One should not accept a blatantly generalized statement as Gospel, especially any statement ladened with politico-economic overtones. Parsing a person’s motives and self-interests is an important tool for screening generalizations for truth and untruth, transferability and usability. School choice is one of those subjects burdened with so many motives and interests that every statement that begins with “I support school choice, because…” should be rephrased as “My interest(s) in supporting school choice are …” or “The school I chose has/does/provides these things for me.” Clear reasons in clear statements for clearer understanding. At the end of the day, there are good and valid reasons for school choice as long as the self-interests are known.
A discussion of school choice begins with this understanding – argument about the legitimacy of school choice is a waste of time and resources. Consumer choice has permeated almost every marketable commodity in our contemporary life. And clearly, politics has made education a marketable commodity. Given that school choice is a fact of life, the discussion no longer is whether to choose but why and how to choose and how choice affects the education landscape.
Historically, there always has been some choosing of schools. For several American centuries, children attended a parochial school affiliated with the family’s religious preference. Most frequently, these were Catholic and Lutheran parochial schools, but Episcopalians, Seventh-Day Adventists, Calvinists, Mennonites, Amish and Orthodox Jews also provided parochial education. In southern states, there are hundreds of schools affiliated with fundamentalist churches. The discussion of faith-based school choices has a history of community acceptance and only the availability of tax-funded school vouchers brings parochial schools back into the new discussion.
Equally, private schools or academies have existed over time. Sometimes organized as military schools to educate boys with structure and discipline. Finishing schools for girls taught grace and style. Elite academic preparatory schools existed for families interested in their children attending prestigious colleges and universities.
Families always have had choices. The simple and single difference between choice then and choice now is that families historically paid to make those choices. Today, public money is becoming increasingly available to fund school choice.
Today there is a bogeyman of reality in the discussion of school choice that cannot be ignored. Government at all levels enforces a “sum certain” and a “zero sum loss” equation on the use of state tax revenues available to fund education. If the equation was “sum sufficient,” the bogeyman would go away. But, education funding is never sum sufficient. Politics today says that tax money no longer is connected to funding schools; tax money is connected to funding the education of a child and whither the child goes, there goes the money. This, the bogeyman tells us, makes school choice all about the money. If a child who was enrolled in a public school enrolls in a private or charter school, the public school loses money and the private or charter school gains money. With choice, there always are financial winners and losers.
In our consumer society, we should know these things about the choosing of schools. Traditionally, parents considered the local, neighborhood when they chose their home residence. “We want this house in this school district, partly because this house is in this school district.” For some, residence and school district no longer are connected. Regardless of the location of their residence, parents can choose the location of their child’s school – these are two independent decisions. Literally, “I have the right to choose where I want to live and I the right to choose where I want my child to attend school.” The caveat in this new paradigm is that parents who choose also are parents who transport. If you want your child to attend a school out of your neighborhood, it is your responsibility to transport your child to your school of choice.
At the same time, the new options of school choice are not equally available to all children. Engaging in school choice is a parental decision. For some parents, employment and paying the bills consumes them and engaging in school choice is something they do not have the time, energy or resources to undertake. The lack of money excludes children. Or, their child’s education is not important. The lack of interest excludes children. Or, their grandparents and parents grew up in the house or neighborhood where the family now lives and everyone in their family attended the local school. The disinterest in change excludes children. Or, the family lives in a rural area where few physical schools of choice are organized and the distance between school districts makes daily transport an unrealistic endeavor. Physical location and sparsity of options exclude children. School choice is an option for more affluent, motivated, urban/suburban parents.
There also is the issue of selective acceptance that creates a significant difference in who attends a public school and who attends a choice school. Public schools educate every child regardless of educational ability and challenge. That is the law. Choice schools do not. Because they are not accountable to the same state statutes as public schools, choice schools can decline to accept students with special education needs, the socially maladjusted, and those that create disciplinary problems once enrolled. These children are the responsibility of public schools and are generally excluded from schools of choice.
It is easiest to parse the reasons for school choice for older children than it is for younger children. Simply stated, given the schooling experiences of older children and the refining of their learning styles and preferences, academic interests, and career and continuing education goals, it is much easier to match an older student with a school choice option. It is more difficult to match a younger child with little experience and unformed preferences, interests and goals. In my experience, parents who are in tune with their older children and can discern educational options reasonably available to the family make very good use of school choice. I worked with a parent whose son was a highly-gifted diver and had outgrown the resources of our school’s swimming and diving program, the local YMCA, and private coaching in our community. His interests and goals as a twelve-year old were best served by moving to Florida and being home schooled so that he could devote the enormous amount of daily time required for training as a world class diver. He never attended a K-12 school again. I watched him compete in two Olympics. School choice worked for him because a quality match of child and school was achieved. I also assisted parents of children with gifts in dance and music to extend their education in specialty schools for ballet and violin, and children with interests in science and language to enroll in magnet schools for those subjects.
It is not so apparent for very young children. I observe that school choice for children in 4K through elementary school is not an educational decision but an associational decision. Parents with the resources to engage in school choice for their very young children are deciding “who their child will go to school with” and “who their child will NOT go to school with” more than they are choosing a school that matches their child’s interests, preferences and goals. Sadly, the decision regarding “who my child will NOT go to school with” creates a re-segregation of schools based upon family ethnicity and economics. Parents choosing “who my child will go to school with” are leaving behind schools with higher percentages of educationally challenged students and schools with diminished financial resources to educate those children.
School choice is not easy. It has, as the bogeyman tells us, real implications for the financial stability of schools, both public and private. Because school finance is sum certain and zero sum loss, there will be financial winners and financial losers. For secondary students who have refined educational preferences, interests and goals, school choice is a wonderful application of American consumerism. For students whose families are not educationally engaged or who have educational challenges and disadvantages, school choice creates educational backwaters and leaves them there. School choice also is creating a greater rift between families with financial resources and aspirations and leaves families without those resources with lower aspirations.
Finally, school choice is the child of politics and it was enacted to provide advantage to families that have the resources to choose. The monied interests that created the laws of school choice knew what they were doing when they put their money behind legislation that created school choice for their state. They created new schools for their socio-economic class, not necessarily for the improvement of their community or for the advancement of all children.