Education Week - September 19, 2012 - 27

EDUCATION WEEK

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SEPTEMBER 19, 2012

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www.edweek.org

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When Florida’s gop-controlled legislature in 2010 approved an expansion of a program that gives corporations tax credits for awarding needy students private school scholarships, the measure had significant backing from Democrats. When the original program was launched almost a decade earlier, only one Democrat in the entire legislature voted for it. State Rep. Darren Soto, an Orlando Democrat, said he supported the recent tax-credit expansion because it would help needy families in his district seek out Roman Catholic schools and other options. “Religious education is very important and popular to a lot of my constituents,” Mr. Soto explained in an interview. “There’s room for a strong public education system, as well as private options.”

justice movement,” said Mr. Emerson, who supports vouchers for poor families. Today, some Democratic support for vouchers in the states comes from African-American caucuses representing districts with large numbers of low-performing public schools, though in other states the backing is more varied, said Mr. Glenn. In general, many Democrats are more inclined to favor expanding existing voucher programs than the politically volatile decision to approve new ones, he said. At the same time, some rural Republicans, Mr. Glenn noted, oppose vouchers, reasoning that they don’t help their constituents because of a dearth of school options

in isolated areas. Michelle A. Rhee, the former chancellor of the District of Columbia schools, said her view of vouchers shifted dramatically during her time in that position, upon meeting parents who had tried and failed to secure coveted spots for their children in the system’s highest-performing public schools, through no fault of their own. Those one-on-one meetings convinced Ms. Rhee that vouchers in certain circumstances—for impoverished students in academically struggling schools—make sense. Ms. Rhee’s position as chancellor was nonpartisan, though she is a Democrat and was appointed by a Democratic mayor. She now

leads StudentsFirst, a national education advocacy organization that has backed the campaigns of candidates in both parties. It was unrealistic to tell a parent “it’s just five years to fix the system, just hold on, honey, cross your fingers and hope for the best—no, ” said Ms. Rhee, in an interview at the Democratic National Convention in Charlotte, N.C. “From a system point of view, it’s better not to allow those kids to leave,” she said, but “there’s no way that I was going to deny those moms the same thing I would do for my own kid.” Another national advocacy organization, Democrats for Education Reform, has no official position on vouchers, and there are very dif-

ferent views on the issue among its donors and the candidates it supports, said the group’s executive director, Joe Williams. Mr. Williams speculated that many state and local policymakers in his party regard vouchers as a distraction from politically difficult changes in policy—such as to teacher tenure and evaluation—that are already regarded warily by teachers’ unions and others, and could be viewed as encouraging parents to leave the public system. “You’ve got a lot of elected Democrats who’ve been looking to do some pretty tough reforms in their systems,” he said. “The last thing you want to do is undercut all that.”

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The traditional party breakdowns on school choice, the ideological breakdowns, are a thing of the past.”

OUR FUNDERS Editorial Projects in Education wishes to thank the following foundations for their generous support. EPE retains sole editorial control over the content of articles and other work underwritten by our donors.

MALCOLM GLENN
American Federation for Children

In other states, though, Democrats have been united in opposing gop-designed voucher proposals. Such was the case in Indiana, where an ambitious measure championed by Republican Gov. Mitch Daniels made it into law last year despite not garnering a single Democratic vote in either chamber.

The Atlantic Philanthropies supports coverage of school climate and student behavior and engagement in Education Week and on edweek. org. The Atlantic Philanthropies is dedicated to bringing about lasting changes in the lives of disadvantaged and vulnerable people. A limited life foundation, Atlantic is focused on four critical social issues: aging, children and youth, population health, and reconciliation and human rights. www. atlanticphilanthropies.org

The GE Foundation supports coverage of implementation of common standards and assessments in Education Week and on edweek.org. The GE Foundation provides grants and invests in initiatives that work to solve some of the world’s most difficult problems in the areas of U.S. and international education, global health, the environment, public policy, human rights, disaster relief, and community success around the globe. www.ge.com/foundation

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Historical Support
Vouchers are perhaps most famously associated with the late economist Milton Friedman, who saw private school choice as the embodiment of a thriving free market in education. Yet Democrats’ interest in vouchers dates back at least as far as the 1960s, notes Adam Emerson, the director of the program on parental choice at the Thomas B. Fordham Institute in Washington. George McGovern, the Democratic Party’s nominee for president in 1972, publicly backed creating tax credits to cover families’ private school costs. The party’s platform that year supported directing “financial aid by a constitutional formula to children in nonpublic schools.” Another influential backer of that idea in the party was the late U.S. Sen. Daniel Patrick Moynihan of New York, who had a strong interest in helping Catholic schools and argued that distinctions between public and private schools mattered little to families. For those Democrats, private school choice was part of a “social-

The Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation supports coverage of the education industry and K-12 innovation in Education Week and on edweek.org, and provides capacity-building support for Editorial Projects in Education, Education Week’s nonprofit parent company. The Gates Foundation is dedicated to the principle that every human life is equally valuable. Its commitment to education centers on ensuring greater opportunity for all Americans through the attainment of secondary and postsecondary education with genuine economic value. www.gatesfoundation.org

The William and Flora Hewlett Foundation supports coverage of deeper learning in Education Week and on edweek.org. The Hewlett Foundation makes grants to address the most serious social and environmental problems facing society. www.hewlett.org

The Charles Stewart Mott Foundation provides partial support for Diplomas Count, Education Week’s annual report on the state of high school graduation and reform efforts. The foundation’s mission is to support efforts that promote a just, equitable, and sustainable society. www.mott.org

The Wallace Foundation supports coverage in Education Week and on edweek.org of public school leadership, extended and expanded learning time, and arts learning. The foundation seeks to create widespread change by sharing lessons that public and private institutions can use to promote benefits for the people they serve. www.wallacefoundation.org

The California Endowment supports coverage of school climate and student behavior and engagement in Education Week and on edweek.org. The California Endowment’s mission is to expand access to affordable, quality health care for underserved individuals and communities, and to promote fundamental improvements in the health status of all Californians. www.calendow.org

The Joyce Foundation supports coverage in Education Week and on edweek.org of policy efforts to improve the teaching profession. Joyce works to close the achievement gap by improving teacher quality in schools that serve low-income and minority children, expanding early-childhood education, and promoting innovations such as charter schools. www.joycefdn.org/Programs/ Education

The NoVo Foundation supports coverage of school climate and student behavior and engagement in Education Week and on edweek. org. NoVo is dedicated to catalyzing a transformation in global society by supporting the development of capacities in people — individually and collectively — to help create a caring and balanced world that operates on the principles of mutual respect, collaboration, and civic participation. www.novofoundation.org

The Walton Family Foundation supports coverage of parent empowerment in Education Week and on edweek.org. The foundation promotes initiatives to expand parental choice and equal opportunity in education to help spur the bold transformation of the national K-12 system of public education. www.waltonfamilyfoundation.org

The Lumina Foundation supports coverage in Education Week and edweek.org of the alignment between K-12 schools and postsecondary education. The Lumina Foundation strives to help people achieve their potential by expanding access to and success in education beyond high school. www.luminafoundation.org

The Noyce Foundation supports coverage of STEM learning — as part of the traditional school day and in informal settings — in Education Week and on edweek.org. Launched in 1990, the Noyce Foundation is dedicated to improving math, science, and reading instruction in public schools, promoting school leadership and education research, and expanding opportunities for informal, hands-on science learning for students. www.noycefdn.org

An anonymous funder helps to support coverage of the early years of a child’s development — birth through 3rd grade — in Education Week and on edweek.org.
Education Week - September 19, 2012

Table of Contents for the Digital Edition of Education Week - September 19, 2012
