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Channeling the Palm Beach Post

You know, if we were Lakeland Ledger subscribers, we would demand a refund right about now.  The paper’s Saturday editorial reads suspiciously like the Palm Beach Post hatchet job from last Wednesday. 

Hey, fisking this sort of stuff is what a blogger lives for. 

What’s the education reform that dare not speak its name in Tallahassee? Hint: It’s the V-word fix. Yes, vouchers are all the rage with Gov. Jeb Bush and the Republican-run Legislature. According to them, in order to "fix" education, Florida must divert money from public schools to private schools.

Those sneer quotes really do speak volumes.  "Fix" education.  There are a couple of ways that could be interpreted: vouchers are a bogus fix, or the whole notion of fixing education some misguided quest, that education is fine and needs no attention.  Just what are you saying, Lakeland Ledger?  Do you really mean to suggest that schools don’t need improvement? 

It is, literally, an article of faith, because Bush refuses to hold private schools to the same accountability measures as public schools.

Sigh.  Like the Palm Beach Post, the Lakeland Ledger apparently can’t be bothered to pay even cursory attention to the Florida legislature, where HB 7041 and S 256 are being considered.  In fact, since this is pretty much just a retread of the PBP’s Wednesday editorial, we’ll save time and just copy and paste from our response to the PBP last week:

These are sister bills going through the Florida House and Senate intended to introduce eligibility and accountability requirements to the McKay Scholarship Program.

Oddly enough, you can check the status of this and similar legislation at the website for the Florida Alliance for Choices in Education.  And you’ll never believe this (no, really–we don’t expect you to believe it), but said organization supports the legislation.  Let’s repeat that: the Florida Alliance for Choices in Education, one of the premier school choice organizations in the Sunshine State, supports increased accountability requirements for school choice programs. Not only do they support this legislation, but they and independent accrediting agencies in the state have supported similar bills that have been introduced during the last two or three legislative sessions–bills that lawmakers on both sides have kicked around, used as pawns, fought over and generally left for dead as the congressional session drew to a close. 

See, one of the most tiring misconceptions about school choice programs is that schools operate entirely free of any sort of oversight.  So it’s time for another real-world, common-sense assertion: if a parent sees that his/her child is not learning, said parent will take his/her kid and tuition and move elsewhere.  It is in a school’s best interests to demonstrate to a parent that it is doing what it is being paid to do.  Therefore, no school in its right mind will operate without meaningful testing.  Believe it or not (again, we expect you probably won’t), most private schools already administer standardized tests.  In short, we suggest that the constant demands for increased accountability are another way of saying parents are too stupid to see if a school is working.  But to fill in the gaps, the legislation currently pending in the Florida legislature would require all schools participating in the McKay program to administer a norm-referenced test recognized by the Department of Education. 

Now, we certainly aren’t going to go so far as to say that all choice schools and activists support this legislation.  Some don’t.  But many do.  Because they see the realities of the situation in Florida, and are willing to meet up halfway to show that, no, tax dollars aren’t being wasted in this program.  So to assert that choice schools are trying to dodge accountability requirements–in essence, to accuse them of trying to game the system–is disingenuous to say the least.

Also: under the legislation currently being debated, test scores would be reported to a third party, and scores would be made public record every year.  Continuing with the Lakeland Ledger’s editorial:

But the Florida Supreme Court has ruled one of Florida’s voucher programs unconstitutional. That cannot stand, so Republicans want to send a proposed constitutional amendment to voters this November that would overturn the court’s anti-voucher ruling.

But this proposed voucher fix doesn’t actually contain the Vword in its text. Rather, it says "The Legislature may enact and publicly fund prekindergarten through college education programs without regard to the religious nature of any participant or nonpublic provider."

So why soft-peddle the V-word? Because public opinion polls indicate that Floridians oppose vouchers. Apparently the idea is to fool the voters into approving vouchers by the clever ruse of not actually using the V-word.

Oh, please.  Once again, as we said in response to pretty much the same statement in the PBP editorial, the dreaded V-word has become so hopelessly loaded in part thanks to the work of editorials like this one.  But when voters are told what the term actually means–giving children a publicly-funded scholarship to attend a higher-performing public or private school–the poll numbers tend to see a significant change. 

But if backers of the education reform that dare not speak its name cannot even use the V-word, they are being honest with neither themselves nor the voters. Shame on legislators if they sanction this constitutional ruse, and shame on voters if they approve it. 

And shame on you for practically cribbing the PBP’s entire editorial.  If you want to go after school choice with a sledgehammer, then fine.  But the least you could do is, you know, offer some original thought and content.