1 week Ago
Regardless of what you think about the Legislature’s fixation on throwing our tax dollars at private schools, no one could have been happy that 7,000 low-income children got caught in the middle of this debate, having already begun this school year in taxpayer-subsidized private schools when the S.C. Supreme Court ruled that paying for parents to abandon our public schools violated the state constitution.
So we welcome news that two donors have agreed to help fund what lawmakers call scholarships for those kids to finish the school year in the schools where they started it. Less than a month after announcing that Pennsylvania businessman Jeff Yass had donated $900,000 to cover the tuition for the rest of 2024, the Palmetto Promise Institute announced on Tuesday that S.C.
businessman Ravenel B. Curry III had kicked in $500,000 to cover half of the cost for the third quarter. Scoppe: If you oppose school vouchers as much as I do, enjoy this moment.
It won't last. Since South Carolina’s Roman Catholic diocese has been raising money to cover tuition for the 195 students who had been attending its parochial schools with vouchers, that leaves about $1.5 million to keep the kids in their classes for the rest of this academic year.
Some of these kids likely will do better in their current private school than they would have in a public school, and most if not all of them would be hurt by having to switch schools mid-semester. We applaud the donations not only because they help the kids but also because this is how private school tuition should be paid: by individuals, not by taxpayers. The taxpayers already are providing a public education to all comers through the public schools that the state of South Carolina owns and operates.
Editorial: SC has at least 3 better ways than school vouchers to help poor kids If those schools aren’t doing a good enough job — and in too many cases they are not — the solution is for the Legislature to change state law and improve those schools, not duplicate their work by funding an alternative, unregulated, unaccountable system of other schools. That has been the obvious solution since our legislators started pushing to outsource public education more than two decades ago, but even the strongest advocates have shown little interest in making those changes — from empowering principals to replace teachers who aren’t up to the job and recruit the best teachers to acting aggressively to replace school and district administrators who can’t or won’t put kids’ needs first. Many have adamantly opposed efforts to give students more choices within the public school system.
Scoppe: Nothing but the best for little Debbie, Hubert Homeowner and SC private schools Even before the elections gave Republicans a larger and more conservative majority in the Senate, we expected the Legislature to make quick work of passing a voucher plan in 2025 to replace the one the Supreme Court struck down. We don’t like that, but it’s the reality. But if taxpayers are going to be required to do the job that philanthropists are doing this year, we should get some assurance that the schools that receive our involuntary contributions are held to some basic standards.
Public schools appropriately have to administer state tests every year and make the results public, so parents and all of us who fund those schools can compare how the schools are doing. Private schools that accept tax funds should have to do the same. But earlier this year, House leaders tried to back away from the wholly inadequate substitute they had agreed to: requiring those schools to administer some kind of tests, which parents but not the general public could see.
Anyone who honestly believes private schools provide a superior education should not only welcome but also demand the opportunity to demonstrate that — as should any legislators who believe it's their job to represent the public instead of special interests. Scoppe: How the voucher crowd killed the last SC public school choice push Click here for more opinion content from The Post and Courier..
