School Choice and the Silver Screen

Here at School Choice Now!, we’re not usually in the business of movie reviews, but lately we’ve been seeing a lot of films about education reform.  This education film movement is led by breakout hit Waiting for Superman, but now has many documentaries and a few dramas to bolster this new “education refilm” genre.

So want to grab some popcorn and watch a few films on education reform?  Here’s a roundup of some of our favorites:

The Cartel (2009)—

“How has the richest and most innovative society on earth suddenly low the ability to teach its children at a level that other modern countries consider “basic”?”

Directed by Bob Bowden, a former producer, reporter, and news anchor, this film looks at how education reform, not education spending, can change our education system.  Looking at New Jersey, which in 2005 spent as high as $483,000 per classroom, the film looks at the cause of our underachievement and what can be done to ensure our children achieve, including charter schools and vouchers.

The Lottery (2010) —

“You could win an education”

A documentary that focuses on the lottery system—a system developed by charter schools that have more families that want to attend than spots available.  This film follows four families whose futures depend on this lottery system to escape the public school system.

The Experiment (2011)—

Ben Lemoine’s documentary focuses on New Orleans that was rocked by Hurricane Katrina, but opened a door to create educational opportunity out of a natural disaster.  Looking at the Recovery School District, this film follows five children as they navigate through a city with charter schools and a voucher program for students from low-income families attending failing schools.

What's the Word on the D.C. Opportunity Scholarship Funding Failure?

After the story broke that thePresident’s budget did not include funding for the highly successful D.C. Opportunity Scholarship Program, folks in Washington and all around the country had a lot to say about it.  Here’s what elected officials, talking heads, bloggers, and everyone else is saying about the President going back on his word:

Very disappointed to see Pres. budget zeroes out funding for DC Opportunity Scholarship Program.

—Senator Joe Lieberman via Twitter

I am committed to ensuring that this valuable program gets the support it needs and deserves from Congress.

—Senator Joe Lieberman via Twitter

Unacceptable: president’s budget zeroes out funding for successful DC Opportunity Scholarship Program

—Speaker John Boehner via Twitter

The advocate in me is angry, the mother in me is disheartened, and the citizen in me is saddened that one again this Administration has chosen to stand with special interests groups and not with the children who need him to stand for them.

—Advocate Virginia Walden Ford

Data Snapshot: Pennsylvania

With the release of the Alliance for School Choice's School Choice Yearbook 2011-12 (available for download here), we'll spend the next few days on School Choice Now! highlighting some of the new data and research it contains.

Pennsylvania has one scholarship tax credit program that serves more than 40,000 students.

2011 Results

• Number of School Choice Programs: 1
• Total Number of Students: 40,879
• Total Number of Participating Schools: Not Available
• Total Expenditures: $48,242,880

Educational Improvement Tax Credit

2011-12 School Year Data Update

• Scholarships Awarded: 40,879
• Schools Participating: Not Available
• STOs Operating: 234
• 2011 Expenditures: $48,242,880

    Growth in Student Participation

2012 Outlook

Pennsylvania is on the cusp of enacting strong school choice legislation.  Last session, the Senate passed legislation expanding the state’s scholarship tax credit program and enacting opportunity scholarships for students from low-income families that are stuck in failing schools.  Governor Corbett is committed to making school choice a legislative priority and the state’s legislature will continue to debate school choice in 2012.

- American Federation for Children | Alliance for School Choice, MSG

'The Great Equalizer' Doesn't Add Up

"Education was historically considered a great equalizer in American society, capable of lifting less advantaged children and improving their chances for success as adults. But a body of recently published scholarship suggests that the achievement gap between rich and poor children is widening, a development that threatens to dilute education’s leveling effects."

That's lead paragraph in a front-page story that ran in The New York Times last week, on February 9. It tells of an often cast aside, but still terrifying fact: children from low-income families are not simply performing worse in school than their more affluent counterparts, but the achievement gap between students from impoverished families and affluent families is actually growing larger.

And one in five children in the United States—that’s 15.8 million young people in total—is living in poverty, according to the 2010 U.S. Census.

The reality is that the status quo is not working to shorten this gap.  Low-income families need educational options to choose an education that will best meet their children’s educational needs.

Education cannot be “the great equalizer” if it is not helping the children who need help most.  And when a school is failing them, low-income families often do not have the option to move to a better neighborhood or pay for private school tuition. 

But school choice programs are designed for children from low-income families, providing much needed options for thousands of children across the nation. 

In fact, 14 programs in 10 states plus the District of Columbia are means-tested or means-preferenced, publicly funded private school choice programs. Family income requirements are often a part of the enrollment process in school choice programs, ensuring that students whose families cannot afford choice independently are given this vital option. 

Based on the federal free and reduced-price lunch program or the federal poverty guidelines, these programs collectively serve 147,750 families across the nation.

Sadly, thousands more families don't have a choice in their education. What at all is equal about that?

- American Federation for Children | Alliance for School Choice, MSG

Data Snapshot: Rhode Island and Iowa

With the release of the Alliance for School Choice's School Choice Yearbook 2011-12 (available for download here), we've spent the past few days on School Choice Now! highlighting some of the new data and research it contains. Our final two entries, examining Rhode Island and Iowa, are below.

Rhode Island

2011 Results

• Number of School Choice Programs: 1
• Total Number of Students: 341
• Total Number of Participating Schools: 55
• Total Expenditures: $592,015

Rhode Island Corporate Scholarship Tax Credit

A corporate scholarship tax credit program that allows corporations to donate to nonprofit organizations that send students from low-income families to the school of their parents’ choice.  The program gives a 75 percent tax credit or one-year donations and a 90 percent tax credit for two-year donations.

    Growth in Student Participation

Iowa

2011 Results

• Number of School Choice Programs: 1
• Total Number of Students: 10,820
• Total Number of Participating Schools: 158
• Total Expenditures: $11,538,448

Individual and Corporate School Tuition Organization Tax Credit

This program was expanded in 2011 by increasing the statewide cap on donations from individuals and corporations to $8.75 million in 2012, allowing even more students to receive scholarships.

    Growth in Student Participation

- American Federation for Children | Alliance for School Choice, MSG

Data Snapshot: Washington, D.C.

With the release of the Alliance for School Choice's School Choice Yearbook 2011-12 (available for download here), we'll spend the next few days on School Choice Now! highlighting some of the new data and research it contains.

Perhaps in the most significant 2011 school choice victory, the D.C. Opportunity Scholarship Program was strengthened and restored thanks to the bipartisan leadership of Speaker John Boehner and Senator Joe Lieberman.  In fact, the program grew by more than 60 percent thanks to reauthorization.

2011 Results

• Number of School Choice Programs: 1
• Total Number of Students: 1,615
• Total Number of Participating Schools: 53
• Total Expenditures: $13,697,550

D.C. Opportunity Scholarship Program

2011-12 School Year Data Update

• Scholarships Awarded: 1,615
• Schools Participating: 53
• 2011 Expenditures: $13,697,550

    Growth in Student Participation

2012 Outlook

While the program has been authorized for $20 million over five years, the program needs to get appropriated for each year.

- American Federation for Children | Alliance for School Choice, MSG

Parent Empowerment at Work in the Grand Canyon State

Here at School Choice Now!, we have a singular goal of kids being in the best school possible—whether that school is a private school, a charter school, or a traditional public school.  Parents, especially those from low-income families, should be empowered to choose what school they think will best prepare their child for a successful life. 

And research shows that parents are very satisfied when they get to choose where their children should go: just look at Louisiana, where four consecutive surveys on the voucher program show parental satisfaction rates of over 90 percent, and at Florida, where 95.4 percent of parents participating in the Florida Tax Credit Scholarship rated their schools as “excellent” or “good.”

But it's not just the numbers that speak to the value of school choice. The stories do, too.

One recent story, from a reporter writing for Arizona's East Valley Tribune, tells of how she exercised her educational options not in her role as a reporter, but as a mother:

Earlier this month, I did something I've said I was going to do for a long time: I took a tour of a charter school as a PARENT, not as a reporter.

Why? Let's just say I'm an over thinker. My kids are doing great at their school - our neighborhood district school. But I keep hearing and talking to people about this charter school and I wanted to go in with a different set of eyes.

Michelle Reese, the reporter and mother of three, is happy with her traditional neighborhood school, but wanted to take a look around. And, living in Arizona, Reese has lots of options.

Arizona has public school choice, private school choice (with three scholarship tax credit programs and one education savings account program), charter schools, and homeschooling options.

In Reese’s ZIP code alone, there are 85 different elementary schools: 47 public schools, 24 charter schools, and 10 private schools. 

So what did she end up doing?

I choose to send my kids to my neighborhood school. We've been there for years, though each spring I do debate other options (just ask my husband and friends who hear about it over and over). Why? Because I can. Because I want my kids to be getting the best education possible. Just last year, I really struggled with where to send my middle child, not because I wasn't happy with our school, but because I knew a Spanish dual language program was opening up not far from us and she wants to learn Spanish.

Because when it comes down to it, school choice is about ensuring that all children have access to a great education that works for them—no matter what type of school that is.

- American Federation for Children | Alliance for School Choice, MSG