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You may be hearing a lot from Republicans this election season calling for “school choice” or “money follows the child” funding. Don't be fooled by these benign sounding words.
These are new terms to describe helping wealthier people pay for private schools, religious schools, magnet schools, charter schools, or home schools with your taxpayer dollars while shifting money away from our district schools (think back to Betsy DeVos). Representative Kimberly Fiorello (R-149th) and Senator Ryan Fazio (R-36th) have been gushing about school choice. Rep. Fiorello introduced several bills to promote it.
The problem? The vouchers, which are worth about $6,500, don't come close to making private school affordable. While the vouchers provide a nice tuition discount for affluent families, they still leave private schools out of reach for most students. Further, as families use vouchers to exit the public school system, they cut into its already strained budget, and push it into a death spiral. Fewer resources lead to poorer education outcomes, leading to more students exiting the system.
There have also been problems with the lack of oversight of charter schools and their failure to meet state education requirements.
Republicans have been trying to privatize public school education since before Roe v. Wade. The attacks on teachers, books, masks and curriculum we see in Greenwich and nationwide are part of a dark money well-funded conservative strategy to turn people against public education and portray schools as “failing,” in order to justify defunding them.
Their attacks on public schools are contributing to a dire teacher shortage. The American Federation of Teachers reported this summer that teachers have reached a breaking point and cannot fill hiring needs.
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