Posted on 08/02/2004 8:29:37 AM PDT by Frumious Bandersnatch
If school vouchers bettered the educational opportunities only of children who use the vouchers to attend private schools or schools in another district, many reformers would be left holding cups half empty. For the animating theory of school choice has always been that it will not only serve as an escape hatch from dysfunctional public schools but also will spark public schools to improve. Thus far this theory remains mostly untested. Through caps on enrollment, chronic underfunding, and legal attacks, voucher programs have been kept artificially small, restraining any influence they might have on local districts. The combined enrollment of all the publicly and privately financed voucher programs in the nation was still only 0.1 percent of public school enrollment in the fall of 2000. The statewide voucher program in Florida affected only two public schools directly.
(Excerpt) Read more at educationext.org ...
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