Redstate

Posted at 8:10am on Jun. 24, 2008 When wearing a "D" means defending failure

By RightMichigan.com

Cross-posted on Right Michigan at www.RightMichigan.com.

Ivory Tower columnist Rochelle Reilly has a new piece in the fish wrap this morning making a pretty compelling case for school choice.  She'd better look out, the governor might revoke her lefty press credentials.  She's sick to her stomach over the way no one seems to care about the chronic failure of the Detroit Public Schools.  To Ms. Reilly I'd like extend a formal "welcome to the club."  Some of us have been complaining for years about the way the school district fails the kids who need them.  Heck, I remember back during the last gubernatorial cycle there was this pesky little illegal teachers strike.  They walked off the job and left the kids out in the street.  And did I mention it was illegal.

Posted in Breaking News | budget deficit | Charter Schools | corrections | Detroit Public Schools | Michigan | School Choice — Comments (2) / Email this page » / Read More »

Posted at 10:02pm on Jun. 20, 2008 Barack Obama On School Vouchers

By Pejman Yousefzadeh

The flip-flopping continues--and at an almost unbelievable rate.

Posted at 10:22pm on Jun. 19, 2008 Memo To Congress

By Pejman Yousefzadeh

Be like Jed Bartlet. Do the right thing.

Posted at 10:28pm on Jun. 18, 2008 Flunking The School Choice Test

By Pejman Yousefzadeh

Neal McCluskey schools Barack Obama. Pointing out that Obama's positions are more "comprehensible" than are those of Eleanor Holmes Norton is, of course, cold comfort.

Posted at 10:08pm on Jun. 17, 2008 Barack Obama's Test

By Pejman Yousefzadeh

If "Change You Can Believe In" is meant to be more than just a slogan, Barack Obama will not hesitate to stand up to people like Eleanor Holmes Norton, who proposes to utterly and callously shut down school choice in Washington, DC:

Barack and Michelle Obama send their children to an upscale private school. When asked about it during last year's YouTube debate, Sen. Obama responded that it was "the best option" for his children.

Several hundred low-income parents in our nation's capital have also sent their children to private and parochial schools, with the help of a federal program that provides Opportunity Scholarships. Like Mr. and Mrs. Obama, most of these parents are African-American. And like Mr. and Mrs. Obama, they too believe the schools they've chosen represent the "best option" for their children.

Now these parents have a question for Mr. Obama. Is Mr. Change-You-Can-Believe-In going to let his fellow Democrats take away the one change that is working for them?

Just a few days ago, Democrat Eleanor Holmes Norton (D.C.'s congressional delegate) told the Washington Post that "the Democratic Congress is not about to extend this program." Today that program will come under the congressional spotlight, when a House subcommittee takes up the annual appropriations bill for the District of Columbia that includes funding for Opportunity Scholarships for the 2009-10 school year. If Mrs. Norton and her allies in the teachers unions have their way, hundreds of African-American children with these scholarships will be forced back into one of the most miserable public school systems in the United States.

There is ample evidence that school choice is the best policy to implement. And since Barack Obama assures us that he wants to help us turn a page in our politics, it would be great to see him lead by example and take members of his own party to task for hanging on to an outdated, unworkable, intellectually and morally cruel education policy while advocating the utter and complete ditching of a policy that can significantly enhance the state of education in the United States by leaps and bounds and which is craved by lower-income families as a way of helping get their kids out of poverty.

Of course, if Obama doesn't follow through on his promises of change and decides to back the educational antediluvians in his party, then I guess we will know what to make of his slogan, won't we?

Posted in Barack Obama | Policy | School Choice — Comments (5)/ Email this page » / Read More »

Posted at 1:45am on Jun. 13, 2008 The School Choice Revolution In Louisiana

By Pejman Yousefzadeh

Here's a good account of what is going on in the Bayou State. It is most heartening; while there remains a lot that needs to be accomplished, Governor Jindal and his allies in the Louisiana State Legislature are light years ahead of many of their contemporaries in working to bring genuine school choice to their constituents. They should be applauded for that and we should look forward to the day when such accomplishments are no longer considered as unbelievably extraordinary as they are these days.

Posted at 9:36am on May 6, 2008 Why Won't Sonny Perdue Sign H.B. 881? This really is for the children and not in a socialist anti-freedom way.

By Erick

Georgia House Bill 881 is legislation in Georgia to help improve the conditions in which charter schools grow. Given the mess in Clayton County, Georgia, the first school district in the nation to lose its accreditation in over a decade, and the kids who are stuck down there, I am really surprised Governor Sonny Perdue hasn't signed this legislation -- it's just common sense reform to prevent local school boards like Clayton County from shutting down charter schools without cause and the legislation provides adequate funding and freedom for charter schools.

Right now Georgia has 71 charter schools with about 30,000 students across the socio-economic spectrum. These schools are currently out performing state averages on standardized tests despite receiving about 30% less than typical public schools. And charter schools don't even get facilities funding.

Under H.B. 881, funding will following children. If a child goes to charter school, the money goes with the child there. If the child goes back to public school, the money goes with the child back. It forces public and charter schools to compete, and competition improves schooling.

Twenty-six Georgia school systems have failed to meet federal and state standards. Clayton County is losing its accreditation. Charter schools are a great alternative.

H.B. 881 is a common sense reform to help foster charter schools. Too often local school districts try to make things extreme difficult for charter schools, while ignoring the need to actually improve local public schools.

It's time for the Governor to sign off on H.B. 881.

Please join me in calling Governor Perdue at (404) 656-1776. Ask him to sign H.B. 881. If you don't want to call, you can contact him via the web by going here.

Posted in Charter Schools | Georgia | School Choice | Sonny Perdue | State Politics — Comments (0)/ Email this page » / Read More »

Posted at 11:31pm on Apr. 8, 2008 Yet Another Argument In Favor Of School Choice

By Pejman Yousefzadeh

School choice gives students access to a better education thanks to competition in a genuinely free educational marketplace. In addition, it does so at significantly less cost.

And no, I don't believe that this is just true in the District of Columbia.

Posted at 1:20am on Mar. 27, 2008 And The Lids Come Off The Silos

By Pejman Yousefzadeh

To summarize this: A Florida education union is threatening to sue to shut down a school choice program in the state if the program expands. They have already successfully sued to shut down a previous voucher program in the state. Basically, if "too many" families opt for school choice, the nuclear litigation weapons will be launched by the union, which is bound and determined that Floridian children be taught their way, as opposed to being taught the best way.

Remember all of this the next time you hear educational unions tell you that they only want what is best for your children. Poppycock. They only want what is best for the unions' political power and for the job security of union members.

Posted in Policy | Revenge Of the Education Establishment | School Choice — Comments (9)/ Email this page » / Read More »

Posted at 1:32am on Feb. 22, 2008 The State Of School Choice

By Pejman Yousefzadeh

Discussed by Andrew Coulson. Bottom line: While charter schools have introduced an element of choice into school systems, that choice--and the degree to which the education market has become more free--is severely "attenuated" in comparison with what is needed. As such, people like Chester Finn and William Bennett are wrong to place national standards over school choice. Rather, they should take a look at the current school choice market and demand more of it in order to augment and enhance educational standards.

Posted at 1:26am on Feb. 19, 2008 School Choice Works: Example # 9,427,386

By Pejman Yousefzadeh

Behold. I don't want the federal government involved in a voucher program; indeed, I don't want the federal government involved in setting a national education policy. That should be for states and localities to do. And it might be better--as people like my RedState colleague, Ben Domenech have pointed out--to have a tax rebate system that will allow families a broader range of choice that will include access to private schools. But in either event, as Alex Tabarrok states, incentives matter. And absent genuine and wide-ranging school choice, there is no incentive for failing schools to improve themselves.

Posted at 2:53am on Jan. 31, 2008 Yousefzadeh's Law Of Education Policy

By Pejman Yousefzadeh

Political resistance to the policy of school choice is commensurate with the degree of success school choice engenders.

Posted at 5:35pm on Jan. 28, 2008 Why does the NEA hate Latinos?

By Jeff Emanuel

According to a study by the National Center for Policy Analysis, school choice could help keep Latinos from dropping out of school, which they currently do at the highest rate of any race in America.

The NEA, though, persists in fighting school choice, and continues to drive this minority group out of school. How sad.

Posted at 1:05am on Dec. 12, 2007 The School Voucher Debate

By Pejman Yousefzadeh

It's not much of a debate anymore, now is it? See also this. At some point in time, are we going to actually implement vouchers in a widespread and systematic fashion, or do we have to simply content ourselves with hearing about the successes of school choice programs in select situations and circumstances?