A Liberal
Dose
Troy D.
Smith
“With
School Vouchers, Follow the Money”
This column is going to be challenging for the next four
years. I don’t even know what to say. Every time I think I have a topic
something even crazier happens- though that is, no doubt, by design. So this
week I am going to start with the local, and expand it to the national.
As I write this the General Assembly is in special session,
taking up (LONG overdue) hurricane relief for East Tennessee, and tying it to
Governor Bill Lee’s favorite chew toy, school vouchers. He tried to push it
through last year, and failed, so this time he is tying it to something else
that people actually do need, hurricane relief, and something they think they
need, a statewide immigration agency, and I fear his odds of winning this time
are better than before due to the current political climate. But they shouldn’t
be.
To be specific: Lee is calling for a $424 million dollar
voucher program that would, in the first year, give awards of $7,000 each to
20,000 students, half of whom must be low-income. But that last part is
misleading. First, because their definition of low-income is under $170,000 per
year. In what universe is someone making $169k low income? Second, the average
cost of private schools in Tennessee is about $12,000 a year, higher for high
schools. Now, I was low income for most of my life, and at no time did I ever have
an extra five thousand dollars to send my kid to private school, which is what these
truly low-income families are going to be stuck with. There ARE cheaper
schools, of course, but with that you get what you pay for, which is not much.
This is why, on average in this state, public school kids score higher on
assessment tests than private schools do. In other words, unless you have the
money to pay for an expensive school -even with the $7,000 -your child will
actually be getting an inferior education compared to public school students.
So what is the point?
Follow the money. In politics -especially Republican
politics -always follow the money. Since this isn’t really going to help
working class families much, because they still won’t be able to afford the
quality schools, who will it help financially? In other states that have
adopted such programs, 75% of the people who take advantage of them are folks
who already have the money to be sending their kids to private schools.
Meanwhile, it is going to be taking money from public schools and therefore
from YOUR kids. First, this money could be spent on public schools instead so
your overworked teachers wouldn’t be having to pay for school supplies out of
their own pockets, and your kids could take music and art classes like we all
did. Second, public schools get their funding according to how many students
they have, so draining away students will cause an even greater financial
burden on the public school system. This plan is only going to help those who
already can afford expensive private schools, and those few who want their kids
in a religious school, and make things harder on public school teachers AND
their students. And the benefits will mostly be in the counties where the money
already is.
In other words: the rich will get richer, and the poor will
get poorer.
By the time this reaches print, the decision may already be
made. But you all know who your representatives are, and do not forget how they
vote on this issue come election time. If it hasn’t been decided yet, as soon
as you read this reach out to Paul Bailey and Paul Sherrell and tell them what
you think, and remind them who keeps them in office. It isn’t Bill Lee and his
fat cat buddies, many of whom reap financial benefits via their companies from
all the tampering Lee (and his predecessor) have done with our school systems.
Haven’t you had enough of this? If your representatives
won’t protect our public schools, next time vote in somebody who will.
--Troy D.
Smith, a White County native, is a novelist and a history professor at
Tennessee Tech and serves on the executive committee of the Tennessee
Democratic Party. His words do not necessarily represent TTU.
You can find all previous entries in this weekly column HERE
A list of other historical essays that have appeared on this blog can be found HERE
Author's website: www.troyduanesmith.com
The author's historical lectures on youtube can be found HERE
