minahkaypoh

Illinois is sure to be disappointed if it continues to move forward with a private voucher program ( SB 2494 ) for Chicago Public Schools. Just ask Wisconsin-- and Milwaukee . Clearly, the Chicago Tribune editorial board ( 'Liberate the kids' ), which is cheering the process on, has not done its homework, not checked its sources, and not looked to its neighbor to the north for guidance. Or it is simply drinking the Kool Aid mixed by Voucher Inc.: And there's evidence that vouchers improve public schools. A 2009 report by The Friedman Foundation for Educational Choice examined 17 studies on the impact of voucher programs. Sixteen studies found that vouchers improved student achievement in public schools; one study found they had no positive or negative impact. In other words, competition works. There is also plentiful evidence that vouchers do NOT improve public schools, including the on-going evaluation of the Milwaukee Parental Choice Program -- the longest-stan...

Education Next apparently has provided a platform for school choice advocate George Mitchell to shill for voucher schools outside of the state of Wisconsin. Here is his latest spin on a study that shows the high school graduation rate to be 12 points higher in seven Milwaukee voucher schools compared with 23 Milwaukee public high schools. The Milwaukee Journal Sentinel story by Erin Richards provides the crucial quote regarding causation from the study's author, John Robert Warren , a sociology professor at the University of Minnesota: "We still don't know whether it's going to the voucher school that causes you to be more likely to graduate, or if it's something about the kinds of families that send their kids to voucher schools would make them more likely to graduate," he said. Then there's the whole question of which and how the voucher and public high schools were chosen for purposes of comparison. More questions than answers. Unlike Mitchell, I ...