The evolution of school choice.

Have you noticed how supporters of charter schools and vouchers keep changing the narrative? In the beginning they were to save children from failing public schools but now that study after study has shown they don’t produce better education outcomes and often worse, the narrative has changed to one of competition being good for public schools.

They also can’t tell the truth and that’s charter schools are here to make people rich and to break the power of teacher unions and to change teachers from professionals to service workers too. Educating children, sure, maybe but that’s an afterthought for the movement.

And before some of you jump on me and say there are some excellent charter schools, I agree but you should be outraged by the flim flam artists and snake oil salesman that have co-opted the industry too. Furthermore you should want voucher schools to have accountability because if they don’t many will continue to pump through and dump out kids ill prepared for anything.

Then it was about competition, the implication that public schools were treading water and needed to be forced to improve and innovate. Two things most charter schools and voucher schools have dubious innovation at best but to be honest it is hard to improve when the powers-that-be, many of whom are choice advocates, think poverty is an excuse and have transformed schools into testing factories staffed by beat up teachers.

Then it evolved in collaboration, lets just do what’s best for the child, which if they were being honest would be keeping children as far away from most charter schools and voucher schools. But are people supposed to forget the demonizing of teachers, the high jacking of education by the high stakes testing movement, the starving public schools of resources and their creation of a crisis just so they can profit off of it. That’s the school choice movements jumping off point. 

There latest reason is school choice is modern day civil rights, and who cares that the NAACP has come out against charter schools, preferring society adequately fund its public schools. What won’t these guys say or do is my question.

But that’s what people do when they have a losing argument, they change it.