The history of U.S. education is fascinating. Before the mid-1800s, elementary and secondary education was based entirely on parental choice. Between the mid-1800s and the 1970s, government-controlled education was in ascendancy until it eventually permitted almost no options in K-12 education to families and children. Then came the 1980s and a reemergence of educational freedom from government. Parental choice made a comeback, with homeschooling as its best, most successful example.
The larger national school choice movement missed an opportunity over the past two decades by not following homeschooling’s model of universality, focused state planning, and commitment. The homeschooling community was united behind its objectives. The national school choice movement has been divided about its aims.
Still trusting government bureaucracy more than families, liberals and neo-conservatives insisted on ‘targeted’ school choice programs - most often using government vouchers - serving low-income, disabled, and failing public school children only. Conservatives consistently argued for freedom of educational choice for all children using education tax credits. The liberal/neo-conservative camp prevailed, and they were successful at first, with Milwaukee and Cleveland leading the way. Their crowning achievement came in 2003 when the U.S. Supreme Court ruled school vouchers constitutional.
Today, however, the ‘targeted’ school choice initiative is losing ground. A number of hard-fought programs have been dismantled or, in the case of the Washington DC voucher program, defunded by liberal national leaders (*see 'Arne Duncan's Choice' below); and other programs are at significant risk. Some in this camp now privately admit that the ‘targeted’ voucher strategy was a mistake because the constituency it served was too small and inadequate to overcome powerful education unions and bureaucracies.
School choice proponents have gained valuable insight in the efforts of the past 25 years. Conservatives have every reason to believe that, when political winds shift, genuine universal school choice will rise out of the ashes of the ‘targeted’ strategy.
Polling data continue to show that families haven’t lost any of their desire for educational freedom for their children. And they are likely to gain a large, important group as allies: local property, state, and federal taxpayers who are beginning to realize school choice tax credits would be a cheaper way to educate children. By the time the national liberal leaders leave office, taxpayers will want more freedom, too, from the punishing public school funding demands.
* Arne Duncan's Choice, WSJ| [U.S. Education Secretary] Duncan is not only preventing new scholarships from being awarded but also rescinding scholarship offers that were made to children admitted for next year.
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