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Saturday, April 8, 2017

Which Religious Schools Are Allowed to Participate in the Arizona Voucher Program? Not All | Diane Ravitch's blog

Which Religious Schools Are Allowed to Participate in the Arizona Voucher Program? Not All | Diane Ravitch's blog:

Which Religious Schools Are Allowed to Participate in the Arizona Voucher Program? Not All

A reader posted a comment yesterday asking why I had a problem with religious schools receiving public funding. Aren’t there good religious schools. I pointed out that most of the religious schools that are funded by vouchers are not very good schools. The very good religious schools don’t have many seats available. The ones that do have seats available and need the money tend to be a certain type of Christian school that teaches creationism and uses textbooks that do not teach modern science, math, or history.
Then another comment arrived, this one from a man who is writing a book about education in Arizona.
I post this quote from a work in progress for the nice lady who wrote about Diane’s piece and asked whether there are good religious schools. Diane used a quote from me in the blog today.
Here are the Organizations already providing “scholarships” on the “tax credit” dime here in AZ. I am a proud Catholic School Graduate and I have grandchildren in Catholic Schools in New Hampshire.
Those choices were my parents and my children’s RELIGIOUS choice. They wanted their children indoctrinated into the Catholic Faith.
Catholic schools have their history in anti-Catholic sentiments going back to the KNOW NOTHING PARTY and anti-immigrant attitudes in the 1840s. There was a time when it was a “mortal sin” for Catholics to attend public school if a Catholic School was available..
We in AZ live in a state that allows a “Christian Scholarship” fund that doesn’t include any Catholic, or for that matter Mormon schools, that is a RED FLAG.
I ask the following.

How is it that the Senate president of the Arizona State Senate, can simultaneously be the executive director of a $17,064,168 organization, The Arizona Christian School Tuition Organization Inc., while having Which Religious Schools Are Allowed to Participate in the Arizona Voucher Program? Not All | Diane Ravitch's blog:
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