This week’s “Daily Journal” guest columnist is Lindalyn Kakadelis, director of the N.C. Education Alliance.
Last week, my Locke Foundation colleague Roy Cordato opined on the perils of school choice, suggesting that its very existence undermines conservative principles and threatens the wall of separation between public and private schools. Indeed, Roy’s view of choice is that it is a wolf in sheep’s clothing – promising freedom, competition, and the powers of the market to gullible conservatives, while furtively laying the groundwork for a government takeover of private education.
I strongly disagree with Roy’s premise. But I welcome the debate. After all, good people can disagree about important issues. Reasoned discourse has a long history of shaping public policy decisions, and we are always the better for it.
My view, then, is that school choice in the form of taxpayer subsidies (or vouchers) does not equate to government control of private schools. Roy’s concern over government regulation is a legitimate and fair one, shared by many conservatives (and libertarians). But the answer is not to shut down a promising reform simply because the educrats are greedy for more power. The education establishment in our country has pushed for gradual control over schools – with or without choice initiatives – since the early 1900s, beginning with a compulsory attendance law. And they show no sign of stopping. But sensible citizens have fought back against unwanted government intrusion for years and will continue to do so.
By way of background, it’s useful to know that centralized government control of K-12 education is nothing new. In many states, all K-12 schools – public, private, or home – fall under the authority of the state’s education department. Here in North Carolina, private schools and homeschools fall under supervision from the Division of Non-Public Education under the Department of Administration, rather than the Department of Public Instruction (the bureaucratic home of traditional public and charter schools).
But even in North Carolina, private schools and homeschools are accountable to the state. Private schools must abide by health and safety regulations, anti-discrimination laws, and other state rules. They participate in widespread voluntary fiscal audits, accreditation, and testing. Homeschools in our state are also subject to some requirements, including the maintenance of a regular schedule and the administration of an annual, nationally standardized achievement test.
Clearly, then, some government oversight is a reality for all education providers. How do we keep it in check? We look to the power and will of the voting public. I believe most people are smart enough to oppose really bad ideas, regardless of how much pressure the education establishment or other bureaucratic entities exert.
Put simply, if it’s not politically feasible, it won’t happen. While at the Mackinac Center for Public Policy, the late Joe Overton designed a useful model of political potential since called the “Overton Window of Political Possibilities.” Overton’s concept rests on the reality that since political leaders like winning elections, they generally operate within “windows” of ideas accepted by the public.
And when they don’t, they pay. Consider the following recent example of legislation that attempted to expand government control, yet was clearly outside the “window” of political reality. A few lines in Governor Mike Easley’s 2005 budget proposed moving the Division of Non-Public Education from the Department of Administration to the Department of Public Instruction, meaning home, private, and public schools would all be under the same umbrella of leadership. After a public revolt – including thousands of phone calls, e-mails, and faxes from homeschooling parents and other opponents – the governor’s political will evaporated, and he withdrew his proposal.
That’s all well and good, some might say, but what about programs already in operation? Roy suggests that some choice programs, like the one in Wisconsin, have already caved in to pressure and must now adhere to excessive regulations. This is simply not true. According to the organization School Choice Wisconsin, state legislators have resisted intrusive regulatory proposals in the past, citing the Wisconsin Supreme Court’s ban on “excessive [state] entanglement” in private religious schools. Private schools participating in Milwaukee’s voucher program are required to administer a national, norm-referenced test like the Stanford 9 and report that information to an evaluator. But most private schools across the nation already do this; North Carolina private schools (with no vouchers on the horizon) are required by the state to administer such a test.
It’s also worth noting that “accountability” regulations in Wisconsin’s program were enacted to protect taxpayer money. Specifically, these regulations forbade sham schools from setting up shop overnight in a naked grab for voucher money if they lacked the necessary capital. Few would argue that restraining these kinds of schools is a bad thing. Finally, participation in voucher programs by private schools is never mandated – schools that are uncomfortable with government regulations always have the option of opting out.
How do we resolve the tension between a power-hungry education establishment and the quest for educational freedom? Patience, prudence, and citizen activism working together can and will stop the grasping hand of government regulation from choking private school autonomy. But let’s not throw the baby out with the bath water. As longtime school-choice reformer and litigator Clint Bolick has said, “The position of school-choice critics is akin to resisting the demise of communism because the free markets that would emerge might be subjected to government regulation. This is hardly a Hobson’s choice.”
It’s fine to say we should focus just on protecting private schools, but in reality, these schools constitute a small minority of the schools attended by America’s children. Nationally, close to 50 million students attend public K-12 schools. In North Carolina, 88 percent of K-12 students (or 1.4 million kids) attend public schools; only about 12 percent attend non-government schools. Many families are happy with their public schools, but thousands of poor families are not and are desperately seeking options outside the government system.
This is hardly surprising considering the state of our schools. In 2003, North Carolina graduated 69 percent of all high school students and only 54 percent of black male students. According to the 2005 National Assessment of Educational Progress (NAEP), only 29 percent of fourth graders and 27 percent of eighth graders in North Carolina are proficient in reading.
Clearly, schools aren’t making the grade. What should we do? First, we need to build coalitions to open the aperture of educational freedom in our state. Some will join us because they believe in social justice – that all children (not just the financial elite) should have access to good educational options. Others will sign on because they believe free-market principles will successfully lower the cost of K-12 education. Still others believe choice has the power to reform our ineffective and monopolistic education establishment.
Whatever our views, we can’t afford to stay where we are. Lucky for us, school choice provides the necessary freedom, competition, and market forces to transform our education system. And when power-hungry bureaucrats seek to expand control (as they most assuredly will), we will fight back. In the end, though, denying parents the freedom to choose because we think we know better isn’t principled conservatism. It’s just bad ideology – by any name.