DCOSP

On April 21st, National Public Radio Senior Correspondent and Fox News contributor Juan Williams wrote the following on the D.C. Opportunity Scholarship program:

"As I watch Washington politics I am not easily given to rage. Washington politics is a game and selfishness, out-sized egos and corruption are predictable. But over the last week I find myself in a fury.

The cause of my upset is watching the key civil rights issue of this generation — improving big city public school education — get tossed overboard by political gamesmanship. If there is one goal that deserves to be held above day-to-day partisanship and pettiness of ordinary politics it is the effort to end the scandalous poor level of academic achievement and abysmally high drop-out rates for America’s black and Hispanic students.

In a politically calculated dance step the Obama team first indicated that they wanted the Opportunity Scholarship Program to continue for students lucky enough to have won one of the vouchers. The five-year school voucher program is scheduled to expire after the school year ending in June 2010. Secretary Duncan said in early March that it didn’t make sense “to take kids out of a school where they’re happy and safe and satisfied and learning…those kids need to stay in their school.”

And all along the administration indicated that pending evidence that this voucher program or any other produces better test scores for students they were willing to fight for it. The president has said that when it comes to better schools he is open to supporting “what works for kids.” That looked like a level playing field on which to evaluate the program and even possibly expanding the program.

But last week Secretary Duncan announced that he will not allow any new students to enter the D.C. voucher program. In fact, he had to take back the government’s offer of scholarships to 200 students who had won a lottery to get into the program starting next year. His rationale is that if the program does not win new funding from Congress then those students might have to go back to public school in a year.

The National Education Association and other teachers’ unions have put millions into Democrats’ congressional campaigns because they oppose Republican efforts to challenge unions on their resistance to school reform and specifically their refusal to support ideas such as performance-based pay for teachers who raise students’ test scores.

By going along with Secretary Duncan’s plan to hollow out the D.C. voucher program this president, who has spoken so passionately about the importance of education, is playing rank politics with the education of poor children. It is an outrage."

Do I sense a little buyer's remorse here? He is outraged, but does he regret voting for "change" and "hope" like 64 million other residents, legal and illegal, living and dead? This is yet another broken promise, along with transparency, lobbyists in the Oval office, fiscally responsible government, ending the culture of corruption, etc., by his highness President Obama. Both parties are guilty of satsifying the desires of lobbyists seeking to enrich themselves with more money versus enriching we people with more freedom, which is their solemn duty under the Constitution.

Consider this: the DCOSP...
...costs less per student ($7,500) than traditional federal programs ($15,315 in the 2004–2005 school year)
...provides a better learning experience - Studies of scholarship families show higher parent satisfaction with their children’s school safety and learning environment. Test scores showed that students offered scholarships were performing approximately 3.1 months ahead in reading of students not offered vouchers and an equivalent of 3.7 months of total additional learning.
...cost a total of $13 million which is a drop in the bucket (0.02% of total) compared to the $68 billion Department of Education (DOE) budget.

Here's another outrage. The recent $787,000,000,000 stimulus bill alone added over $98,000,000,000 (12% of total) to the DOE. In fact, the 2007 DOE budget spent almost $14,000,000 per DOE employee (which ranked the highest of all cabinet departments that year in terms of $ per employee including defense!), yet they didn't see fit to continue $7,500 per D.C. student? How exactly will this $166,000,000,000 be spent? Who is accountable for showing its effectiveness? How can a bureacracy effectively manage this vast sum of money?

If the government sees fit to confiscate this wealth from its citizens, which I do NOT advocate, would it not be better spent on school choice, scholarship programs for ALL inner-city, poor, underpriveleged minority students? Why do the majority of the parents of these students keep voting (no real stats but just looking at an electoral county map of the country that ALWAYS shows big cities shaded blue) for the people who say they will help them but help the unions and other campaign contributors instead? Mr. Williams probably speaks well for these parents, but will he and they actually do something about it and vote for real change next time?