Wisconsin: School Vouchers: Saviour or Devil?
Gov. Walker just can not leave any thing alone and let things settle down. But he made it clear from the start he was very much in favor of school vouchers.
The idea behind school vouchers is good, but are they needed? We already have Open Enrollment. It was suggested that these vouchers are life-savers for those who live in an area like Milwaukee where the public schools are not good, so open enrollment does not really work there because none of the schools are that good. So transferring from one bad public school to another makes no sense.
Some might not have the resources to transport their child to a school outside of Milwaukee , so they are stuck with the Milwaukee schools. This voucher system allows them to go to private schools in Milwaukee, without much travel.
I have heard several people mention they do not want ” their ” tax money going to fund private schools, through these vouchers. I will remind people those who use these vouchers also pay taxes and they have the right for their child to get a decent education.
Some people feel it’s just Walker’s way down the long, slow path to privatizing public schools. That in 10 years there will be few public schools left in Wisconsin.
Quite honestly with the way some public schools are run and the results they DO NOT produce maybe that is best.
HOW ever private schools if they are going to receive TAX MONEY need to be held to the same standards of Public Schools. They must also show results and from what I have read so far they are not. So until private schools are showing results we need to hold off on expanding the voucher program.
Well put, Chasin' I am on the same page with you there. Because it seems that the purpose of the voucher system has been subverted. These schools did not even have to take the same student achievement tests until last year, at which point it was discovered that the student achievement of students enrolled out of MPS to the voucher schools was equivalent or worse than MPS students. Bear in mind that the remaining students in MPS are higher needs and still performing as well as or better than the voucher schools. After twenty years of the voucher program, they finally found out that the great social experiment had failed. So, yes enable students who are prisoners of the MPS to seek education as long as it is of proven superiority.
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