As Obama pontificates, his minions kick poor black children under the bus

[irish_mafia]

Despite being “a skeptic of vouchers,� candidate Barack Obama promised this would not prevent him from “making sure that our kids can learn.� As he told the Milwaukee Journal-Sentinel, “You do what works for the kids.�

Last January 21, his first full day in office, President Obama declared, “My Administration is committed to creating an unprecedented level of openness in Government.�

Obama has broken both these promises. And poor-but-promising minority kids suffer the consequences.

These 1,714 children -- 90 percent black and 9 percent Hispanic -- enjoy the DC
Now it emerges that Obama’s Department of Education [[DOE) possessed peer-reviewed, Congressionally mandated, research proving this program’s success. Though it demonstrates “what works for the kids,� DOE hid this study until Congress squelched these children’s dreams.

Worse yet, DOE researchers reportedly were forbidden to publicize or discuss their findings.

“One expects better from Obama who won a scholarship at age 10 to attend Hawaii’s prestigious, private Punahou school. “There was something about this school that embraced me, gave me support and encouragement, and allowed me to grow and prosper,� Obama has said.

With young black kids themselves begging for vouchers, why would reputedly pro-poor, pro-black Democrats kill this popular and effective school-choice program?
Follow the money: Teachers’ unions’ paid $55,794,440 in political donations between 1990 and 2008, 96 percent of it to Democrats. Senator John Ensign’s [[R – Nevada) March 10 amendment to rescue DC’s vouchers failed 39-58. Among 57 Democrats voting, 54 [[or 95 percent) opposed DC vouchers.

As the late Albert Shanker, former American Federation of Teachers president, once said: “When school children start paying union dues, that’s when I’ll start representing the interests of school children.�

When poor, black school kids start making political donations, Democratic politicians will start fighting for them.

Deroy Murdock is a New York-based columnist with the Scripps Howard News Service and a media fellow with the Hoover Institution.

[Mikeg]

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[ejames01]

Pay for your own damn private school.

[irish_mafia]

Pay for your own damn private school.

We already do. Everyone in this state pays for the debacle called DPS which charges us more per student than many private schools that actually educate and soesn't allow us to have a a voice in how the money is spent to educate the children...but education isn't what you are after apparenntly ejames. What is it that you think we should be forced to pay for? Union jobs?

[ejames01]

That is their problem, not mine. When I sent my daughter to private school, I paid.

We already do. Everyone in this state pays for the debacle called DPS which charges us more per student than many private schools that actually educate and soesn't allow us to have a a voice in how the money is spent to educate the children...but education isn't what you are after apparenntly ejames. What is it that you think we should be forced to pay for? Union jobs?

[humanmachinery]

The study you're talking about was Evaluation of the DC Opportunity Scholarship Program: Impacts After Three Years. Its lead author is Patrick Wolf and it was co-published by the University of Arkansas' School Choice Demonstration Project and by the Institute of Educational Sciences at the National Center for Educational Evaluation and Regional Assistance. It was reviewed for the Think Tank Review Project by Professor Martin Carnoy of Stanford University, an economist and expert in voucher research.

Silenced? This study has been available to the government since November, and was released in April. That means if Obama is guilty of silencing the results, then so is Bush Jr.

http://ies.ed.gov/ncee/pubs/20094050/

The study concluded that, after three years, students who used vouchers scored 5.27 points, or one-sixth of a standard deviation, higher than those who stayed in public schools on achievement tests in reading -- a statistically significant difference -- and less than one point higher in math, which was not statistically significant. However, Carnoy points out that analyses of subgroups of these students show that any positive voucher effect on reading was concentrated among students with higher initial reading scores, middle school students, and females. Moreover, while Congress created the voucher program primarily to benefit students attending D.C. schools designated as "needing improvement" -- the study found that the voucher effect was focused on students who had not attended those schools.

Additionally, parents of voucher students felt their children were safer and that they were significantly more satisfied with their children's schools. Among students themselves, however, there was no significant difference in school satisfaction or perceived safety.

I consider those decidedly mixed results.

http://epicpolicy.org/thinktank/revi...DC-opportunity
http://www.aasa.org/content.aspx?id=1582

Granted, Patrick G. Wolf, the author of this study, has gone around the country vigorously promoting school vouchers. It's important to note that he also did that before writing this study, and also wrote a book some years ago in favor of voucher programs. It would seem he's hardly impartial about this issue.

[elganned]

This is, sadly, no more or less than the Republicans in Lansing are doing to Michigan schools: when the money runs out, the kids are the first to be jettisoned.

When it comes to educating our kids, both parties have failed us.

[ghettopalmetto]

When it comes to educating our kids, both parties have failed us.

It's not the responsibility of the political parties to make sure our children is learning.

[humanmachinery]

Kevin Carey has a very good piece about the program here, and argues that the voucher program wasn't going to grow large enough to have serious effects on the district.

[elganned]

Agreed. It is not their responsibility to make sure our children is [sic] learning. But it is their responsibility to provide the resources and environment where they can learn.

They can't make the horse drink, but they can at least provide fresh, clean water.

[jams]

It's not the responsibility of the political parties to make sure our children is learning.

Guess again.

[irish_mafia]

At the end of the day, after I have paid my high suburban taxes to put my children through a superior public school district and ejames has paid the tuition for his kids' private school, we will both be charged an additional amount for "public education" in detroit and other districts that have less money than us.

The problem is that money for "education" is not used for that. It is used to support the goals of the bureacrats and the teachers unions, which have proven time and again that their needs are in conflict with the best use of money to educate children.

Ejames doesn''t want to "pay for" superior private school education for these kids so he "pays for" no education at all sending another generation of illiterates into the world to bide time until their jail cell is ready. It is absolutely criminal.

Take the money we already pay and educate the kids. It was shown to work in DC and Obama just stole the future of those kids.

In Detroit, we have seen the results and they are ugly!

[ejames01]

My kid is in a public school now and I am very happy with the school & district.

At the end of the day, after I have paid my high suburban taxes to put my children through a superior public school district and ejames has paid the tuition for his kids' private school, we will both be charged an additional amount for "public education" in detroit and other districts that have less money than us.

The problem is that money for "education" is not used for that. It is used to support the goals of the bureacrats and the teachers unions, which have proven time and again that their needs are in conflict with the best use of money to educate children.

Ejames doesn''t want to "pay for" superior private school education for these kids so he "pays for" no education at all sending another generation of illiterates into the world to bide time until their jail cell is ready. It is absolutely criminal.

Take the money we already pay and educate the kids. It was shown to work in DC and Obama just stole the future of those kids.

In Detroit, we have seen the results and they are ugly!

[irish_mafia]

My kid is in a public school now and I am very happy with the school & district.

Your story doesn't ring true

[elganned]

Take the money we already pay and educate the kids. It was shown to work in DC and Obama just stole the future of those kids.

You evidently didn't bother to read what humanmachinery posted.

The program didn't do what it was instituted to do. It didn't produce a statistically significant result for the children it was aimed at. That doesn't support your contention that it was "shown to work".

In Detroit, we have seen the results and they are ugly!

On this, at least, we agree.

[irish_mafia]

Did you mean this part?

The study concluded that, after three years, students who used vouchers scored 5.27 points, or one-sixth of a standard deviation, higher than those who stayed in public schools on achievement tests in reading -- a statistically significant difference

[oladub]

Little Barry was a homeschooler? That's what he inferred or claimed in his speech. I'm not saying that's bad but maybe that's the secret of his secret; that and his $300,000 private school education starting at age 10. Did the President or his daughters ever attend a public school?

This is circumstantial evidence that the private health care options will be allowed to survive under Obamacare. Its difficult to imagine the elite having to sit in 'public option' waiting rooms.

[ghettopalmetto]

Did you mean this part?

What about the kids who didn't get vouchers? How well did they do?

Is it possible that the kids who availed themselves of vouchers also tended to take a more proactive role in their education, and were already higher achievers than their peers? I find it hard to believe that cutting a check makes a kid smarter. I've personally met many an idiot kid with an expensive private school education.

[elganned]

Did you mean this part?

No, I meant this part

However, Carnoy points out that analyses of subgroups of these students show that any positive voucher effect on reading was concentrated among students with higher initial reading scores, middle school students, and females.

And this part

Congress created the voucher program primarily to benefit students attending D.C. schools designated as "needing improvement" -- the study found that the voucher effect was focused on students who had not attended those schools.

Indicating that the effect was concentrated in students who were already doing better than the group, and that the effects didn't reach the targeted group.

So maybe the vouchers should be restricted to better readers, middle school students, girls, and kids that don't go to "bad" schools. That seems to be the formula for success.

The rest? Well, I guess some kids are beyond help.

[elganned]

I've personally met many an idiot kid with an expensive private school education.

George W. would qualify in that category.

[irish_mafia]

John Kerry,
Al Gore

[ghettopalmetto]

John Kerry,
Al Gore

So you agree that vouchers for private schools are no guarantee of academic success.

[ejames01]

What makes you say that?

Your story doesn't ring true

[elganned]

Why, his preconceptions, of course.

[irish_mafia]

So you agree that vouchers for private schools are no guarantee of academic success.

Interesting leap in logic...

I agree that Al Gore and John Kerry went from their silver spoons to inauspicious academic
activity at their private schools on their rich daddies' dimes.

Here's your dunce caps boys, now go invent the internet!

You have a defenseless argument whatever it is.