The midterm elections show America’s major shift in attitude to charter school privatization
It’s not hard to find news stories about waste, fraud, abuse and downright theft in the school privatization sector
For years, the policy window for privatizing public schools has been wide open, and what was once considered an extreme or at least rare idea — such as outsourcing public schools to private contractors with few strings attached, or giving parents public tax money to subsidize their children’s private school tuitions — has become widespread as charter schools are now legal in all but a handful of states, and voucher programs have proliferated in many forms across the country.
Politicians of all stripes have been extremely reluctant, especially at the national level, to lean into a real discussion of the negative consequences of redirecting public education funds to private operators, with little to no regulation for how the money is being spent. Candidates have instead stuck to a “safe boilerplate” of education being “good” and essential to “the workforce” without much regard to who provides it.
But policy windows can be fleeting (remember “the deficit crisis”?), and multiple factors can rejigger the public’s views. Indeed, in campaigns that candidates are waging in the upcoming midterm elections, one can see the policy window on school privatization gradually shifting back to support for public schools and increasing skepticism about doling out cash to private education entrepreneurs.
"Vulture schools"
It is the wave of new progressive candidates who appear to be the ones who are shifting the policy window on school privatization.
Take the campaign of progressive superstar Randy Bryce, running for the congressional seat Paul Ryan held in Wisconsin. The Badger State recently expanded statewide a voucher program that was confined to Milwaukee and Racine, and charter schools have expanded significantly under the leadership of Republican Governor Scott Walker.
On his website, Bryce provides the usual bromides about “every child deserves a quality education” and “charter, private and traditional public schools can all thrive,” but he then adds the curious statement that “no student should see money taken from their classroom in order to serve another.” What does that mean? Continue reading: The midterm elections show America’s major shift in attitude to charter school privatization | Salon.com
