“Illinois will likely become the largest blue state to offer private school choice”
Last week, Governor Rauner signed an historic school funding reform bill into law surrounded by leaders from both parties who came together to forge a compromise that will improve education for all Illinois schoolchildren.
The new school funding law includes Illinois’ first-ever Scholarship Tax Credit Program to offer true school choice to underprivileged schoolchildren. One outlet has
From the Chicago Tribune’s Editorial Board:
Great news: Thousands of Illinois children trapped in dismally performing classrooms soon will have places other than charter schools to break free and learn.
These schoolchildren will receive tuition scholarships for private schools, thanks to a $100 million program starting in the 2018-19 school year.
This five-year program — which we hope becomes permanent — is part of a sweeping Illinois school funding overhaul. It will use money from donors to educate low- and moderate-income students.
Students get a chance for a better education. Donors get a 75-cent tax credit for every dollar. And Illinois joins many other states in dramatically expanding school choice beyond charter schools. Win-win-win.
…In many homes across Illinois, a new school year brings mingled emotions among students and their parents — anticipation, anxiety, hope. But in too many homes there’s only one reaction: Dread, because parents are forced to send their children to dangerous or dead-end schools. They don’t have, or can’t afford, a better choice. A better chance.
That changes now, if only for a limited number of Illinois children. Watch the long line of students and their parents who’ll apply for these scholarships. Jensen estimates that 15,000 to 20,000 youngsters will gain scholarships annually once the program ramps up.
Think of them as the fortunate vanguard in a new era of Illinois school choice. May it succeed and grow.
From the Associated Press:
Democratic-leaning Illinois is the latest state to direct taxpayer money to private schools.
…Rauner says the credit is a way for lower-income parents to be able to send their kids to their school of choice.
…Nearly 20 states have tax credit scholarship programs. Most are Republican-led states, including Florida, Arizona and Indiana.
From Chicago Tribune Columnist Kristen McQueary:
The only way to explain headstrong resistance to Illinois’ new school choice program is this: Most people who oppose it don’t understand it.
They haven’t done the research on scholarship tax credits, or only selectively. They haven’t studied successful choice models. They are oddly suspicious of faith-based education. They haven’t talked to families fortunate enough to escape failing public schools. They haven’t talked to students on school waiting lists. They haven’t spent time inside chronically underperforming public schools.
They haven’t talked to parents desperate to find safer learning environments for their children.
To those moms and dads they say: Wait for public schools to improve. Just wait. Your child has forever, right? What’s the rush?
Gov. Bruce Rauner signed into law Thursday a bill that overhauls the way the state of Illinois pays for education, channeling more resources to property-poor areas of the state. The bill includes a five-year pilot program for tax credit scholarships, which encourage citizens and companies to charitably donate toward tuition programs for low- and middle-income school kids in exchange for a generous income tax break from the state.
…Why would legislators, many of whom describe themselves as progressive Democrats, want to continue protecting institutional failure instead of dropping a lifeline to at least some of the kids who remain at those schools?
There is nothing progressive, or liberal, or inclusive, or equitable about denying low-income families the same opportunities legislators themselves have. That’s called elitism.