The School Voucher Illusion

The School Voucher Illusion PDF Author: Kevin Welner
Publisher: Teachers College Press
ISBN: 0807781703
Category : Education
Languages : en
Pages : 321

Get Book Here

Book Description
This authoritative book examines the long-standing campaign that resulted in today’s school voucher policies. Advocates of private school vouchers promulgated a vision of service to low-income families, students of color, and other marginalized student populations. Vouchers were sold as a way to advance civil rights. But as voucher policies grew in size and became an element of Republican orthodoxy, they evolved into subsidies for a broad swath of advantaged families, with minimal antidiscrimination protections. The approach also transmuted into forms like education savings account programs and vouchers funded through tax-credited donations. In this book, scholars and national experts untangle this complex story to show how law and policy have aligned to dramatically alter the likely future of American schooling. They offer recommendations for modifying current policies with the goal of capturing more of the originally stated vision of voucher programs—equitable access to quality schooling, protection of all students’ civil rights, and advancement of the wider societal goals of a democratic educational system. Book Features: Shows how a fast-growing policy is transforming education in the United States in ways that are very different from how that policy was sold to the public. Sets the stage with a discussion of the history and legal dimensions of voucher battles, as well as the politics of policy change. Examines the basic structure of contemporary private schooling, the Southern history of vouchers, and the key federal court decisions that have opened the door to an explosion of state legislation. Offers profiles of voucher policies in two states that have made the largest efforts to support vouchers, as well as the only nationally funded program in the nation’s capital. Edited by three scholars with extensive experience in the study of school choice, with chapters by national experts who have produced seminal work in the field.

The School Voucher Illusion

The School Voucher Illusion PDF Author: Kevin Welner
Publisher: Teachers College Press
ISBN: 0807781703
Category : Education
Languages : en
Pages : 321

Get Book Here

Book Description
This authoritative book examines the long-standing campaign that resulted in today’s school voucher policies. Advocates of private school vouchers promulgated a vision of service to low-income families, students of color, and other marginalized student populations. Vouchers were sold as a way to advance civil rights. But as voucher policies grew in size and became an element of Republican orthodoxy, they evolved into subsidies for a broad swath of advantaged families, with minimal antidiscrimination protections. The approach also transmuted into forms like education savings account programs and vouchers funded through tax-credited donations. In this book, scholars and national experts untangle this complex story to show how law and policy have aligned to dramatically alter the likely future of American schooling. They offer recommendations for modifying current policies with the goal of capturing more of the originally stated vision of voucher programs—equitable access to quality schooling, protection of all students’ civil rights, and advancement of the wider societal goals of a democratic educational system. Book Features: Shows how a fast-growing policy is transforming education in the United States in ways that are very different from how that policy was sold to the public. Sets the stage with a discussion of the history and legal dimensions of voucher battles, as well as the politics of policy change. Examines the basic structure of contemporary private schooling, the Southern history of vouchers, and the key federal court decisions that have opened the door to an explosion of state legislation. Offers profiles of voucher policies in two states that have made the largest efforts to support vouchers, as well as the only nationally funded program in the nation’s capital. Edited by three scholars with extensive experience in the study of school choice, with chapters by national experts who have produced seminal work in the field.

The Illusion of Public Opinion

The Illusion of Public Opinion PDF Author: George F. Bishop
Publisher: Rowman & Littlefield Publishers
ISBN:
Category : Political Science
Languages : en
Pages : 256

Get Book Here

Book Description
In a rigorous critique of public opinion polling in the U.S., George F. Bishop makes the case that a lot of what passes as 'public opinion' in mass media today is an illusion, an artifact of measurement created by vague or misleading survey questions presented to respondents who typically construct their opinions on the spot. Using evidence from a wide variety of data sources, Bishop shows that widespread public ignorance and poorly informed opinions are the norm rather than definitive public opinion on key political, social, and cultural issues of the day. The Illusion of Public Opinion presents a number of cautionary tales about how American public opinion has supposedly changed since 9/11, amplified by additional examples on other occasions drawn from the American National Election Studies. Bishop's analysis of the pitfalls of asking survey questions and interpreting poll results leads the reader to a more skeptical appreciation of the art and science of public opinion polling as it is practiced today.

No Child Left Behind and the Illusion of Reform

No Child Left Behind and the Illusion of Reform PDF Author: Thomas Stewart Poetter
Publisher:
ISBN:
Category : Education
Languages : en
Pages : 152

Get Book Here

Book Description
No Child Left Behind and the Illusion of Reform highlights the scholarship of eight doctoral students in curriculum and their professor, who took on the legal, political, philosophical, social, cultural, economic, and curricular assumptions of the No Child Left Behind Act (NCLB). This book, the manifestation of their work, is a critical examination of the impact of the NCLB on the lives of children, families, and teachers; and the elusive, but powerful, dynamic found between the rhetorical machinations of the law and the ideological touchstones that dominate the American political terrain. This book openly challenges the law with arguments founded on solid research, scholarship, and data. No Child Left Behind and the Illusion of Reform argues that this law is not only a bad idea for children, but also for teachers, parents, schools, and communities because it undermines good teaching through an over-emphasis on testing and measurement. NCLB also pits schools against each other in a competition for limited resources. The book argues that the law sets impossible goals, which further and unnecessarily defeat and deflate the institution of public education.

Publicly Funded School Voucher Programs

Publicly Funded School Voucher Programs PDF Author: Nathan A. Benefield
Publisher: Universal-Publishers
ISBN: 1581121164
Category : Business & Economics
Languages : en
Pages : 108

Get Book Here

Book Description
This study provides a policy analysis of publicly funded school voucher programs. This research provides an analysis of voucher programs in Cleveland and Milwaukee and of political, legal, and programmatic constraints facing voucher programs. A synopsis of student test score analyses and parental surveys provides a basis for analyzing the effect of programs on participants. A survey of 30 individuals working with the Cleveland and Milwaukee public schools or voucher programs clarifies the effect of the programs on the overall educational environment. A review of financial data from the programs, pending legislation, national poll data, and court rulings provides an understanding of the policy constraints facing voucher programs. The research indicates that school vouchers have positively affected student participants' academic achievement and finds that public schools have adapted to the competitive impact of vouchers by initiating reforms aimed at improving schools. While the analysis indicates that legal constraints still loom over voucher policy, school vouchers have become politically and programmatically viable as a policy alternative. The study concludes that vouchers programs are a beneficial and, pending legal outcomes, practical policy alternative.

Reign of Error

Reign of Error PDF Author: Diane Ravitch
Publisher: Vintage
ISBN: 0345806352
Category : Education
Languages : en
Pages : 418

Get Book Here

Book Description
From one of the foremost authorities on education in the United States, former U.S. assistant secretary of education, an incisive, comprehensive look at today’s American school system that argues against those who claim it is broken and beyond repair; an impassioned but reasoned call to stop the privatization movement that is draining students and funding from our public schools. In a chapter-by-chapter breakdown she puts forth a plan for what can be done to preserve and improve our public schools. She makes clear what is right about U.S. education, how policy makers are failing to address the root causes of educational failure, and how we can fix it.

School Vouchers

School Vouchers PDF Author: Martin Carnoy
Publisher:
ISBN:
Category : Education
Languages : en
Pages : 72

Get Book Here

Book Description
This study reviews recent empirical research on the effect of school vouchers on student achievement (particularly for low-income minorities attending private schools) and the effect of the threat of vouchers on low-performing public schools. The study examines the Milwaukee voucher experiment, the Cleveland voucher program, and new voucher research. Research on the voucher programs in Cleveland and Milwaukee indicate that for African American students these programs have little or no positive effect on their academic achievement. Research from Dayton, Ohio, New York, New York, and Washington, D.C. shows no significant test score gains for Hispanic and White voucher students but statistically significant gains for African American students. However, several methodological issues make these comparisons of achievement problematic. Findings that the threat of vouchers for students in failing public school caused math and writing gains among Florida's lowest-performing schools to increase significantly more than gains of higher-performing schools are plagued by methodological problems. Three papers are appended: "What Caused the Effects of the Florida A+ Program: Ratings or Vouchers?" (Doug Harris); "Replication of Jay Greene's Voucher Effect Study Using Texas Performance Data" (Amanda Brownson); and "Replication of Jay Greene's Voucher Effect Study Using North Carolina Data" (Helen F. Ladd and Elizabeth J. Glennie). (Contains 33 endnotes and 29 references.) (SM)

Hands Up for School Choice!

Hands Up for School Choice! PDF Author: Tony Hockley
Publisher:
ISBN: 9780954561185
Category : Educational vouchers
Languages : en
Pages : 30

Get Book Here

Book Description


Accountancy

Accountancy PDF Author:
Publisher:
ISBN:
Category : Accounting
Languages : en
Pages : 1172

Get Book Here

Book Description


False Choices

False Choices PDF Author: Robert Lowe
Publisher:
ISBN:
Category : Education
Languages : en
Pages : 44

Get Book Here

Book Description
A voucher system of schooling would destroy the few democratic gains made in public education in recent years, worsen inequalities that already permeate education, and block opportunities for meaningful reform. Articles included in this special issue are: (1) an introduction, "Why We Are Publishing False Choices" ("Rethinking Schools" Editorial Board); (2) "The Hollow Promise of School Vouchers" (R. Lowe); (3) "Voucher Plans Proliferate: From Colorado to California, Milwaukee to Baltimore" (B. Miner); (4) "'Choice' Will Devastate Our Urban Schools" (M. Waters); (5) "Our Schools Need Money, Not Rhetoric" (C. J. Prentiss); (6) "Choice Is a Smokescreen" (L. Darling-Hammond); (7) "The Debate Is about Privatization, Not Choice" (D. Meier); (8) "Playing Politices with 'Choice'" (G. Orfield); (9) "A Battle for the Soul of Public Education" (W. Furutani); (10) "Questions and Answers about School Choice" ("Rethinking Schools" Editorial Board); (11) "Whittle's Raid on Public Education" (J. Kozol); (12) "Chris Whittle's Trojan Horse" (A. J. Alvarado); (13) "Is Public School 'Choice' a Viable Alternative?" (A. Bastian); (14) "Massachusetts: Robbing the Poor To Pay the Rich" (S. Karp); (15) "Chicago: Public School 'Choice' and Inequality" (J. Kozol); (16) "When "Choice" Equals No Choice" (H. Kohl); and (17) "'Choice' and Public School Reform" (R. Peterkin). (SLD)

Taking Sides Educational Issues

Taking Sides Educational Issues PDF Author: James William Noll
Publisher: McGraw-Hill/Dushkin
ISBN:
Category : Education
Languages : en
Pages : 484

Get Book Here

Book Description
This debate-style reader is designed to introduce students to controversies in education. The issues reflect viewpoints on fundamental issues such as: should school attendance be compelled; can charter schools revitalize public education, and do school uniforms promote safety and improve discipline. For additional support on this title, visit our student website Dushkin Online (www.dushkin.com/online/).