The Opportunity of School Choice

Time has come to focus on the student, not the System.

Giving every family in South Carolina access to a quality education for their children is essential to our state’s future.

It also shows that we, as a state, understand that parents have a right –even a responsibility– to make important decisions about their children’s lives.

Through school choice South Carolina can move away from the antiquated, exclusive model of “public or private schools,” and embrace a broader system in which public AND private schools are made available to meet the learning needs of individual students. School Choice means real options for all parents: public and private and charter and magnet and virtual and home school.

South Carolina High School Graduation Rates

“How many children drop out of school in South Carolina?”
“What is the graduation rate in South Carolina high schools?”
“How many students in OUR school district will graduate from high school?…”

(HINT: Scroll down and find out!)

It is hard to get a straight answer when it comes to questions about graduates and dropouts in South Carolina’s public schools.

A recent report indicates that in the senior class of 2008-09, only 42,947 (or 66.3% of those enrolled in 9th grade four years earlier) graduated public high school with an earned diploma. In other words, 1-in-3 students (or 122 pupils each day) dropped out, were held back, or failed to complete the full diploma requirements

Already some in the media are raising questions about the validity of so-called “statewide gains” and the wide disparity between numbers cited by Jim Rex, those reported in the Education Week report, and the figures publicly available on the US Department of Education’s website.

The State Newspaper (6/9) reported:

The on-time graduation rate reported by Education Week and the State Department of Education differ, and there’s no clear consensus on why.

The Anderson Independent Mail (6/9) reported:

…But, those [Education Week] figures are misleading, said Jim Foster, spokesman for the South Carolina Department of Education. The graduation rates in Education Week are estimates that over the years have resulted in disparities from one report to the next, he said.

The Greenwood Today (6/9) reported:

The graduation figures in the Education Week publication, seen as a national standard for K12 education policy and assessment, vary greatly from higher numbers released by the South Carolina State Department of Education.

Attention is also being drawn to that fact that South Carolina has not released district-specific graduation levels since the 2004-05 school year for the federal government’s uniform rankings. In that 2004-05 school year, the statewide graduation rate was 52.23%.

The graduation rate varied from 87% in York District 4 to 29% in Lee County School District.

Thankfully, these figures can be found in Common Core of Data section of the US DOE website.

Below is a district-by-district list of enrollment and diplomas numbers for the South Carolina public high school class of 2005 drawn from the Federally reported data (again, this is the most recent year for which detailed data -not estimates and averages- is available):

SOUTH CAROLINA STATE TOTALS

64,027 (9th Graders enrolled in 2001-2)

38,657 (12th Graders in 2004-5)

33,439 (Diplomas issued in 2004-5)

52.23% (% of 9th graders who graduated in 4 school years)

ABBEVILLE COUNTY SCHOOL DISTRICT

348 (9th Graders enrolled in 2001-2)

WSJ: SC Senator Robert Ford right to push School Choice

“School Choice Is the New Civil Rights Struggle” by Brendan Miniter of the Wallstreet Journal (5/30).

A word of support from the president could transform local politics on the issue.

Getting arrested doesn’t normally bolster a politician’s credibility. But when South Carolina state Sen. Robert Ford told me recently that he saw the inside of a jail cell 73 times, he did so to make a point. As a youth, Mr. Ford cut his political teeth in tumultuous 1960s civil-rights protests.

Today this black Democrat says the new civil-rights struggle is about the quality of instruction in public schools, and that to receive a decent education African-Americans need school choice. He wants the president’s help. “We need choice like Obama has. He can send his kids to any school he wants.”

Mr. Ford was once like many Democrats on education — a reliable vote against reforms that would upend the system. But over the past three and a half years he’s studied how school choice works and he’s now advocating tax credits and scholarships that parents can spend on public or private schools.

Jim Rex admits some schools are “dropout factories”

South Carolina State Superintendent of Education Dr. Jim Rex admits to the existence of “dropout factories,” which he blames for the state’s shameful 55.6% on-time graduation rate.

Video footage was taken of Rex speaking at Education Department orchestrated “Town Hall meeting” at Greenville’s J.L. Mann High School on May 28, 2009.

Despite the shameful dropout rate, Rex is committed to blocking serious reform being push by parents and educators across the state.

Chronic illiteracy plagues SC Public Schools

Parents and community members throughout Charleston were shocked this week to learn that illiteracy and under-literacy run rampant in the Charleston County public school system.

From the P&C‘s recent article by Diette Courrégé:

“Test scores show 20 percent of rising 9th-graders read at or below 4th-grade level.”

Among the disturbing data points:

–More than 20 percent of the Charleston’s rising ninth-graders read on a fourth-grade level or worse.

–Nearly half of the incoming freshmen at North Charleston High School read at a fourth-grade level or worse.

–Eleven percent of the incoming freshmen at Wando High School read at a fourth-grade level or worse.

The reporter further notes that one-in-seven adults in Berkeley, Charleston and Dorchester counties is functionally illiterate, defined as reading below an eighth-grade level. Up to 20,000 tri-county adults have less than a ninth-grade education, which is an alarming level, but makes sense in light of the South Carolina’s shoddy 55% on-time public high school graduation rate.

Functionally illiterate adults can’t understand a newspaper article, complete a job application, follow the directions on a prescription label or fill out a bank deposit slip.

Real school choice in S.C. is high priority

“Real school choice in S.C. is high priority,” an editorial published in the Times and Democrat (5/22).

In recent weeks some politicians and administrators who claim to speak for “public education” have made a frightening suggestion: They’ve argued that public debate over school choice should be entirely halted.

Dr. Paul Krohne, director of the S.C. Schools Boards Association and Dr. Jim Rex, state superintendent of schools, have called the discussion of educational choices “expensive,” “distracting” and even “dangerous.”

Their core premise is that one-size-fits-all government schools are a panacea for all that ails the children — and communities — of South Carolina. Rather than defend and explain this questionable position, they try to squelch public debate.

This tactic is absurd and alarmingly undemocratic. It indicates an esteem of the system over the individual students and families those schools were opened to serve.

More Black Lawmakers Supporting School Choice

According to this article in USA Today, school choice is a reform measure that more black lawmakers are willing to publicly support.

Despite heated opposition from unions and status quo politicians, these officials have been willing to do whatever it takes to help children in failing public schools have access to a quality education. Prominent examples of this very necessary leadership are Sacramento Mayor Kevin Johnson, Newark Mayor Cory Booker and former Washington, D.C., mayor Anthony Williams.

Putting children first- in the face of political pressure- puts these leaders in stark contrast to President Obama, who presided over the demise of the school choice program in Washington, D.C. that allowed low-income students to escape public schools so bad that US Secretary of Education Arne Duncan referred to them as “a national disgrace.”

Here in South Carolina, State Senator Robert Ford has been a strident voice for school choice options. Despite personal attacks and dismissive treatment by establishment hangers-on, Ford has continued pointing out the hypocrisy of lawmakers refusing parents choice, and demanding that low-income students in South Carolina have the same opportunities as those available to the children of more influential citizens.

Schools rake in fake awards

Taxpayer-funded “publicists” at the SC Department of Education like to use “awards” as a measure of public school “success.”

In the first four months of 2009, there were 20 press releases issued by the department that included the term “award” in the title or first sentence.

The problem is that many awards and accolades are not actually tied to student achievement, and some seem designed to distract from a school’s performance failures by improving parents’ perceptions of the school.

Here are two recent examples:

Allendale Elementary School

In March, Allendale Elementary School was awarded “a gold certificate and banner by USDA Food and Nutrition Service Southeast Regional Administrator Donald E. Arnette for meeting USDA’s HealthierUS School Challenge“

“The HealthierUS School Gold award is one of the highest honors a school nutrition program can achieve and reflects a strong commitment to provide students with additional healthy food options throughout the school campus, and to emphasize nutrition education and physical activity in the school curriculum.”

Allendale Elementary is classified by the State and Federal governments as a “persistently failing school” and has again been identified this school year as “at-risk.” There are 569 students forced to attend this failing public school.

Parents are Talking, Are Lawmakers Listening? (VIDEO)

Dozens of parents have testified before state senators about the need families have for real school choice, and thousands more have visited the Statehouse over the last three years to plead with lawmakers for a fair chance at quality education.

Private school educators,  home school parents and public school parents have pointed out example after example of children with educational needs that local public schools are unable, or unwilling to meet.

Lawmakers, like State Senator Robert Ford, have pointed out the injustice of confining thousands of children to failing public schools, with no education, and no hope for anything better.

Even in front of the parents pleading with the state senate for help, education officials and establishment insiders stand up and try to divert lawmakers’ attention away from parents, and back to the wants of the establishment.

Lawmakers need to listen to the people in their districts who want real choices, and act accordingly.

Parents head to Columbia, demand School Choice

Melissa Melvin, a parent from York County, testifies before the SC Senate K-12 Education Subcommittee about her personal experiences dealing with the public school system in South Carolina. Like dozens of other parents, she wanted lawmakers to know that families across the State expect public policies which put students first.

Learn more about S.520, the Education Opportunity Act here.