Vouchers

Trumps nominee for Secretary of Education is a proponent of school choice which includes Charter Schools and vouchers. While for people living in the suburbs or smaller cities this is not that important but for students in the inner cities like St. Paul things are quite different. Many of these students, through no fault of their own, have not been taught respect for authority and they can be very disruptive in the classroom going so far as to engage in physical violence. It is the responsibility of the teacher to promote a learning atmosphere in the classroom but that is difficult if even one student is disruptive and if more than one it become almost impossible. The serious students in these classes are not able to learn properly and they would be the likely prospects for vouchers. A voucher means that a certain amount of money spent on each student could be transferred to a school of their choice. In other words the money would follow the student. This is a pending disaster for many inner city schools. If serious students begin to leave the inner city schools for the suburbs there will be a black student flight similar to the white flight that happened years ago when many white people left the city and moved to the suburbs. The one impediment to this black flight is transportation as buses would not be available. Many concerned parents in the inner city are considering sharing in a car pooling to get better educations for their children. The problem with Charter Schools is that they are opposed by the teachers union. In public schools many children with various types of disabilities are main-streamed into regular classrooms. In many cases they have a special adult that goes with them but often they are in the classroom alone. This all depends on the ability of the child. This is costly and the fear is that Charter Schools would not accept these children but the laws as currently written forbid this type of selection. One of the reasons that the principals in the district I sub in loath the idea of expulsions is that each student represents $13,500. This is money that comes from government meaning taxpayers. Charter Schools get about $9,000. Their costs are lower because their salaries are lower and the number of non-teaching staff is lower and things like pensions and facilities cost less.