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Private school vouchers are the worst idea ever. How's removing yet more funding for public schools supposed to be an answer to public schools don't have enoug

by jgeada 2y ago

Private school vouchers are the worst idea ever. How's removing yet more funding for public schools supposed to be an answer to public schools don't have enough funding? As the funny paraphrasing goes (https://x.com/teedjvt/status/1685251077753430016 https://x.com/teedjvt/status/1685251077753430016) "I don't really like the city parks. I want to join a country club so my kid doesn't have to play with 'those' kids and I want the city parks system to pay for my membership"

slt2021 2y ago
public school system is full of grift, politically appointed and allocated resources, and zero accountability. if you face inefficient system that cannot manage resources - you cannot pour more resources and expect better results. as a proof you can look at Chicago, DC and Baltimore school systems that have the highest per capita spend and the lowest academic achievement metrics. we just need to provide parents an option to opt-out of crooked system
- jgeada 2y ago
  Nobody forces you to put your kids in public schools. But just like other taxes you don’t get to opt out of paying and you don’t get to take your money back.
  - slt2021 2y ago
    well the voucher system allows me to opt out of supporting this corrupt system with my taxes.
    - jgeada 2y ago
      How about the pentagon, or homeland security, or … Why are you picking on the fractional pennies in the budget and letting the millions go out the door? The system is corrupt precisely because people with influence are allowed to opt out & simultaneously benefit.
      - slt2021 2y ago
        School is a local matter, I want tonhave a feedback mechanism of “taking my business elsewhere” in education. If private school offers more competitive product with better teacher, I want it. There is not much sense to force people to pay for local school and pay for private school. And there is a way to opt out of federal taxes: just move out and change tax residence
        eesmith 2y ago
        School is a local matter, but voucher systems are forced onto local districts by the state. Voucher systems are not set up as “taking my business elsewhere” because a voucher doesn't contain just your money but includes other people's taxes, making it their business too. > If private school offers more competitive product That "competitive" is doing a lot of heavy lifting. If you think more religion in school make the school more competitive, then you can already choose a private religious school. If you think having a lacrosse and water polo team makes the school more competitive, then some expensive private schools have that. These are more expensive, sure, but that's Pareto optimality for you. If you want to choose a school where the graduating class all have high SAT scores, and they do it by ranking the class every year and expelling the bottom 10% as "deadweight", than that's an option at some schools. But if you really want this level of competition, then you'll end up having a lot of smaller schools, and lose out on the economy of scale in a consolidated school system, where you can have a school with 3,000 students like I went to which offered classes in jazz music, Latin, machine shop, and differential equations. > There is not much sense to force people to pay for local school and pay for private school. Your argument seems to be that public tax money should not go to education. After all, if I have no kids, or my kids have graduated, why should I pay taxes which go to the school system? But in that case, why limit it to education? If I don't have a car, why should I pay taxes that go into highways? If I only buy books, why should I pay taxes which go to the library? If I have a private pool memberhip, why should I pay taxes which go to the city pool that I never use? > just move out and change tax residence Such a comedian! That "just" is neither easy not cheap. Why don't you "just" use the feedback mechanism of bringing things up to your school board and convincing your fellow voters to change things?
    - eesmith 2y ago
      If it were simply about your taxes, that's one thing. [1] But voucher systems aren't simply that. For example, https://www.woodridge.k12.oh.us/m/news/show_news.jsp?REC_ID=607885&id=0&fbclid=IwAR1VZ6xAdStIii9RSpcCWwvaVVxjIZWa0iNMgPE3O46l508g649_-NbLNbs https://www.woodridge.k12.oh.us/m/news/show_news.jsp?REC_ID=... says the voucher then would be $6000 per student. It is extremely unlikely that your family is paying $6000 in taxes earmarked for the school. If you send your kid to a voucher school then your taxes, plus those of a lot of other people, are directed away from public schools and into private/voucher schools. Including by people who think the voucher system is corrupt, and without the "public audit, public representation, uniform accounting, teacher licensure, public records rules, student testing requirements, or many other mandates that public schools are forced to follow." (Quoting that link.) The voters directly voted for local property tax levies for the school district. They did not vote for these levies to be sent to voucher schools. It was the state which overrode local democracy. [1] Not a good thing, but it is a thing. I don't get to decide to not pay taxes for the new road construction even though I think the road construction system is corrupt.
- eesmith 2y ago
  > and zero accountability That's simply not true, if only because most voucher schools insist their records don't have the same requirement for public access as at public schools. That's even less accountability, and accountability can't be negative. > if you face inefficient system that cannot manage resources Consolidated public schools exist because of the economies of scale. Break it apart into many smaller school and you lose that. > as a proof you can That is not proof. Get a forensic accountant on the case, look at the books, and identify the inefficiencies. Otherwise you can't dismiss the possibility that perhaps they are about as efficient as can be expected. > academic achievement metrics Which academic achievement metrics do you think are credible and appropriate? If a school spends a week on test prep, rather than teaching other topics, is that efficient? If a school does less music, arts, history, foreign language, etc. to focus on surface reading and arithmetic - the two tests which are cheapest to carry out - is that efficient? > we just need to provide parents an option to opt-out of crooked system That's been tried many times over the last 20 years. The resulting schools are not better, and the often even more crooked. - only accept the students which are easiest to teach (no troublemakers, no kids with serious disabilities, no ESL students) - if the school system pays more for students with disabilities, cherry-pick only those students with a disability which is easy to handle. - use pretextual reasons to expel low-performing students, so your end-of-the-year test scores are higher - have voucher school be a non-profit A owned by the same person who owns for-profit property company B and for-profit teaching materials company C. Have school A rent the building from B and pay C for teaching materials. Never report the finances. - place requirements on parental involvement which can only be done by families with a stay-at-home parent. This biases the student population towards richer families, which are also well-correlated with good test scores. - require additional tuition and other fees, again biasing the student population towards richer families. - set up a voucher school in town where it's cheaper to teach, and let the public school handle transport for the rural school population - define your catchment area to overlap with the richest part of town And that list of real-world crooked policies comes simply from reading examples which have popped up on Peter Greene's Curmudgucation blog.

by jgeada 2y ago

slt2021 2y ago

public school system is full of grift, politically appointed and allocated resources, and zero accountability. if you face inefficient system that cannot manage resources - you cannot pour more resources and expect better results. as a proof you can look at Chicago, DC and Baltimore school systems that have the highest per capita spend and the lowest academic achievement metrics. we just need to provide parents an option to opt-out of crooked system

jgeada 2y ago
Nobody forces you to put your kids in public schools. But just like other taxes you don’t get to opt out of paying and you don’t get to take your money back.
- slt2021 2y ago
  well the voucher system allows me to opt out of supporting this corrupt system with my taxes.
  - jgeada 2y ago
    How about the pentagon, or homeland security, or … Why are you picking on the fractional pennies in the budget and letting the millions go out the door? The system is corrupt precisely because people with influence are allowed to opt out & simultaneously benefit.
    - slt2021 2y ago
      School is a local matter, I want tonhave a feedback mechanism of “taking my business elsewhere” in education. If private school offers more competitive product with better teacher, I want it. There is not much sense to force people to pay for local school and pay for private school. And there is a way to opt out of federal taxes: just move out and change tax residence
      - eesmith 2y ago
        School is a local matter, but voucher systems are forced onto local districts by the state. Voucher systems are not set up as “taking my business elsewhere” because a voucher doesn't contain just your money but includes other people's taxes, making it their business too. > If private school offers more competitive product That "competitive" is doing a lot of heavy lifting. If you think more religion in school make the school more competitive, then you can already choose a private religious school. If you think having a lacrosse and water polo team makes the school more competitive, then some expensive private schools have that. These are more expensive, sure, but that's Pareto optimality for you. If you want to choose a school where the graduating class all have high SAT scores, and they do it by ranking the class every year and expelling the bottom 10% as "deadweight", than that's an option at some schools. But if you really want this level of competition, then you'll end up having a lot of smaller schools, and lose out on the economy of scale in a consolidated school system, where you can have a school with 3,000 students like I went to which offered classes in jazz music, Latin, machine shop, and differential equations. > There is not much sense to force people to pay for local school and pay for private school. Your argument seems to be that public tax money should not go to education. After all, if I have no kids, or my kids have graduated, why should I pay taxes which go to the school system? But in that case, why limit it to education? If I don't have a car, why should I pay taxes that go into highways? If I only buy books, why should I pay taxes which go to the library? If I have a private pool memberhip, why should I pay taxes which go to the city pool that I never use? > just move out and change tax residence Such a comedian! That "just" is neither easy not cheap. Why don't you "just" use the feedback mechanism of bringing things up to your school board and convincing your fellow voters to change things?
  - eesmith 2y ago
    If it were simply about your taxes, that's one thing. [1] But voucher systems aren't simply that. For example, https://www.woodridge.k12.oh.us/m/news/show_news.jsp?REC_ID=607885&id=0&fbclid=IwAR1VZ6xAdStIii9RSpcCWwvaVVxjIZWa0iNMgPE3O46l508g649_-NbLNbs https://www.woodridge.k12.oh.us/m/news/show_news.jsp?REC_ID=... says the voucher then would be $6000 per student. It is extremely unlikely that your family is paying $6000 in taxes earmarked for the school. If you send your kid to a voucher school then your taxes, plus those of a lot of other people, are directed away from public schools and into private/voucher schools. Including by people who think the voucher system is corrupt, and without the "public audit, public representation, uniform accounting, teacher licensure, public records rules, student testing requirements, or many other mandates that public schools are forced to follow." (Quoting that link.) The voters directly voted for local property tax levies for the school district. They did not vote for these levies to be sent to voucher schools. It was the state which overrode local democracy. [1] Not a good thing, but it is a thing. I don't get to decide to not pay taxes for the new road construction even though I think the road construction system is corrupt.
eesmith 2y ago
> and zero accountability That's simply not true, if only because most voucher schools insist their records don't have the same requirement for public access as at public schools. That's even less accountability, and accountability can't be negative. > if you face inefficient system that cannot manage resources Consolidated public schools exist because of the economies of scale. Break it apart into many smaller school and you lose that. > as a proof you can That is not proof. Get a forensic accountant on the case, look at the books, and identify the inefficiencies. Otherwise you can't dismiss the possibility that perhaps they are about as efficient as can be expected. > academic achievement metrics Which academic achievement metrics do you think are credible and appropriate? If a school spends a week on test prep, rather than teaching other topics, is that efficient? If a school does less music, arts, history, foreign language, etc. to focus on surface reading and arithmetic - the two tests which are cheapest to carry out - is that efficient? > we just need to provide parents an option to opt-out of crooked system That's been tried many times over the last 20 years. The resulting schools are not better, and the often even more crooked. - only accept the students which are easiest to teach (no troublemakers, no kids with serious disabilities, no ESL students) - if the school system pays more for students with disabilities, cherry-pick only those students with a disability which is easy to handle. - use pretextual reasons to expel low-performing students, so your end-of-the-year test scores are higher - have voucher school be a non-profit A owned by the same person who owns for-profit property company B and for-profit teaching materials company C. Have school A rent the building from B and pay C for teaching materials. Never report the finances. - place requirements on parental involvement which can only be done by families with a stay-at-home parent. This biases the student population towards richer families, which are also well-correlated with good test scores. - require additional tuition and other fees, again biasing the student population towards richer families. - set up a voucher school in town where it's cheaper to teach, and let the public school handle transport for the rural school population - define your catchment area to overlap with the richest part of town And that list of real-world crooked policies comes simply from reading examples which have popped up on Peter Greene's Curmudgucation blog.