The Dark History of School Choice | by Diane Ravitch | The New York Review of
Books
The Dark History of School Choice
How an argument for segregated schools became a rallying cry for privatizing
public education.
During her tenure as secretary of education, Betsy DeVos repeatedly asked
Congress to allocate billions of dollars for vouchers for religious and
private schools. She was repeatedly rebuffed. Even Republican members of
Congress were unwilling to use the federal education budget to pay for
vouchers. After all, most of their constituents’ children attend public
schools.
After the pandemic struck, DeVos tried again. Late last March, Congress
passed a $2.2 trillion relief bill called the Coronavirus Aid, Relief, and
Economic Security (CARES) Act,
which allocated $13.2 billion for K–12 education. Congress expected that the
money would be shared, as federal education funds typically are, among the
nation’s nearly 100,000 public and 7,000 charter schools, as well as private
schools based on the number of low-income students they enroll. DeVos
instead directed states to share the money allotted to public schools with
private and religious schools that enrolled middle-income and affluent
students. The NAACP and several states responded with lawsuits, arguing that her order
was illegal. Three federal judges in different parts of the country ruled
against DeVos, and she backed down.
But the Trump administration found another way to enrich charter and private
schools. The Paycheck Protection Program (PPP), also part of the CARES Act, was supposed to rescue small businesses. Lobbyists for the
charter industry, however, encouraged charter schools to apply as
nonprofits, thus double-dipping into both the public school and PPP funds (public schools were ineligible for PPP funding). Private and religious schools also qualified for PPP funds as nonprofits. Therefore, through a bill supposed to aid small
businesses at risk of bankruptcy, thousands of charter, private, and
religious schools received an average of about $855,000 each, compared to
about $134,500 per public school through CARES. Religious schools of every denomination, elite private schools, and more
than one thousand charter schools received anywhere from $150,000 to $10
million each according to a database compiled by a website called COVID Stimulus Watch. Antelope Valley Learning Academy, a charter school in
California, received $7.8 million. The for-profit Academia Corporation
charter school chain won $28.6 million. Buckingham Browne & Nichols, an
elite private school in CONTINUE READING: The Dark History of School Choice | by Diane Ravitch | The New York Review of Books
