Going beyond the name of the School Choice Bill: Does it do what it purports to do?
April 7, 2023 | Montgomery County, TX
by Bonnie Lyons, Legislative Chair, Montgomery County Republican Party
Commentary
I have long been an advocate of the concept of school choice. How simple and logical can you get? Tax dollars should follow the school that each student chooses to attend. It’s a simple transaction.
By doing so, our children are able to escape the prison of under-performing schools, we break the monopoly of public schools and make schools more competitive, and we impact the power of the unions that have indoctrinated our children and lowered educational standards.
But is that what we will get with SB 8? I’m not sure why it takes 22 pages to describe the concept. Maybe it does. And why does it seem that it takes a big expansion of government to administer a change in school funding?
Do we trust government enough to put our children first in this process? What strings will be attached to the money? We have seen what our politicians and our bureaucrats are willing to impose upon our children and our families without our consultation or permission. Will the problems that we are dealing with in our public schools simply spread to private and home schools?
We can say that only schools that are properly chartered or accredited can receive the school choice funding, but who will be issuing and making decisions on which schools receive charters and accreditation? Will it be the same people who are introducing CRT and ‘equity standards’ into classrooms and pornographic books into our children’s libraries? If it is, will they target our alternative schools, withholding funding and ultimately forcing them to close?
In conversations with other Republican voters who are following this bill, we found other concerns and questions.
A big one is the manner in which home school families are being treated in the legislation. For instance, the bill would require a child be in a public school for a year to even receive any funds. Current private school and home school kids cannot get funds. So if your public school is failing, your kid gets to stay there for a year.
In other states that have begun these programs, government oversight increases. Home schoolers could lose their freedoms/protections as they are considered private schools under the Leeper decision. Requirements or regulations could be forced on them, as these programs expand. Currently, home schoolers in Texas are free to choose what they want to teach their children and are not required to test.
And on the testing issue, this bill opens the door for more testing requirements. Testing is an important part of learning, but is an added focus on it an improvement or is it an avenue for the education lobby to bleed more big money out of our school systems? Expect the education lobby to be out in force to include this in the program.
Isn’t this basically a welfare program for education, creating more dependence on the state, which as we know never contracts and ALWAYS expands. And it will expand because where it doesn’t go far enough is to provide funds for people who will actually want them for their choice of schools.
There is a parents rights section in the bill, but there is no enforcement included. What’s that about?
Are we making any progress by passing a bill that will give our government more control of all of our schools instead of just the public ones? I don’t pretend to be an authority or even have a firm grasp on this piece of legislation, but the questions that come to mind are substantial.
For a very long time, School Choice has been the rallying cry of families alarmed about problems in the schools that we are forced to support with our tax dollars. But we are not willing to be sold a solution just because it bears that name.
It is exactly because of government’s over-reaching role in our schools that parents have demanded ‘School Choice’. More government involvement does not give us choice. It just gives us more government.
Current Status
This bill has already passed the Senate, but in the House, some Republicans joined with Democrats to pass an amendment to the state’s budget that prohibits funds being spent on school choice. It is doubtful the move will stop the legislation, as the budget must still pass in the choice-friendly Senate, which is likely to strip the amendment, while the House takes up the actual bill. However, it does create conflict, attention, and an opportunity for discussion.
We welcome discourse on this topic if you have a differing opinion or answers to some of our questions. Email me at info@mctxgop.org. I’d love to hear your thoughts on this issue.