Citizen groups call for equal educational opportunity for every child
January 4, 2010 | Filed Under Education, Government, Corruption, Israel Teitelbaum, Liberals, Rights, State Government | Comments Off
-By Israel Teitelbaum
It was ironic to learn that Governor Jon Corzine, less than one month prior to leaving office, signed an Executive Order creating the Non- Public Education Funding Commission to “consider the challenges non-public school children face, identify their educational needs and make recommendations on how available resources can be best utilized to enhance educational opportunities in New Jersey.”
As an accomplished businessman he is surely well informed of the writings of the late, world renowned economist Dr. Milton Friedman on free enterprise and competition – the engine that drives our economy. Friedman applies this to education. “Government ownership and operation of schools alter fundamentally the way the industry is organized. In most industries, consumers are free to buy the product from anyone who offers it for sale, at a price mutually agreed on. In the process, consumers determine how much is produced and by whom and producers have an incentive to satisfy their customers. These competitive private industries are organized from the bottom up. They have been responsible for truly remarkable economic growth, improvements in products and increased efficiency in production.” PDF file
He recommends a school voucher system. “The prescription is clear. Change the organization of elementary and secondary schooling from top-down to bottom-up. Convert to a system in which parents choose the schools their children attend—or, more broadly, the educational services their children receive, whether in a brick-and-mortar school or on DVDs or over the Internet or whatever alternative the ingenuity of man can conceive. Parents would pay for educational services with whatever subsidy they receive from the government plus whatever sum they want to add out of their own resources. Producers would be free to enter or leave the industry and would compete to attract students. As in other industries, such a competitive free market would lead to improvements in quality and reductions in cost.“
Had Governor Corzine instituted such a funding system in the four disaster districts that fall under the jurisdiction of the State of New Jersey – Camden, Jersey City, Newark and Paterson – we would not be facing an $9.5 billion deficit. Nor would our children be forced to suffer in schools where learning is almost non-existent.
Thankfully, the voters of New Jersey have spoken. Despite being outspent three to one, voters supported school choice candidate Chris Christie, who assured us of his support for parental choice in education. What we need to avoid at all costs is a repeat of Governor Christie Whitman’s “Advisory Panel on School Vouchers,” established in April 1995. They spent the better part of two years holding public hearings around the state and making their recommendations. It was all for naught. The NJEA would not allow vouchers – even as a pilot program.
There never was the need for a panel, nor is there one now. Milton Friedman devoted over 50 years of his life to developing and perfecting the voucher system. He summarized it well in his 2005 article, School Vouchers Turn 50 But the Fight is Just Beginning. “An educational voucher of reasonable size, though less than the current government spending per student, that was available to all students regardless of income or race or religion and that did not prohibit add-ons or impose detailed regulations on start-up service providers would end up helping the poor more than a charity voucher — not instantly, but after a brief period as competition did its work. Just as the breakup of the Ma Bell monopoly led to a revolution in communications, a breakup of the school monopoly would lead to a revolution in schooling.”
If evidence were needed that competition works, this is provided by Caroline Hoxby, Professor of Economics at Stanford University and Director, Economics of Education Program at the National Bureau of Economic Research. She researched the Milwaukee voucher program and reported, ”Schools that faced the most competition from the vouchers improved student achievement radically–by about 0.6 of a standard deviation each year. That is an enormous, almost unheard-of, improvement. Keep in mind the schools in question had had a long history of low achievement. Yet they were able to get their act together quickly. The most threatened schools improved the most, not only compared to other schools in Milwaukee but also compared to other schools in the state of Wisconsin that served poor, urban students. Milwaukee shows what public school administrators can tell you: Schools can improve if they are under serious competition.”
Competition would also reduce costs dramatically. Take for example Pope John Paul II School in Clifton, serving the Roman Catholic Diocese of Paterson. With only 400 of its 800 seats filled, and many of its students on scholarships, the school is being compelled to close. Students will be forced into the public educational system at a cost to taxpayers of over $8 million per year. Were this trend to continue in coming years, until all 172,000 nonpublic students were forced back into the public system, this would cost taxpayers an additional $3.5 billion per year in today’s dollars. Construction costs to accommodate them would exceed $7 billion.
In sharp contrast, a voucher program that cut per-student costs by only 20 percent (many faith based schools cut costs by more than 50 percent), would save New Jersey taxpayers a cool $5 billion. Added to this would be future cost savings in domestic security, courts and jails, which are primarily filled with school drop-outs.
It’s time we stopped chasing red herrings and focused our attention on the real crises in our cities. Our children, schools and communities need to be saved now! Those who delay have the blood of our children on their hands. Those who help achieve equal educational opportunity for every child will be in great company with people like Presidents George Washington, Abraham Lincoln and the Rev. Martin Luther King, Jr. Let’s do it for our children.
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Israel Teitelbaum is currently creating a new school choice organization to help further the efforts to improve our public schools. His blog will soon be up and running at SchoolChoiceVoter.org. Mr. Teitelbaum can be reached at israel@schoolchoicenj.org.
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