Scott Kamps
People often debate what we can do to change the world.
As we see our nation and culture descend further into perversion and selfish excessiveness, those of us who still value virtue – the good, the true, and the beautiful – often wonder if we can do anything to stem the tide.
There are no quick fixes to our culture/nation, but there are many things we can do to make a difference.
There may be some question as to what the most effective things are, but one thing that would undoubtedly bring great cultural change in the right direction is to give parents the choice of how to educate their children.
Finally, something that is defined by choice that benefits children instead of harming them!
As a result of some of the COVID-19 “public health” policies, there is actually some political momentum behind the school choice movement.
Utah and Iowa recently passed legislation approving forms of education saving accounts (ESAs) in their states. Arizona was the first state to offer ESAs to every student last year. There is similar legislation right now in about a dozen other states, with Arkansas, Florida, Indiana, Ohio, Oklahoma and Texas following Arizona’s example this year.
In an AP News article (“Pandemic, culture wars revive ‘school choice’ policy push,” Jan. 27, 2023), Heather Hollingsworth succinctly describes what ESAs are and how they differ from vouchers:
“Vouchers traditionally allow parents to take the funds that would otherwise be used to educate their children in public schools and put them toward tuition for accredited private or religious schools.
Education savings accounts and scholarship programs are more expansive, giving parents additional latitude on how they can spend the funds, including on home-schooling.
“ESAs have steadily grown in popularity over traditional vouchers due to legal challenges in states with constitutional limits on sending public money directly to religious organizations.”
There is a significant economic disadvantage for those who do not send their children to public schools.
Their tax money is funneled into public schools and then they have to pay for their children’s education out of their own pocket – whether private schools, online schools, or homeschooling materials.
This eliminates any other option than public schools for many people. ESAs help solve this inequity.
Instead of sending around $10,000 per student to the public school (the state average was $9,958 per public school student last year), there would be $8,000 traveling with each student who does not attend the public school to be used for their education (in Arizona, for example).
This gives parents more options to consider in providing the best education for the children they are responsible to train up. This kind of provision would create private schools or maybe mini-schools in our county.
The competition would raise the standard of education in all schools, including the public school. If a public school is failing or underperforming, it will either improve or shut down.
Either way, our children and our community will reap the benefits.
Scott Kamps writes a bi-weekly column for The Graham Star. He can be reached via email, thestableguy@frontier.com.