What is it? School choice
With school choice debates in states across the country, author Neal McCluskey helps us answer important questions like “what is it” and “why is it controversial?”
Texas Governor Greg Abbott has been out on the road to push for school choice legislation in the Lone Star state, saying freedom of education is one of his top priorities.
“It’s my job to make sure we pass a piece of legislation that puts mom and dad back in charge of their child’s education in the great state of Texas,” Abbott said Tuesday night at a school choice event in Texas. near Texas. Houston.
Abbot supports a proposal, SB8, which would give families $8,000 per student in an education savings account and allow them to spend the money on approved private school education. School choice typically allows tax dollars to track a student rather than a specific school district.
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“For education savings accounts, as directed by our policy, the comptroller’s office would take applications to use these $8,000 education savings accounts and they would go directly to an approved private school preferred by the family,” Texas Sen. Brandon Creighton, the author of the bill, told a local ABC affiliate.
The bill would also ban schools from teaching sexual orientation and gender identity topics “in an age-inappropriate manner” and require districts to upload their lesson plans to an online portal where parents can view the learning materials.
Critics fear the legislation would drain money from the public school system, leading to a drop in funding and attendance.
BALTIMORE’S WRONG SCHOOL SYSTEM MAKES SCHOOL CHOICE THE ONLY HOPE FOR STUDENTS, SAYS EDUCATION ACTIVIST
“If we lose five or 10 students, that’s a teacher’s salary. But we can’t afford to have one less teacher, so now we’re cutting academic programs, we’re cutting sports, we’re cutting the things that this community trusts on,” chairman Aaron Hood of the Texas Association of Rural Schools told NBC News.
But Abbot denied that accusation.
“Just as charter schools have not done away with private schools in the state of Texas, neither will school choice in the state of Texas,” Abbott said at a school choice meeting Tuesday in Austin. “Wherever school choice is used, public education is improving.”
Texas Governor Greg Abbott supports school choice. (Brandon Bell/Getty Images)
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Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton issued legal advice on Monday stating that education savings accounts are legal. Creighton’s legislation is one of several bills to be introduced to the Texas Senate Committee on Education on Wednesday.
For more information about school choice, click here.
Jon Michael Raasch is an associate producer/writer at Fox News Digital Originals.
