Seriously, Folks: School Voucher Proponents Need to Get Real
“ Megan refers to the schools in New York City. But she would do better far better referring to schools in Camden, Philadelphia, or Detroit . . .”
As luck would have it, today the Philadelphia Daily News ran a glowing article about an extremely successful Philly k-8 neighborhood school. Kids and parents love it. Researchers from across the country want to study it. In the latest state test, around 80% of the students are proficient in math and reading, basically double the School District of Philadelphia average. It has such an excellent reputation that it seems to have sparked the rapid gentrification of the surrounding neighborhood – indeed the school has even started to become whiter.
Surely this is the product of some pilot voucher program that has harnessed the magic of competition, or perhaps a bold for-profit enterprise chaired by some business-world Prometheus? Well, not quite. Penn Alexander is actually the result of a partnership between the school district and the University of Pennsylvania. And what is (part of) the secret of their success?
“For starters, Penn contributes $1,000 per student annually at the 511-student school. The additional teachers hired with those funds help keep class sizes no larger than 17 students in kindergarten and no more than 24 students in first through eighth grades. (In the school district, by contrast, classes can be as large as 30 students in kindergarten through third grades, and 33 students in fourth through 12th grades.)
The school has a certified librarian, a full-time instrumental music teacher and an education technologist who oversees the school’s 350 laptop and desktop computers, which are in three labs, the library and all classrooms, Kreidle said.
In addition, the school selects all of its own teachers and is aided by staff and student teachers from Penn’s Graduate School of Education, while regular field trips to Penn’s science lab and other facilities are invaluable, Sydnor said.”
There’s something for almost every interest to dislike a bit, in a sense – the union had opposed site selection in Philly, for example, (probably wrongly, but out of a not-unreasonable concern that it would be abused), there’s more autonomy from the district than usual – but it all works together to result in a genuinely impressive success that has everyone deeply impressed. For example, the school can hire all its own teachers, but it’s the 17/24 max classes, and all the other good things, which mean that lots of high-quality teachers will want to be hired – and actually stay – there. And so on – talk about a virtuous cycle.
Now, this is change, certainly, but it’s not frantic system-smashing change, propelled by untested ideological commitments and even darker currents. It’s reform within the system, with very common-sense principles: provide enough resources – funding, expertise, skill, etc. – to actually do the job. This exact model may be limited – certainly not every urban public school can have a top-notch university partner – but the underlying ideas aren’t. It would be great if some of the passion being poured into vouchers could be directed towards a variety of practical reforms – reforms which might well reasonably include some aspect of choice, some voucher component. Of course, this doesn’t provide a platform to screech about the need to delete unions or teachers or “systems”, so anyone in it most strongly for that probably wouldn’t be interested.
