group, and one of them was completely lost. Perfectly good public school. If my tax dollars went to the private school instead of the government run school, what do I care? I want the kid to be miserable just because why?

I can also be behind giving states/localities more room to do something different than federal regs/funding typically allows for failing schools. I fear that some states would drive schools to failing so they could take over, but that could probably be dealt with.

 

[Ranchdawg]

Agree with the 2nd paragraph. On the first paragraph, I think its pretty naive to think that the inner city Baltimore schools are “failing to educate” at that clip, and that there are no other factors in play. Everyone knows that’s not true. Even the dumbest of the dumb can easily achieve a 2.0 in the average American public school, K-12, simply from showing up, behaving well enough to not get suspended / expelled, and knowing how to read.

I’ll now ask you to take a wild guess on what are the 3 biggest problems that Baltimore educators face for students in elementary school and beyond…..and who is to blame for those problems.

Here's a good article on the school system with some excellent statistics for spending nationwide: Baltimore Schools failing
BTW, Maryland is spending $15,489 per student while MS is spending $9,653/student.

 

[PooPopsBaldHead]

 

[johnson86-1]

Proponents also like to point to the idea that vouchers can help low income students attend better schools. But that argument is disingenuous at best. Voucher legislation is written in such a way that it's never really fully funded. And that's intentional. It means low income students can't actually take advantage of the program. If Private School A costs $10,000 a year and the voucher is only for $4,000 a year, those lower income families can't cover the difference. But a middle or upper class family, who can probably already afford the tuition anyway, would be happy to have the tax payer give them a discount.

All you have to do is require that schools accepting vouchers make a certain number of spots available for the voucher amount, and require that those spots be handed out first roughly to the poorest people first. I think Jackson Academy is ~$15k a year. THat's not going to be the typical voucher school, but let's say they have 100 students in each grade and you require that 15% of students be allowed to attend for the voucher amount. So they add 12 spots in each grade for $4k and "lose" $132k from those students. The families of the other 100 students now have an extra $400k to spend. You think JA can raise tuition $2k per student, and have an extra $200k annually per grade to offset the discounted tuition? They'd probably raise it $3k and capture $300k per grade.

The more typical situation would be in the Delta with relatively cheap tuition. So it'd be $4k voucher and $7k tuition. Say 50 students and they add six voucher students. So they "lose" $18k in tuition per grade and the families get an extra $200k per grade. If they capture half of that, that's a huge boost to their budget.

Probably would be better to require 10% at the voucher amount and another 10% at the voucher plus half the difference, or $3k, whichever is less. Plenty of ways you could structure it, would just have to look at the details of how you do it to encourage existing schools to accept as many low income students as possible without making it so burdensome that the paying parents can't come out ahead.

ETA: That said, vouchers are certainly not a cureall. The main problem for most students is their home environment, not the school (or really the fact that so many people they are around and at school with have a poor home environment). Lots of those kids will have parents that don't care to do anything other than the easiest thing possible to them. But a decent voucher program at least prevents the worst immorality of the current situation, which condemns students with parents that care but are poor to a ****** and unsafe school because while the parents care, they don't know how to move them to a decent public school in a place they can afford to live.

 

[Boom Boom]

I'm not necessarily opposed to making more opportunities available to high achieving students but I also don't think being poor and of average intelligence means you don't deserve the opportunity to go to a safe and decent school.



I just don't get the reverence for government run schools or the disdain for people that aren't above average intelligence. I'm paying the money, I just want the money to be used to educate kids. I have relatives who send two of their kids to a big *** public school and the other they send to a small private school. One of them would thrive anywhere, one of them needs the big *** school to have a peer group, and one of them was completely lost. Perfectly good public school. If my tax dollars went to the private school instead of the government run school, what do I care? I want the kid to be miserable just because why?

And there it is. If it isn't destroying public education, you're not interested.

Note that I said it would apply to failing schools. So yes poor and stupid kids get to go to a safe school too, oh disingenuous one.

It's not a reverence for govt run schools, it's a recognition of the alternatives.

It's not disdain for stupid kids. My proposal spends EXTRA money for them to get safe, decent schools too. I'm just not proposing spending even more money to give a lavish education to stupid kids.

 

[Ranchdawg]

All you have to do is require that schools accepting vouchers make a certain number of spots available for the voucher amount, and require that those spots be handed out first roughly to the poorest people first. I think Jackson Academy is ~$15k a year. THat's not going to be the typical voucher school, but let's say they have 100 students in each grade and you require that 15% of students be allowed to attend for the voucher amount. So they add 12 spots in each grade for $4k and "lose" $132k from those students. The families of the other 100 students now have an extra $400k to spend. You think JA can raise tuition $2k per student, and have an extra $200k annually per grade to offset the discounted tuition? They'd probably raise it $3k and capture $300k per grade.

The more typical situation would be in the Delta with relatively cheap tuition. So it'd be $4k voucher and $7k tuition. Say 50 students and they add six voucher students. So they "lose" $18k in tuition per grade and the families get an extra $200k per grade. If they capture half of that, that's a huge boost to their budget.

Probably would be better to require 10% at the voucher amount and another 10% at the voucher plus half the difference, or $3k, whichever is less. Plenty of ways you could structure it, would just have to look at the details of how you do it to encourage existing schools to accept as many low income students as possible without making it so burdensome that the paying parents can't come out ahead.

Where did the $4k number come from? I understand MS is paying over $9k per student.

 

[OG Goat Holder]

 

[johnson86-1]

Where did the $4k number come from? I understand MS is paying over $9k per student.

I was using his example. I do think that it's probably a realistic number. I think a politically realistic number would be to allow the state funds to follow the student, not necessarily the local funds. And then you have to account that the $9k average is inflated by special needs students. And if it's designed properly, there will be a lot of people currently paying taxes and paying full freight at private schools, so it will push spending up if we fund vouchers to the same extent as state funding. I think that'd be well worth it, but politically, there would probably be some reduction in the voucher amount to keep from blowing the budget up and also to leave flexibility to help failing schools with fixed costs they can't get rid of immediately.

 

[PRAVan1996]

Newt from Twitter:
When 41% of Baltimore City School students earn BELOW a 1.0 grade point average we face a moral, humanitarian and national security crisis. Morally how can you exercise your right to “pursue happiness” if your school fails to educate you?

Barely a few minutes of research shows this statement from Gingrich is, at best, taken out of context but more likely intentionally misleading. It's from a report where data was taken partway through the school year before first-semester grades at several of the schools had been entered.

 

[johnson86-1]

And there it is. If it isn't destroying public education, you're not interested.

??? Not revering government run schools does not mean wanting to destroy them. And government run schools and public education are not the same thing. We can have public education without government run schools just like we can have food assistance without government run farms.

Note that I said it would apply to failing schools. So yes poor and stupid kids get to go to a safe school too, oh disingenuous one.

You said only older kids in failing schools would get to go. If you make kids in failing schools wait until they're older, you're waiting too late.

It's not a reverence for govt run schools, it's a recognition of the alternatives.

??? So it's just animosity towards private schools? Dislike of Catholics maybe? Still don't get it.

It's not disdain for stupid kids. My proposal spends EXTRA money for them to get safe, decent schools too. I'm just not proposing spending even more money to give a lavish education to stupid kids.

Sorry, I thought you were talking about just letting the money follow the students, not letting the money follow them and add to it. Not opposed to that and I do think we fail our smartest kids almost as much as we fail our neediest students, but I still would want something for just anybody in a bad situation to be able to change schools. Definitely in failing schools but there are decent schools that are still bad fits for certain students. I had an elementary school kids on a sports team that changed schools mid year just to get away from bullying. Was like a switch was flipped in how he acted at practice once he wasn't getting bullied at school. He was lucky enough to be able to go to another public school, but if that hadn't been an option, I really don't think they'd have been able to pay for private school. I just don't understand what benefits there are that justify trapping a kid like that in a bad situation.

 

[CoastTrash]

Mississippi needs a change of culture like our football program pre Dan Mullen

we can win in Mississippi

 

[GloryDawg]

Why can't we have a list of counties with the best piece of tail?

 

[PRAVan1996]

All you have to do is require that schools accepting vouchers make a certain number of spots available for the voucher amount, and require that those spots be handed out first roughly to the poorest people first. I think Jackson Academy is ~$15k a year. THat's not going to be the typical voucher school, but let's say they have 100 students in each grade and you require that 15% of students be allowed to attend for the voucher amount. So they add 12 spots in each grade for $4k and "lose" $132k from those students. The families of the other 100 students now have an extra $400k to spend. You think JA can raise tuition $2k per student, and have an extra $200k annually per grade to offset the discounted tuition? They'd probably raise it $3k and capture $300k per grade.

The more typical situation would be in the Delta with relatively cheap tuition. So it'd be $4k voucher and $7k tuition. Say 50 students and they add six voucher students. So they "lose" $18k in tuition per grade and the families get an extra $200k per grade. If they capture half of that, that's a huge boost to their budget.

Probably would be better to require 10% at the voucher amount and another 10% at the voucher plus half the difference, or $3k, whichever is less. Plenty of ways you could structure it, would just have to look at the details of how you do it to encourage existing schools to accept as many low income students as possible without making it so burdensome that the paying parents can't come out ahead.

ETA: That said, vouchers are certainly not a cureall. The main problem for most students is their home environment, not the school (or really the fact that so many people they are around and at school with have a poor home environment). Lots of those kids will have parents that don't care to do anything other than the easiest thing possible to them. But a decent voucher program at least prevents the worst immorality of the current situation, which condemns students with parents that care but are poor to a ****** and unsafe school because while the parents care, they don't know how to move them to a decent public school in a place they can afford to live.

I think your intentions are good. And I agree with some of your larger point - let's try to get kids the best education possible. But you seem to have some idealized notion of how voucher programs could or should work that doesn't line up with how they are purposefully designed to work when the legislation is actually drawn up.

You're offering reasonable compromises like requiring a certain number of spots for just the voucher amount or making the schools be accredited or making sure the students can pass a state test. And I think your belief that poorer students or students in bad situations should be able to more easily move schools is admirable. But the people in power at the state level who are pushing voucher programs don't actually want the programs to work that way. And the private schools (not to mention the parents of kids already at the private schools) also don't want the program to work the way you describe.

They sell the voucher programs as "kids from bad schools can move to better schools" but then write the legislation in such a way that that never actually happens. I hesitate to call it a bait and switch but that's basically what it is. They sell the program as helping disadvantaged kids but then structure it so that private schools end up with public money without any obligation to actually help the students that need help.

As for your belief that vouchers aren't designed to starve public schools... I don't know how else to say this but it's just wrong. That is literally the stated aim of many people who are pushing voucher programs. They want to privatize education at the expense of public schools.

 

[johnson86-1]

I think your intentions are good. And I agree with some of your larger point - let's try to get kids the best education possible. But you seem to have some idealized notion of how voucher programs could or should work that doesn't line up with how they are purposefully designed to work when the legislation is actually drawn up.

You're offering reasonable compromises like requiring a certain number of spots for just the voucher amount or making the schools be accredited or making sure the students can pass a state test. And I think your belief that poorer students or students in bad situations should be able to more easily move schools is admirable. But the people in power at the state level who are pushing voucher programs don't actually want the programs to work that way. And the private schools (not to mention the parents of kids already at the private schools) also don't want the program to work the way you describe.

I don't think you have a great idea of most private schools, particularly those in Mississippi, work. Most private schools are not selective and have lots of students with families that are just scraping by. Most of them aren't stellar, but just filtering for parents that care mean they do ok to good even without spending a lot of money. Those families and schools aren't going to turn down money to keep their schools "exclusive". Having parents that go through the trouble of pursuing vouchers will mostly be enough of a filter to avoid having kids that seriously negatively impact the school.

Certainly there will be schools that don't want voucher students, but I think they'll be pretty strongly outnumbered by schools that want the vouchers unless the requirements are set up to make it hard for private schools to participate.

They sell the voucher programs as "kids from bad schools can move to better schools" but then write the legislation in such a way that that never actually happens. I hesitate to call it a bait and switch but that's basically what it is. They sell the program as helping disadvantaged kids but then structure it so that private schools end up with public money without any obligation to actually help the students that need help.

As for your belief that vouchers aren't designed to starve public schools... I don't know how else to say this but it's just wrong. That is literally the stated aim of many people who are pushing voucher programs. They want to privatize education at the expense of public schools.

I suspect the reason voucher programs sometimes end up like that is that there is nobody that is concerned about negative impacts from vouchers willing to be reasonable. They fight anything that will help and in the face of the number of students trapped in failing schools, that's an increasingly untentable position outside of blue states. Certainly that approach delays any vouchers as long as possible, and for anti school choice people, that comes with the possibility that it will never come, but there is no incentive to move incrementally when the hold outs' votes are no longer necessary to get a voucher bill passed.

But also, this is florida's requirements for schools:

Requirements for Participating in State Scholarship Programs

Important: This is an attempt to summarize important requirements related to the state scholarship programs. This page is only a guide, and the provisions in.

www.fldoe.org

It not particularly stringent, but doesn't appear to be the wild west either.

Here are some of the individual requirements and amounts available:

https://www.fldoe.org/core/fileparse.php/7553/urlt/FLK12SchProgComp22.pdf

They're averaging about $7,400. There are certainly schools that are more than that. But I suspect there are plenty of schools that are that cheap also. For the traditional voucher program, you can't be affluent and qualify (unless a parent is in the armed forces). The traditional voucher program is limited to 1% of public school enrollment. So that was a pretty limited and incremental step that has still helped the most needy.

 

[TaleofTwoDogs]

The perception that Mississippi has a lower cost of living is just that, a perception. Moved last year from Dallas and in many respects the Jackson metro area is just as expensive. Maybe the greed driven inflation of the last year was the great equalizer, don't know.

 

[Palos verdes]

The perception that Mississippi has a lower cost of living is just that, a perception. Moved last year from Dallas and in many respects the Jackson metro area is just as expensive. Maybe the greed driven inflation of the last year was the great equalizer, don't know.

Inflation post covid

 

[WilCoDawg]

These are some of the best points dealing with this issue that I have read in this entire thread and, I must say that golfer and PRA are really hitting the nail on the head:
Point #1 It's also written so that private schools can teach whatever they want to teach, without any sort oversight or consistency.
Point #2 Which, again, means those private schools are spending our tax dollars without any sort of oversight.
Point #3 But a middle or upper class family, who can probably already afford the tuition anyway, would be happy to have the tax payer give them a discount.
Point #4 We've never fully funded education in this state so we don't know how outcomes would improve if we did spend more money on it.
Point #5 The truth is that the voucher system - as it is actually written in legislative form - is design to starve the public school system of resources so that it eventually collapses.

I could not agree with these five points more. The reality is proponents of the school choice voucher system as proposed are looking to shut down the public education system. Some might think this is a great idea but many others including myself do not. The bashing of the public school system by politicians and others that have never set foot in a classroom make it seem like this is a viable option, but as we can see from the points above it is not really viable. Not only that but it would only make the situation for poor kids worse unless the money comes with oversight this is a really just another power grab by the wealthy. I can not believe I am agreeing with golfer but his analysis is spot on in terms of accountability. As long as private schools are allowed to play by their own set of rules then they should never receive any kind of public funds.

But the public schools basically have no, if any, oversight or accountability. The unions have made sure of that. The point of vouchers is indeed meant to starve the public schools. The point of that is the same in the business world: if your product sucks and no one likes it, MAKE A CHANGE. Do you think people would send their kids to a private school if they could save money by getting the same education for free?
I don’t want to get rid of public schools by any means. My kids are public schooling it. I want it to work. But I also don’t think public schools should be doing a lot of the things they’re doing either.

 

[Boom Boom]

??? Not revering government run schools does not mean wanting to destroy them. And government run schools and public education are not the same thing. We can have public education without government run schools just like we can have food assistance without government run farms.



You said only older kids in failing schools would get to go. If you make kids in failing schools wait until they're older, you're waiting too late.


??? So it's just animosity towards private schools? Dislike of Catholics maybe? Still don't get it.


Sorry, I thought you were talking about just letting the money follow the students, not letting the money follow them and add to it. Not opposed to that and I do think we fail our smartest kids almost as much as we fail our neediest students, but I still would want something for just anybody in a bad situation to be able to change schools. Definitely in failing schools but there are decent schools that are still bad fits for certain students. I had an elementary school kids on a sports team that changed schools mid year just to get away from bullying. Was like a switch was flipped in how he acted at practice once he wasn't getting bullied at school. He was lucky enough to be able to go to another public school, but if that hadn't been an option, I really don't think they'd have been able to pay for private school. I just don't understand what benefits there are that justify trapping a kid like that in a bad situation.

Lol. Sure, just like we don't need an Army for national defense.

I'm open on age of eligibility for vouchers. I could be wrong, but I don't think we have as much of a problem at the younger grades than the older.

It's not animosity at all. You are correct, you don't get it. It's recognition that public education will not be achieved by private ends. It's called history and basic human nature.

I get that some kids just don't fit into public school. And I'm open to a solution that addresses it, but blanket vouchers for sure ain't it. At some point you just have to accept the limits of our ability to spend to fix problems. Some people are just dealt a worse hand than others. That's the conservative in me.

 

[Ranchdawg]

Lol. Sure, just like we don't need an Army for national defense.

I'm open on age of eligibility for vouchers. I could be wrong, but I don't think we have as much of a problem at the younger grades than the older.

It's not animosity at all. You are correct, you don't get it. It's recognition that public education will not be achieved by private ends. It's called history and basic human nature.

I get that some kids just don't fit into public school. And I'm open to a solution that addresses it, but blanket vouchers for sure ain't it. At some point you just have to accept the limits of our ability to spend to fix problems. Some people are just dealt a worse hand than others. That's the conservative in me.

Well, we can shut the thread down now. The ultimate authority has decided for us. We understand comrade. ***