Liberty to Choose Your School

By Hugh Gourgeon

Should Nevada’s parents retain the right to choose private education for their children?

That question will be answered not by parents and teachers. A government agency that aims to cripple Nevada’s private child care centers is imposing more burdensome and unnecessary regulations. These regulations will jeopardize the viability of private preschools in Nevada and do absolutely nothing for the welfare of students.

One bureaucrat explained, “If you run a school correctly, you cannot make money at it.” This preposterous statement only makes sense from the perspective of someone who pays for their programs with the taxpayers’ coin.

Printing or taking money via force is not an option for private preschools whose very existence relies on the delivery of a superior curriculum and care to parents who choose to pay for it with their hard-earned money.

The Bureau of Services for Child Care claims that it is only interested in the safety of children, but it exempts state-funded schools from such regulations! Why should a school funded by tax money be exempt from the laws? If additional protections are needed, why don't they apply to all centers equally?

In truth, these new regulations are not in response to safety concerns in our schools. They are being re-written by bureaucrats who bulldozed over parents and industry professionals for the last 6 years with the assistance of self-serving legislators whose very jobs and political careers rely on additional regulations.

Additionally, why does the Bureau not recognize that unreasonable demands placed on centers will create higher costs to be passed on to parents? It will force parents to seek care that does not meet the same high standards currently met by Nevada’s licensed centers.

Please call your representatives serving on the Legislative Commission and ask them to reject Nevada Child Care Regulations (NRS 432A, R-0019). They represent the end of choice in Nevada.

Assemblyman John Oceguera: 702-452-4800, joceguera@asm.state.nv.us
Assemblyman Marcus Conklin: 702-363-3885, mconklin@asm.state.nv.us
Senator Maggie Carlton: 702-452-3619, mcarlton@sen.state.nv.us
Senator Barbara Cegavske: 702-873-0711, bcegavske@sen.state.nv.us
Senator Steven Horsford: 702-985-7535, shorsford@sen.state.nv.us
Senator Randolph Townsend: 775-825-5111, rtownsend@sen.state.nv.us
Senator Maurice Washington: 775-331-3826, mwashington@sen.state.nv.us
Senator Joyce Woodhouse: 702-896-1453, jwoodhouse@sen.state.nv.us
Assemblyman John Carpenter: 775-738-9861, jcarpenter@asm.state.nv.us
Assemblywoman Marilyn Kirkpatrick: 702-655-0332, mkirkpatrick@asm.state.nv.us
Assemblyman James Settelmeyer: 775-265-7739, jsettelmeyer@asm.state.nv.us
Assemblywoman Debbie Smith: 775-331-0897, dsmith@asm.state.nv.us

DC residents like DC vouchers

Democrats in Washington have all but killed the DC Opportunity Scholarship program, a voucher that awards scholarships of up to $7,500 to low-income students, allowing them to attend private schools. Unless Congress overturns its recent decision, the program will die by suffocation — the Democrats are not allowing new participants.

But how do DC residents feel about the program?

According to a recent survey, “Fork in the Road: Where does the district go in education?” by the Friedman Foundation, there is clear support for D.C. Opportunity Scholarships:

• 74 percent have a favorable view of the D.C. Opportunity Scholarship Program


• 79 percent of parents of school age children oppose ending the D.C. Opportunity Scholarship Program


• 74 percent have a favorable view of public charter schools


• 76 percent of respondents viewed the public education system as “poor” or “fair.”

Interestingly, only 47 percent of respondents say they prefer a private school over other school types. Still, there is overwhelming support for both public and private educational options. NPRI and the Friedman Foundation found similar support for private and charter schools in Nevada.

Empowerment School laws ignored

In case you missed the latest updates on Nevada's empowerment schools (schools that control most of their own budget rather than having central office bureaucrats dictate how resources are to be used), NPRI revealed that both Washoe County School District and the Nevada Department of Education are ignoring laws requiring the creation of empowerment schools.

Unfortunately, ignoring state law is not a new phenomenon. A 2006 Legislative Counsel Bureau compliance audit of the Nevada Department of Education notes that the department had failed to comply with state and federal laws in the past. The audit found "...weaknesses allowed non-compliance with some state and federal laws, rules, regulations and guidelines, and monitoring of certain educational programs..."

Between FY 2001 and FY 2007, said auditors, the department failed to take adequate steps to oversee proper use of approximately $390 million in legislative appropriations. Laws establishing rules for revoking teacher certifications, including teachers who had become convicted criminals, were ignored, as were laws regarding employee evaluations.

We wonder, will anyone force the government to comply with its own rules?

Education reform is a civil rights issue

Racial segregation in education ended with the 1954 Supreme Court ruling in Brown v. Board of Education. Sixty-five years later, racial segregation is long gone, but a racial achievement gap still remains.

The Nevada Policy Research Institute highlighted this devastating achievement gap in its 2009 report “Failure is No Longer an Option,” noting that, while 71 percent of Nevada white students in the fourth grade read at grade level, just 47 percent of African Americans and 42 percent of Hispanic students do so.

These problems are not isolated to Nevada. The Citizens Commission on Civil Rights has been looking closely into this issue for a long time. The group's goal is to "eliminate the racial and ethnic achievement gap in public education by working to create an effective school for every child."

The Citizens Commission on Civil Rights released a report titled "National Teachers' Unions and the Struggle Over School Reform," in which it placed some of the blame for the existing racial achievement gap on the teacher unions.

Over "the last decade," notes the report, "the national leaders of the National Education Association and the American Federation of Teachers have made their unions implacable foes of laws and policies designed to improve public education for disadvantaged children."

As I have noted already, “education reform is a civil rights issue.”

Read my latest commentary on this issue, “In self(ish) defense: How teacher unions harm students and teachers alike.”

Teaching is a good job

Dr. Jay P Greene, an education research professor at the University of Arkansas, makes an excellent point about teacher recruitment.

“If we make an appeal to prospective teachers at all,” he notes, “it is usually akin to an appeal to enter the priesthood. You’ll make the world a better place, we say. We almost never say, “And you’ll do well for yourself while doing well for others.”

The observation is valid. Other colleges within the university point to the wonderful jobs a student may move into after graduation. They highlight the pay, benefits and opportunities. But in the realm of education, it is all about sacrifice and working for others. How appealing is that?

Dr. Greene points out that teachers make pretty good wages, have high job security, and excellent benefits. While there are serious problems with the teacher pay schedule — ignoring individual excellence, for example — prospective teachers should be told they have a chance to make a good living while helping students succeed in life.

Read his comments here.

NCLB and AYP

Karen Gray, an education researcher with the Nevada Policy Research Institute explains what it means if a school has attained Adequate Yearly Progress under No Child Left Behind.

For more information, check out Karen's aptly titled commentary, What 'Adequate Yearly Progress' really means.

Can we attract more math and science teachers?

The National Council on Teacher Quality released “Tackling the STEM crisis,” a report on how to help school districts attract, hire and retain high-quality science, technology, engineering and mathematics teachers.

Some of the main recommendations:

• Raise standards for students to be accepted into teaching profession programs. The report states that even the NCAA has minimum requirements for student athletes, but that most states have none for would-be teachers. The National Council on Teacher Quality recommends only recruiting students from the top half of college graduates.

• Improve the quality of undergraduate preparedness. They suggest that math and science teachers should take advanced courses in their subjects to acquire a better understanding, even if they won’t teach that level of difficulty in the classroom.

• They also recommend creating a program to attract undergraduates with science and math backgrounds into the teaching profession. One such program is UTeach, at the University of Texas, Austin. UTeach is one of many alternative licensure programs that help students and graduates become licensed teachers without going through a traditional education college.

• Create alternative pathways to teacher licensure by allowing practitioners who may lack relevant college coursework to become teachers if they can prove sufficient content knowledge.

• Create more flexible pay schedules to allow part-time teachers/practitioners to teach specialty subjects like Advanced Calculus or Chemistry.
• Create bonus programs to attract existing STEM teachers from other states and allow them to start at higher levels on the pay scale more appropriate to their work experience.

• Create bonuses to attract teachers to at-risk schools.

• Focus professional development on content — the report notes that many teachers feel that the professional development they are required to take is not useful.

• Create tough but meaningful standards for students that also provide teachers with better and stronger curricula to teach.

Nevada already has a few of these programs in place, but it couldn’t hurt to add a few more.

Florida evaluates the tuition tax credit program for low-income students

Florida’s very popular Corporate Tax Credit (CTC) program serves more than 20,000 low-income students with $3,950 scholarships that allow each student to attend a private school chosen by his or her parents. The vast majority of those students are minorities.

Corporations make a donation to a non-profit scholarship organization, which in turn awards the scholarships to low-income kids. The State of Florida offers a dollar-for-dollar tax credit for each dollar so donated.

This week a study of the CTC program that the Florida legislature had ordered was released. According to the St. Petersburg Times the study revealed no significant gains for students enrolled in the program. However, Dr. Jay P. Greene of the University of Arkansas noted that the study was descriptive and did not complete a statistical analysis of the available data, making such a conclusion premature.

Dr. Greene, along with the study author, noted that students receiving the CTC scholarships come from schools where students are more disadvantaged than students remaining in Florida’s traditional public schools. As a result, the typical criticism from voucher opponents — that vouchers only benefit advantaged students — falls flat, as the voucher students here are the poorest and lowest achieving students. Unfortunately the study does not prove, one way or the other, the effectiveness of the program.

Dr. Greene believes that more data and a more rigorous research design will provide enough useful information to reach a conclusion on the program, but it is too early to tell. The problem, he notes, “is that the standard for success when it comes to school choice is that it has to produce a quick fix or critics deem it a failure…”

CCSD saves $1 million

The Clark County School District officially restructured its administration today into “four broad service areas” instead of the five regions and several distinct offices.

CCSD has eliminated the Superintendent’s School Division Office and the Office of the Assistant Superintendent of Business. Some positions are allegedly eliminated while others will be reassigned based on the new organization.

The new CCSD will include the Instruction Unit, Superintendent’s Office, and Finance and Operations. The press release did not name the fourth service area.

According to the district, the changes will save $1 million. While the savings are peanuts compared to the district’s $3.6 billion in expenditures scheduled for the next school year, small savings are still good savings.

Clark County’s empowerment schools will be moved from the Superintendent’s Schools Division Office to the Instruction Unit. There is currently no news on how the restructuring will affect Clark County’s empowerment schools in the future.