The participants in our dialogue are discussing variety in educational programs and funding for such programs....
Q- Arkansas passed a bill in the spring of 1990 which provided funds for five youth apprenticeship programs in areas which the Governor, Democratic presidential candidate Bill Clinton, perceived as critical to the state's future well being. Any comment?
A- The child labor laws, safety regulations and liability all work against any apprenticeship program. Not to mention the cost to businesses that are having to let already qualified workers go. But most of all I guess you realize I would question the wisdom of having a philosopher-king or kings, decide just what is "critical to the state's future well being."
Q- At least you're consistent. I guess it's obvious what you think of the following quote from the December 12, 1990 issue of Business Week: "America must develop a national consensus."
A- I'm for variety. The more individuals, schools, communities, states that are experimenting with ideas the greater chance we have on hitting on a brilliant new concept. The United States of America thrives on diversity.
Q- One would think the federal government is loaded with money. Congress is trying to eliminate private lenders from the federal guaranteed student loan program and force the government to return to grants instead of loans as the preferred form of federal aid to students.
A-The idea is to convert the old Pell Grants into entitlements.
Q- What does that mean---" convert into entitlements"?
A- Something is called an entitlement when a person or group automatically qualifies for benefits by meeting specified requirements. In this instance, any student whose income qualifies for assistance would receive a grant, no matter the condition of the federal budget. Entitlements are the main cause of the massive debt this generation is passing on to the next.
Q- Is it true that the Bush administration wanted to limit Pell grants to students with family incomes under $10,000---an unbelievably low figure?
A- That's right. Critics claimed 400,000 students would be thrown out of the program. Actually there are a variety of proposals to finance higher education, including low cost government loans to be paid back out of payroll deductions adjusted according to the graduates' income.
Q- I understand that half the money of the student loan program is not going for education but for loan defaults and administration of the program.
A- Defaults alone cost the nation $2.5 billion a year.
I should mention here that David Price of North Carolina introduced a bill to restore the tax deduction for interest paid on an education loan and that tacked onto the Budget Reconciliation Act at the end of 1990 was a federal law requiring college applicants lacking a high school diploma or its equivalent, to take a government-approved test to determine their ability to benefit from higher education.
Q- I can't believe it!
A- The idea was to weed out applicants likely to default on federal college loans.
Q- I can't believe some entity didn't file suit.
A- California did, and as a native Californian, I'm proud of it. But unfortunately the suit filed by California's 1.5 million student community college system was based on the unlikelihood of about 900,000 immigrant and minority students being able to pass the test.
Q- In other words the suit was based on a pragmatic likelihood rather than on principle.?
A- You've got it! And there are numerous examples where pragmatism takes precedence over principle.
Q- By pragmatism you mean. . .?
A- I'm referring to the theory developed by Charles Pierce and William James, that the meaning of a course of action lies in its observable consequences. There is a great tendency in the conduct of political affairs to reject precedent and theory and to resort to practicality and expediency. For example Newt Gingrich of Georgia introduced a bill to provide monetary rewards to students for reading and reporting on books.
Wisconsin has a program called "Learnfare" where a family's welfare check is withheld if kids don't attend school on a regular basis. It certainly gives parents, or more likely a parent, incentive to make sure their children attend classes.
Q- And I guess the practice of giving money for good grades that we talked about earlier would be an example of getting good results at the expense of principle?
A- Exactly. At the expense of the principle that self-appointed, or even voter-appointed philosopher-kings should not be in the business of manipulating independent self-controlling individuals.
Q- The new phrase is "investment in human capital". It stands for more money for prenatal care, Head Start and other preschool programs, as well as overhauling public schools.
A- To some people investment in human capital means pensions should be made portable and health insurance extended to everyone.
Q- How would this be accomplished?
A- Some people urge greater regulation of prices for medical procedures by government.
Q- No matter the means, the price of investing in human capital is bound to be high.
A-High? You bet, but the answer is predictable "We can pay a price now or a far greater price down the road."
Q- Other people propose tilting the tax code away from protecting property and toward promoting people. I've heard it suggested that we scale back the mortgage deduction on homes in exchange for tax breaks for companies that institute job training programs.
A- And of course individuals could receive education tax credits.
Q- I found the following quote in my notes which may be attributed to a sociologist at the University of California at Berkeley, one of your alma maters, but there is no name attached. Anyway I saved it for you and you'll recognize why: "It's time for Americans to demonstrate national resolve about America's economic future. If we move beyond self-interest to confront difficult issues, we might just rekindle the spirit of exceptionalism that motivated our forefathers. "
My notes go on to say that the speaker had no aspiration for America to become Ronald Reagan's City On the Hill, rather he visualized the United States as "one of the town criers in the global village".
A- What can I say after an invitation to criticize someone; I don't even know who! I guess you're baiting me because you know how I detest low expectations. Quoting Senator Simon again, "We can do better" and you know I believe that City on a Hill is a goal well worth fighting for.
Q- I have a name to go with the following quote by another supporter of human capital. Robert Reich claims "A nation's most important asset is the skills and learning of its work force. . . . Americans can't add value in a global economy if they are uneducated, unhealthy or lack the means to sell their labor in the global marketplace."
A- Human capital always requires dollars for health, education and training. If a concern for the poor and downtrodden fails to work, an appeal can be made to economic self-interest. Professor Reich is a strong advocate of government-academia-business partnerships and is absolutely correct that investment by all three or any combination would result in a healthier and more educated workforce.
Q- Isabell Sawhill of the Urban Institute located in the District of Columbia, says public investment and private investment are complementary.
A- I know. She believes it's impossible to achieve good private returns without good public investment.
Q- Business Week says "Economic distress has forced government and business to expand their social roles before." In the thirties the free market was sacrificed.
A- And to no avail. It was the activity generated by the second world war that pulled us out of depression, not the sacrifice of the free market, a mistake this country still hasn't recovered from, in my opinion.
Q- I'm afraid that's an opinion that is not shared by many.
A- Chester Finn says "American education is to education what the Soviet economy is to economy." He also says the results at improving the system over the last decade are similar again to the results the Soviets had with perestroika---a mere bandaid or tinkering around the edges of a gigantic problem.
Q- You mentioned him earlier. Who is Chester Finn?
A- Chester Finn is the director of the Educational Excellence Network and an adviser to Secretary of Education Lamar Alexander. He has written several books showing the deplorable condition of education in this country, the most recent titled We Must Take Charge: Our Schools And Our Future.
Finn compares the failure of reform in the Soviet Union and in the American educational system saying that in both cases "the task of reforming the system was given to the very people who have a vested interest in its preservation, the education establishment."
In both cases it seems that reforms were merely to put a good face on a mammoth problem, "to change appearance, not the fundamental power relationships and the basic rules by which the system operates."
As we enter the dialogue, the participants are discussing the work of Jonathan Kozol....
Q- Jonathan Kozol is another author whose 1991 book, Savage Inequalities has made an enormous contribution to the year's debate regarding education in America.
A- His ideas have certainly been discussed. Savage Inequalities explores the extremes of wealth and poverty in our school systems. Mr. Kozol suggests doing away with the property tax for school funding and substituting the more fair (read more progressive) income tax. As was established earlier, the federal government provides between six and seven percent of the funding for education with the rest of the bill underwritten on a pretty equal basis by the states and by local property taxes.
Q- But Jonathan Kozol thinks the federal government isn't contributing "it's fair share" of dollars.
A- Where have we heard that phrase before?
There are more ways than one to fund our schools. I heard about a plan in New Hampshire to give property-tax credit to taxpayers who educate children outside the local public schools?
Q- I think you're referring to the Epsom Plan because the idea originated with the small town of Epsom, in New Hampshire. Taxpayers will receive up to $1,000 in property-tax abatements if they pay to educate a high-school student outside the regional public high school. Since it costs the town $5,000 a year for tuition for each student attending its schools they will save $4,000 which each abatement. It's a win win situation because it expands choice while lowering taxes.
A-I imagine the public school teachers don't support it.
Q-How perceptive! The National Education Association and ACLU both threatened suit before the plan was even finalized.
A- There is a fairly new concept which has taken hold in England, called grant-maintained schools. These are independent schools financed by government.
Q- Now you're on Mr. Kozol's track.
A- I've heard Mr. Kozol pooh-poohing the idea that the federal government is broke, pointing to the $200 billion for the S&L bailout and asking which is more important to our nation's destiny.
Q- Doesn't he claim the states have a constitutional obligation to provide education ? I heard him say they ought to provide three quarters of the funding for public schools with the other one quarter coming from the federal government.
A-Why not have the federal government provide one hundred percent of the funding for education in the form of vouchers? If an amount was allocated to every child in the nation, formulated for his or her particular locality and funded in the form of a voucher, competition would do the job now facing myriads of commissions consisting of carefully bureaucratically-picked philosopher kings. Vouchers would unleash the ingenuity and creativity of millions of ordinary citizens and the best ideas would survive to be copied because the market would demand them.
Q- Isn't there a company in Los Angeles that is trying to get vouchers accepted in California?
A- You might be referring to Whittaker Corp., an aerospace supplier, whose CEO has been working on a voucher initiative for the 1992 election.
Q- I thought the administration was supposed to favor choice?
A- That's right. In fact Lamar Alexander, the Secretary of Education would like to provide vouchers even for private schools that teach religion, as long as they are willing to be accountable to the taxpayers. He argues that the poorest families would benefit the most from choice. Vouchers would allow low-income parents to choose private education for their children which would hasten the goal of a classless society.
Q- Mr. Kozol, in his own words, is "bitterly opposed to the voucher plan."
A- I realize that. He says the free market won't work in education because the most sophisticated parents will choose the best schools and the poorest kids with the least educated parents will be left with the worst schools.
He doesn't believe that the worst schools will be closed down, will be bankrupt because they will attract no customers. He doesn't tell us why they will remain open, just that he knows that they will----that's the scenario he needs to justify his position that vouchers are unworkable.
Q- Many people prefer tax credits to vouchers because since the dollars flow to the parents rather than the educational institutions there is no need to regulate those institutions.
A- Minnesota allows tax credits for non-public school students up to $1,000 to cover many educational expenses. Iowa allows a tax credit equal to five percent of private tuition.
Q-Mr. Kozol claims that in public schooling social policy has been turned back a century.
A- He presents some pretty terrible illustrations. In Chicago nearly 18,000 children come to school and find no teacher, not even a substitute. He claims that on normal days one-quarter of Chicago's public school teachers are substitutes.
Q- Besides changing and equalizing the funding of schools, does he offer any other ideas for reforming our dilapidated educational system?
A- Mr. Kozol has a six point program to improve education in America:
1) Fund Headstart so that every eligible child can participate and also provide literacy instruction to parents if needed.
2) Reduce class sizes in inner city and low income rural schools to 20 children.
3) Give the highest salaries to teachers that teach the poorest children.
4) Replace old and ugly urban schools with new modern buildings.
5) Give up the idea that charity can substitute for, as he put it "equity assured by government".
6) Abolish the property tax as the basic form of funding for our public schools.
Q- And I suppose you don't agree with any of them.
A-Let's take them one at a time. We've already discussed the possibility that Head Start may not be as advertised, Kozol's first point, and that there are ways to fund education other than the tax on real property, his sixth point. We might combine the fifth point concerning government assured equity and the second point about class size by considering that more dollars would mean more teachers and a smaller class size.
Q- Is there a convincing correlation between class size and successful learning?
A- Japanese classes are much larger than ours. Their math classes are almost double ours in number of students and yet Americans have come in last in international math tests. It just might have something to do with teaching methods and expectations.
Too often our children are busy interacting and learning to get along in social situations. It's not surprising that critics urge less "psycho-babbling" and more concentrated study on subjects like science and math. We have twice the population of Japan but only half the number of scientists and engineers.
Q- Are you familiar with a report recently issued by the Educational Research Service in Arlington, Virginia which analyzed one hundred different studies which had focused on class size over a 35 year period and concluded that smaller classes have a beneficial affect in the earliest grades but matter little or not at all in high school?
A- I know a study was conducted in 1967 of the Riverside school district in Southern California and it was determined that class size made a big difference in the reading skills achieved with first graders but not much difference at all by the third grade. That study even suggested that high school students did better with larger classes.
To have any really significant impact the change in class size had to be rather drastic; below 15 or over 40 except when it came to truly disadvantaged students where smaller classes almost always resulted in benefits.
Q- I remember a relevant study by Herbert Walberg and Bill Fowler of schools in New Jersey which was issued in 1987.
A- That's right. Their study was published in a journal; the Educational Researcher. They showed that while class size went down between 1955 and 1988, test scores did not go up. Spain, France, Japan and Korea all were shown to have much larger classes; an average of 55 students in Korea.
Q- And Korean students placed first in math in the 1988 International Assessment of Education Progress!
A- The point, as Walberg and Fowler wrote, is that class size has little or no effect on learning unless you get down to very small groups which amount to tutoring.
Q - I just want to back track a minute and add something to the discussion about funding education. Property taxes are not a universal source of funding for education.
In the summer of 1991 small rural school districts in Tennessee won their suit against the state, charging that Tennessee's manner of distributing funds for education according to sales tax revenue discriminated against them and was therefore unconstitutional.
A - The rural school districts had a good point. Large shopping centers where the most sales tax revenue is generated are located in urban areas.
Q - It is rare to have sales tax revenue used for education. But more than a dozen states have seen their system of funding education challenged, whether it was dependent on property or sales tax.
A - Getting back to Mr. Kozol's third point, we have already established that there is little if any correlation between teacher pay and results, so I doubt that money would be an effective incentive to attract the very best teachers that would be needed to teach the most disadvantaged children.
Q- As for the point about replacing shabby buildings?
A- That could more easily be accomplished if local governments would allow some creativity.
Some of the expensive reports, hearings and all the gobbledegook which enriches attorneys and architects at taxpayer expense could be waived as a cost-containment measure. Non-union labor, including donations from parents and friends, as well as donations of materials and supplies should be not only permitted but encouraged.
Q- I would think now would be a good time to pick up some of these empty buildings taken over in the savings and loan debacle and remodel rather than start building projects from scratch. That would be especially beneficial in states like California where the school age population is expected to go from 5 million to 7 million over the next eight or nine years and where older voters refuse to approve school bonds.
A- In California you're talking big bucks---between $1.5 billion and $2 billion! Ordinary people, unhindered by bureaucratic red tape, could do so many things that need to be done in communities, and at a reasonable price if government would back off. We are a can do nation, but only if we stick to our concept of a limited government!
Q- Didn't you say something earlier about a report on education by the Washington, D.C. based Heritage Foundation?
A- That's right. The Foundation recently issued a report intended to explode some myths that it believes have derailed education reform in this country.
Q- Such as?
A-Such as the idea that an increase in spending necessarily leads to higher performance.
Q- Did Heritage offer any specific examples?
A-They looked at 116 public high schools in New York City in 1989 and found that of the average of $6,107 spent per pupil,only $1,972 actually reached the classroom.
Q- Are you serious? What happened to the rest?
A- The rest was spent on administration along the way. Of the 119,258 employees, only 54 percent were teachers and some of those were staff and development employees and not ever in the actual classroom.
Things were even worse in Milwaukee. Of the $6, 541 allocated for the education of each child, only 26 percent made it to the elementary classroom. Instructional spending in Milwaukee in 1968 accounted for 70 percent of the education budget, but by 1989 only 45 percent of the budget was used for instruction.
Q- Unconscionable!
A- But even if more of the money did actually reach the classroom, there is independent evidence to refute any contention that there is a correlation between dollars spent on education and the performance of students. South Korea spends little on a per-pupil basis but Korean children consistently outscore Americans on math and science examinations.
Q- Now that you mention it, the 1987 Walberg and Fowler studies found no link between per-pupil expenditures and student achievement.
A- Eric Hanushek of the University of Rochester looked at 65 studies on the relationship of spending and performance and found absolutely no correlatio in 75 percent of the cases, a positive impact in 20 percent and an acutal negative impact in 5 percent of the studies.
Q- Walberg and Fowler determined that it is not spending as much as it is teaching techniques that determine results in the classroom.
A- Ordinary people are our best hope. A few years ago the Emeryville, California school district was issuing I.O.U.s to its teachers and last year it provided $1,000 scholarships to each of its graduates.
Q- How could this be?
A- Emeryville is small; only 525 students in the entire school district, kindergarten through twelfth grade. The district was turned around and saved from bankruptcy by the leadership of the District Superintendent, Dr. Peter Corona.
Some of that American "can do" attitude I was talking about earlier was evidenced in the attitude of the principals, teachers and staff who came in on weekends and evenings and did double and triple duty as teacher, administrator, counselor, janitor and gardener. They all pulled together and turned a probable disaster into an unqualified success.
The district repaid a $600,000 five year loan from the state in only three years and was able to give its teachers pay raises and its students a quality education, as evidenced by the district's test scores which were higher than before the financial problems.
Q- Plus the scholarship which, besides the financial help, is tangible evidence that someone cares and has a real interest in what students do with their lives beyond the confines of the Emeryville school system. I'm really impressed.
A- There are many inspirational examples throughout the country. The Marcus-Garvy school in Los Angeles, Westside Preparatory run by Marva Collins in Chicago and Philadelphia's Ivy League, Father George Clemmons' Holy Angels School, Wally Simpson's Lower Eastside Community in New York City are all superior independent black schools. They operate on about one third of the budget of most public schools.
Q- How can they do this when they are laws regulating wages and working conditions and so forth?
A- There's no doubt that minimum wage laws and labor regulations are handicaps to these schools. Low-skilled or less preferred people are invariably harmed by these kinds of restrictions.
Q- On April 16, 1991, news commentator Paul Harvey drew attention to Kansas State University. He pointed out that on April 1, 1991 the University of Kansas lost the NCAA basketball championship and Kansas State University won a national debate championship and all the media coverage went to the former.
"For reasons we may someday regret, we celebrate our athletes more than our scholars." Mr. Harvey went on to call Kansas State the student scholar capital of America among public universities. And most memorable of all he said, "If that doesn't properly shame the laggards, this should. Kansas State offers this quality education for less than $7,000 a year, and that includes room and board."
A- Kansas State has managed, in the words of its President, Jon Wefals, to produce "Ivy League-caliber scholars on a shoestring budget. " Forty-two of the forty-seven top national scholarship winners since 1986, came from Kansas State University. Also the institution is ranked in the top one percent among private and public universities in producing Rhodes scholars .
Q- And its team won the national championship debate in 1990-91.
A- The National Society of Black Engineers named a K-State student the top black engineering student and six of the nine architectural awards given by Architectural Digest magazine went to K-State students. All K-State's nominees for the Barry Goldwater scholarships, set up by Congress in 1989 for science and math students, were winners.
These and numerous other honors and awards show that students from a rural state like Kansas can compete successfully with the best the elite institutions on both coasts have to offer. These accomplishments are achieved despite low faculty salaries and operating budgets, proving that money is not an essential ingredient for success in academic pursuits.
These achievements were honored by the Bush Administration. President Bush met personally with the K-State debate team and Senator Dole arranged for the team to be brought onto the Senate floor.
Q- Why is K-State so successful?
A- I think much of the success is due to the philosophy of its President, Jon Wefals. As reported in the May 11, 1991 Kansas City Star, "If something comes in I try to read it right then. I answer all my letters and calls every day. If a problem comes along, don't establish a committee. Roll up your sleeves and try to solve it. If someone calls here, anyone can get through any time. We like to minimize bureaucracy and maximize action."
Q- Have you ever heard of Edgar Fiske, author of Smart Schools, Smart Kids ?
A- I haven't read his book but I heard an interview he gave on August 17, 1991. I remember he gave an example of a math test given to eight graders in New York City. There were 4 multiple choice answers to the question: "I'm thinking of a number between 40 and 80--the sum is eight and the product is twelve." The students had to choose one out of four suggested answers. Two of the answers weren't between 40 and 80 so the choice was narrowed to either 53 or 62. The kids were asked in essence to play a game---they were only called on to manipulate information that other people generated---they were not being asked to think.
Q- I think he wrote about Vermont's educational system. Did he mention it in his interview?
A- He said that Vermont has done the most testing. The state has looked at work over a period of time and has developed what they refer to as a portfolio approach---teachers initially look at a student's first draft and then the fifth draft.
He gave an example of a question one might find on a math test in Vermont: "Six percent of all Americans eat at McDonalds every day. Is this a plausible statement or not?"
The students were given information such as there are 250 million Americans and so many McDonald stores. The students were asked to demonstrate, in writing, that this was a viable hypothesis. Students were graded on their justifications on a scale of 1 to 4. Everyone immediately calculated 250,000 times .06 divided by the number of stores and then says something like 500 patrons is a reasonable number to expect to serve in a day.
Q- That's just what I did.
A- That answer would get you a "one" rating.
Q- The lowest score?
A- Sorry. According to Mr. Fiske, some students go on for seven or eight pages calculating the drive-in trade, breaking the possibilities down by breakfast, lunch and dinner and so forth. These speculations would be revealing and earn a higher grade.
Q- I would be an absolute wash out in such a test. I simply would never think to mess around with all those other possibilities but would go directly to the heart of the problem and be done with it.
A- Be glad then that you are not a high school student in Vermont.
Mr. Fiske also brought up New York's One Nation Many Peoples blueprint for changing their school curriculum. The plan hopes to de-emphasize the content of social studies and heighten the critical thinking of grade-schoolers with questions that "equips them with the moral sensitivity to ask: 'Is my economic well-being at the expense of the well-being of others. What can I and others do to promote greater economic fairness and equity?'"
Q- Who is qualified to determine and teach this sort of thing. It sounds like a fertile ground for political indoctrination.
A- I agree that such discussion necessarily involve opinions rather than facts, and the opinion of a teacher could amount to brain washing of young children in political and public policy matters. But that type of analysis leads to something I abhor even more; a teacher who, for fear of indoctrinating students with his or her beliefs, fails to lead class discussions or to teach anything of real value.
For instance I heard of an incident in which a student found a lot of money and returned it to the rightful owner. Everyone in the class told the student what a stupid move that was and declared they would have kept the money for themselves. The teacher was silent, offering no guidance to the class and no justification for or encouragement to the student who had returned the money.
Q- If we don't teach morals and responsibility we won't get them from our young people and the United States of America won't be, and in some places already isn't, a very nice or safe place to live. The trouble is, in a diverse nation such as ours, there are many views concerning morality and sensitivity and so forth. How does a school system determine which view of morality to teach?
A- You've made an excellent point for "choice". School systems, teachers, bureaucrats----none of them should be making that decision for my child---for your child. That is a parent's decision and can only be made when a parent is given choice over the type of school and teaching her child is to receive.
Q- Did Mr. Fiske (Edgar Fiske, author of Smart Schools, Smart Kids; see previous file for further discussion of his work) mention his views on "choice"?
A- He claimed to favor "choice" but only among public schools and believes it is a good way to bring parents into the process. "If we let people opt out of the system we're letting a lot of potential energy that would help improve the public schools evaporate." He would like us to do what is done in Cambridge, Massachusetts where everyone is forced to choose among public schools---most actually chose on the basis of proximity so they end up going to their old neighborhood school . . .
Q- Like we all used to do without all this hoopla.
A- But in Cambridge students attend local schools by choice.
Q- So how does it work?
A- It turned out that people wanted more alternative programs than were available and two schools were undersubscribed. People were unhappy if they didn't get any of their first three choices and so the two undersubscribed schools were transformed into the alternative schools most desired. Choice became a force in Cambridge to increase quality as a whole, as well as involving parents.
Q- Memphis has had choice for ten years.
A- California's Superintendent, Bill Honig favors choice but the unions fight the idea. They dread competition and accountability.
Q- A 1987 Gallup poll found that 71% of Americans and 77% of non-whites favored choice and a plurality supported vouchers. Choice just might work!
A- Public education has been a monopoly for too long---poor kids are too often subjected to drugs and crime instead of education. Robert Woodson, founder and president of the Washington D.C. based National Center for Neighborhood Enterprise, favors choice. He says it gives poor folks the chance at what the more affluent already have.
Q- Our public school system is a socialized monopoly and that accounts for its inefficiency, high cost and poor quality. It needs competition, which means privatization, which means vouchers.
A- The poll you just cited shows the public favors the idea but the educational establishment sabotages it every time there is a chance to introduce it. I find it extremely interesting that the new Soviet minister of education, Edward Dneprov, told the London Times that his goal is to dismantle the centralized and authoritarian Soviet education system. He already has programs ready to launch in Moscow and Rostov to provide vouchers to Soviet children, equivalent to the cost of one year's education. They will be offered to the independent public or free-market private schools of a Soviet family's choice.
Q- Terrific! Like all converts, the Soviets are accepting capitalism at face value and their children may enjoy the freedom to attend the school of their choice before ours do!
In the fall of 1990 another poll showed that two-thirds of Oregon's voters favored a voucher initiative but it was defeated after children were sent home with propaganda from the educational bureaucracy.
A-In January, 1991, 27 low-income parents filed suit accusing the public schools of Chicago of "educational malpractice". They demanded Chicago provide vouchers so their children could have the option of attending private schools like the children have in Milwaukee, Wisconsin, thanks to the efforts of democratic state legislator, Polly Williams.
Q- I heard something about that. Apparently hundreds of low-income students are using vouchers to attend private schools in Milwaukee.
What do you know about Polly Williams?
A- Polly Williams, 54, is a former welfare mother and a black Democratic assembly woman in Milwaukee Wisconsin. She is noted for her commonsense typically American approach to problem solving.
Like Clarence Thomas, she was raised by very strict religious parents. She tells it like it was: If a young woman got pregnant she stayed home and the baby was raised by two mamas, big mama and her own mama. There was no food stamps or welfare to tempt babies with babies to set up apartments on their own.
Her district is the largest black district in Wisconsin with a high unemployment rate. The first time she ran she was opposed by the 60,000 member Wisconsin Education Association Council representing public school teachers. Many liberals put the interest of the eduction lobby above that of inner-city children. White, liberal Democrats refused to join Republicans and black Democrats even though inner-city parents clamored for Mrs. William's program and packed the hearings.
She won and as a state representative she pressured Governor Tommy Thompson to sign into law a bill allowing about 1,000 low-income students to opt out of Milwaukee's dreadfully inadequate public schools. Parents were allowed to enroll their children in any private, nonsectarian school that signed up for the program.
Q- How does the program work?
A- To qualify a family of four can earn no more than $12,000/year. The state pays up to $2,500 in tuition for each student and subtracts the money from the public school system's budget. The idea is to allow parents to exercise the leverage of competition to force change in the public schools. The parents signed agreements with the schools that they would participate fully in their children's education.
Q- With that kind of commitment from parents public schools might work just as well.
A- Even though 1,000 vouchers were authorized for low-income students, only 252 children participated in the first year of the program and 400 in the second year.
Q- If funds were available for a thousand children, why did so few participate?
A- The vouchers barred private schools that teach religion from participating and there weren't that many nonsectarian schools in the area. The renowned privately operated Urban Day School received 600 applications under the voucher program for approximately one hundred available spaces.
Q- Wasn't Urban Day school started in 1967? If I'm correct it has been providing quality education for inner city youngsters for almost twenty-five years.
A- That's right. Over 98 percent of Urban Day students graduate and 50 percent go to college. But some private schools refused to sign up for Polly William's voucher program, preferring to wait until all legal challenges were exhausted. Of course this further depleted the number of spaces.
Q- You said the first time she was elected. . . I assume that means Mrs. Williams won re-election?
A- To win the support of teachers in her re-election Mrs. Williams gave them a taste of their own medicine. She introduced legislation that would have prohibited public school teachers from sending their own children to private schools.
Q- Did Mrs. Williams send her own children to private schools?
A- Long before the voucher program, she sent her own four children to a private academy sustained by corporate contributions that allowed it to charge parents only what they could reasonably afford.
Q- Did this school sign up to participate in Mrs. William's voucher program?
A- Yes. Polly Williams has become the political symbol for school choice, but her goal is not to undermine public schools but to give them competition.
Q- I assume Mrs. Williams favors affirmative action.
A- Then you assume incorrectly. She criticizes affirmative action programs but at the same time wants the city of Milwaukee to distribute its contracts on the basis of race.
Actually I believe she is a classic racist. She figures the issues in this country are based on race.
Q- Don't you?
A- No, I don't. But I admire her courage and think she is on the right track in trying to encourage her constituents to become independent. Independence is something that all Americans should strive for, in my opinion.
She says the Great Society programs imprison blacks by robbing them of motivation and dignity. I agree. She also says,
We no longer have chains on our ankles; the chains are on our brains now. . . These socialcrats have built their lives around taking care of us. Now they're running scared that they'll lose their jobs. When we no longer need them to take care of us, what are they going to do?
Q- Julia Hill, president of the board of directors of the Kansas City, Missouri school district, wrote an article published in the ABA Journal in September 1991. She wrote "that the cure for segregation is not just about buses and school assignments, but about classrooms worth going to."
In 1985 nineteen of Kansas City's fifty elementary schools had 90 percent or higher black enrollment as did three of the eight middle and three of the eight high schools. By 1991 only six elementary and one middle school were at that high level of black enrollment.
In the fall of 1991 1,300 new non-minority suburban and private-school students applied to attend Kansas City magnet schools. One of the elementary magnet schools (school of choice) was recognized in 1990 by the Department of Education as one of the 221 most outstanding public or private schools in the nation.
Before desegregation Central High School was all-black and with its change to a magnet school with an outstanding computer program and new facilities, by 1991 it had pretty near reached the goal of 40 percent non-minority status.
Q- It used to be that people decided to live in a certain area because of the reputation of the school district. Poor parents have always found it hard to pack up and move in search of the best schools for their children, but many have done so.
A- At least vouchers would give the poor more flexibility. I remember a poem written by a school child in New York City: "America the beautiful/Who are you beautiful for?"
Q- That might have come from Jonathan Kozol's book. There's something that's stuck in my head ever since I heard it also.
In the fall of 1990 bullet-proof back to school clothing was advertised in New York City and sales were said to be booming!
A- That's absolutely unconscionable! If government had only one duty it would be to protect its citizens. To hear that our most innocent and vulnerable---our children---are living in blatant fear is intolerable. Vouchers are no substitute for law and order.
Q- Of course not, but let's stick to the subject. We're discussing vouchers at the moment. A lot of people are afraid vouchers would mean the end of the public school system.
A- And those that raise the loudest objections are often the ones that have already taken their own children out of that public system. That's why Polly William's threat influenced the Milwaukee teachers. The majority of teaching parents in Chicago send their own children to private schools. Jesse Jackson's son attended exclusive St. Albans in DC but yet he warns against the destruction of the public school system. Former DC delegate, Walter Flauntroy, sent his kids to private schools.
Q- It is a further manifestation of the mentality that our policymakers exhibit in so many areas----they make policy and exempt themselves from living under it. They have little compunction about exercising their right to reject fraud in education ----because it is fraud when we tolerate public schools that can't even teach children to read. Their high salaries give them the ability to reject poor schools and pay for the best schools they can find for their own children.
A- Vouchers are a way for everyone to reject poor schools and pay for the best schools they can find. Public schools would set tuitions to attract vouchers and parents could supplement their vouchers and send their kids to a more expensive school. Vouchers give parents the maximum power to control their children's educational destinies, with the possible exception of home schooling which isn't plausible for a large percentage of the population.