Florida’s Voucher are Good Because They’re Cheap…

In case you missed it, on 6/22/2016, Florida’s Board of Education member, Gary Chartrand, explained the real purpose of vouchers in Florida and, spoiler alert, it is NOT about the kids.

Mr. Chartrand’s comments came in response to a presentation by Palm Beach County Superintendent, Dr. Robert Avossa, who spoke as a representative of FADSS (Florida Association of District School Superintendents). You can watch the discussion here; Mr. Chartrand’s comments begin at 2:17:00.

Mr. Chartrand thanks Mr. Avossa for his presentation and suggests that, although FADSS presents at every FLBOE meeting, there could, and perhaps should, be more collaboration between the two groups. He suggests that Florida’s school districts should not expect much increased funding in the upcoming year and advises them to look for ways to be more efficient with their current funding.

“As a business person, you have revenues and then you have expenses. I would ask FADSS to look at those barriers that are costing you money so that you can’t deliver the services that you want and try to fix that… If we could correct those types of things in the system, that frees up more money to be able to do what you want to do. Does that make sense? And I would like you to focus on those things because I just don’t think you’re going to get a huge increase.”

Sorry folks, he is not advising districts to spend less on expensive standardized testing, test prep, progress monitoring or the purchase of 1:1 digital devices for kindergarteners so those districts can spend more on creative activities like art and music… He is talking about eliminating the voter-approved Class Size Amendment, which he feels “constricts” districts, and closing “underutilized schools.” He says these might be “hard things to do but they are efficient.”

Mr. Chartrand then goes on to urge FADSS to pressure the FEA (Florida Education Association, the state’s teacher’s union) to drop their current lawsuit challenging Florida’s Voucher system (known in Florida as “Tax Credit” or “opportunity” scholarships) saying:

“The State is being sued by the FEA on opportunity scholarships, where 90,000 kids, with an average of $25,000 family income, get a chance to take a voucher at a savings… to the taxpayers to go to a private school. And, I don’t know where FADSS is on that, but if you took 90,000 kids and put them back into the system tomorrow, you would have a real funding problem [at this point, in the background, you can hear FLBOE Chair Marva Johnson, and other board members, snickering. Apparently, creating a funding problem is funny.] because, if you take an average of 500 kids for a school, depending on utilization, I don’t know, that’s 200 new schools you would need, when (private) schools are already available because kids are choosing to go with a voucher.”

I will interject here: perhaps those 90,000 kids could go to those “underutilized” public schools that Mr. Chartrand was encouraging districts to close just moments before. Perhaps, no new construction would be necessary. Perhaps, without voucher’s encouraging students to attend unregulated private schools, those underutilized public schools, which Mr. Chartrand finds so inefficient, could be saved.

Mr. Chartrand went on to suggest that public schools will suffer a funding crisis if the FEA lawsuit prevails:

“That’s my personal opinion… if you want to talk about funding, having those 90,000 kids come back into the system is going to be a real cramp… First of all, I think it’s a great program, I’m in favor of the program, but I would ask FADSS to call on the FEA to drop that lawsuit.”

Here are some facts about Florida’s Voucher Program:

• Tax Credit Scholarship funding is a cheaper way for the state to educate poor children. For the 2016-2017 school year, the maximum voucher scholarship allowed is $5,886 per student. In contrast, the basic per pupil funding for public school students is $7178.49 (this does not account for additional funding a student might receive as an English Language Learner or a Special Education Student or because they were taking Advanced Placement or career certification courses). Florida’s per pupil spending ranks 44th in the nation and is well below the national average of $10,700.
• Private schools that accept vouchers are under no obligation to provide special education services to children with disabilities (learn more here). Public school students with special education needs get extra funding from the state, so encouraging these students to use vouchers provides significant savings to the state (which no longer has to fund necessary special education services for these identified children).
• The State requires no accountability as to the quality of the private school education these “scholarship recipients” receive. Many students flee their public schools to escape high stakes, standardized testing and other state “accountability” mandates. In private schools, no such accountability is required. With vouchers, schools and teachers are not ranked and rewarded based on test scores and there are no mandated third grade retention, progress monitoring, remediation, or test associated course or graduation requirements.
• There is NO evidence that students in voucher schools outperform those who choose to remain behind in traditional public schools. While voucher students are required to participate in some type of standardized testing annually, in most cases these students take low stakes, nationally normed assessments, the results of which can not be directly compared to Florida State Assessments (which are high stakes and standards based). Learn more here and here.

As Mr. Chartrand made clear, the Reformer’s view is that Voucher program’s are “good” because they allow state’s to spend LESS money on poor children’s education AND they encourage the closure of the public schools that have been left underfunded and under-attended by the same Voucher programs. In other words: Private good, Public bad, Cheap even better.

No Child Left Behind shined a spotlight on the tremendous achievement gaps between low income and more advantaged children. While celebrating “choice”, voucher (or Tax Credit Scholarship) programs allow state’s to spend less money on our neediest children and remove those children from the testing regimens designed to assess progress towards diminishing the achievement gap. It is like sweeping poor children under the rug and it is another example of accountabaloney.

Mr. Chartrand warns that, should the FEA lawsuit be successful, the influx of these students back into the system will cause a funding crisis, requiring the construction of possibly 200 new schools. In almost the same breath, he encourages the superintendents to close existing, underutilized, suggesting such decisions would lead to efficiency even though they might be difficult. The contradiction is mind blowing.

Underfunding the education of our neediest children, closing their community schools and sending them to private schools with no accountability is the goal of Mr. Chartrand’s beloved voucher program. It is NOT designed to improve education for these children but to provide the “illusion” of doing so while saving tax payers’ money. The Voucher program is good BECAUSE it is cheap, something Mr. Chartrand has made abundantly clear.

To be clear, we are not challenging a parent’s choice to send their children to private school. We ARE questioning the motives behind Florida’s voucher program. On 6/22/2016, Mr. Chartrand made those motives abundantly clear: Florida’s vouchers are good because they are cheap and because they encourage the closing of existing public schools.

This isn’t the first time that Mr. Chartrand has used his position to try to influence the FEA’s voucher lawsuit. In 2014, he called the Florida School Boards Association’s participation in the lawsuit “disheartening” and called on them to “rethink their position and withdraw the lawsuit” (read more here). Ultimately, the FSBA did drop out of the lawsuit, but they appear to have been subsequently penalized by conservative lawmakers when they “approved funding and policy changes that favored a rival organization of individual school board members, which didn’t like the FSBA taking part in the lawsuit.”

When Mr. Chartrand suggested that there should be more collaboration between the FLBOE and FADSS, what did he mean? Should FADSS “collaborate” by doing the Mr. Chartrand’s bidding, and exert pressure on the teacher’s union to drop the suit? If they fail to act, will they be shut out like the FSBA? And who is acting on the behalf of public schools? Closing schools and underfunding education for low income children is, clearly, not “for the kids.”

We support the FEA in their legal challenge of Florida’s Tax Credit Scholarship/Voucher program. We encourage FADSS to disregard Mr. Chartrand’s advice and to support the FEA in their efforts to provide high quality, appropriately funded, public schools for all children, in all neighborhoods.

Actions speak louder than words and the act of Superintendents joining WITH teachers to save public education will send a loud and clear message that public schools serve ALL children and are a necessary and vital component of out local communities.