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Ducey regularly subverts the will of the people to push his party’s agenda. During the recession, the republicans convinced the teachers to take a pay cut, conv

by jmpman 4y ago

Ducey regularly subverts the will of the people to push his party’s agenda. During the recession, the republicans convinced the teachers to take a pay cut, convincing them it will be returned in more prosperous times. Ducey, under pressure of a limp strike, provided a fraction of the promised increases. Unhappy with the underfunded schools, the public twice voted for higher taxes on the wealthy, only to have Ducey fight them in court, and most recently set all taxes to a flat tax, negating the citizen supported initiative. The AZ schools have a large population of students from immigrants from Mexico and Central America who join with English as a second language barriers and parents without a history of educational prioritization. This leads to districts with extremely poor test scores. The republicans point to these poor test scores, and claim that the public schools are failing the students and school choice is the answer. Ducey continues to push for school vouchers, citing school such as Basis. Basis charter school is a for profit school, which takes in a class of self selected students in ?7th? Grade, and is extremely rigorous. A sizable fraction of the students drop out after the first year, not to be replaced with new students. After the second year, more students drop out, again not to be replaced. By the time the end of high school rolls around, the remaining students are regularly being admitted to Harvard and Stanford. It’s listed as the best school in the country. Effectively all it’s done is taken the elite students from all the surrounding school districts and concentrated them down into a stream of successful graduates. The remaining charter schools are regularly for profit schools, where the children of a church congregation end up attending the pastor’s school. The results are lower test scores than the public schools. None of these options solve the really tough problem of educating the migrant students with English difficulties. And the charter schools are not required to provide services to these students, further concentrating the underperforming students in public schools. The result is that a fraction of the elite students are given a slightly better education than they would have in their already excellent honors programs. The religious are able to scam money from the system, providing arguably worse outcomes. And the underclass remain underserved and under-motivated. That’s what Ducey’s school reform have provided.

JumpCrisscross 4y ago
> all it’s done is taken the elite students from all the surrounding school districts and concentrated them down into a stream of successful graduates This creates a valuable learning enforcement and social network for those students. > None of these options solve the really tough problem of educating the migrant students But it improves outcomes for some students. At the same time, support for public funding is broadly maintained. The alternative is an increasing fraction of voters switching to private schooling. In the long run, that will undermine political support for public education entirely.
- JKCalhoun 4y ago
  > In the long run, that will undermine political support for public education entirely. Yeah, that kind of seems like the actual plan, doesn't it?
- jmpman 4y ago
  > But it improves outcomes for some students. Correct, but it’s a fraction of 1%, and those students would have already graduated in the top of their classes. Ducey cites a program that works better for the top fraction of students as a solution for the larger population. In other charter schools with true open enrollment, the outcomes are worse than public schools. Overall, this will damage education in Arizona, and it’s all done for politics. That makes Ducey the worst of politicians. If he could demonstrate general improvements over public schools, I’d happily support the change.
JKCalhoun 4y ago
Public education was such an amazing (dare I say progressive?) undertaking in 1800's America. Even from just doing genealogy I often find the point where my rural farmer relatives went from being: "Can Read/Write?" : "No" to their progeny answering "Yes" in the decades that follow. (For whatever reason, it seems to have kicked off after the Civil War.) No doubt it allowed the rural migration to cities where no doubt literacy (and math literacy) became increasingly important. To return more or less to an era where only the wealthy get good educations is shockingly regressive in my mind. Say what you want about the degree to which this is already the case with post-Secondary education and the better funding that even public schools get in the wealthier neighborhoods, exacerbating this trend is, in my opinion, not a good idea. Often when this is pushed (whether through vouchers or similar) it seems to be an attempt to either reward the rich by returning their education tax dollars that they were foregoing anyway since their kids went to private schools or, worse, a mechanism to erode or destroy the fabric of public education in general.

by jmpman 4y ago

JumpCrisscross 4y ago

> all it’s done is taken the elite students from all the surrounding school districts and concentrated them down into a stream of successful graduates This creates a valuable learning enforcement and social network for those students. > None of these options solve the really tough problem of educating the migrant students But it improves outcomes for some students. At the same time, support for public funding is broadly maintained. The alternative is an increasing fraction of voters switching to private schooling. In the long run, that will undermine political support for public education entirely.

JKCalhoun 4y ago
> In the long run, that will undermine political support for public education entirely. Yeah, that kind of seems like the actual plan, doesn't it?
jmpman 4y ago
> But it improves outcomes for some students. Correct, but it’s a fraction of 1%, and those students would have already graduated in the top of their classes. Ducey cites a program that works better for the top fraction of students as a solution for the larger population. In other charter schools with true open enrollment, the outcomes are worse than public schools. Overall, this will damage education in Arizona, and it’s all done for politics. That makes Ducey the worst of politicians. If he could demonstrate general improvements over public schools, I’d happily support the change.

JKCalhoun 4y ago

Public education was such an amazing (dare I say progressive?) undertaking in 1800's America. Even from just doing genealogy I often find the point where my rural farmer relatives went from being: "Can Read/Write?" : "No" to their progeny answering "Yes" in the decades that follow. (For whatever reason, it seems to have kicked off after the Civil War.) No doubt it allowed the rural migration to cities where no doubt literacy (and math literacy) became increasingly important. To return more or less to an era where only the wealthy get good educations is shockingly regressive in my mind. Say what you want about the degree to which this is already the case with post-Secondary education and the better funding that even public schools get in the wealthier neighborhoods, exacerbating this trend is, in my opinion, not a good idea. Often when this is pushed (whether through vouchers or similar) it seems to be an attempt to either reward the rich by returning their education tax dollars that they were foregoing anyway since their kids went to private schools or, worse, a mechanism to erode or destroy the fabric of public education in general.