This is a rant about school vouchers—which I oppose. And it’s a shaggy dog story of sorts. It ties together in my mind, so if you care at all about the former, I hope you will stick with the latter. Because Minnesota, in the Crazy Mixed Up World that is 2017, is actually entertaining the notion of sending tax dollars to private schools.
Calling them tax credits, or scholarships, doesn’t change the basic calculus. We are talking about sending public money—which people of myriad creeds contribute, because way back when we decided we were one nation, indivisible—to institutions that may decide to flaunt civil rights.
Not long ago, I was in Texas interviewing parents at, among other events, a school choice fair. I stopped at the booth of a school serving students on the autism spectrum that claimed to get great results via novel methods. After chatting with the school’s founder for a little while, I arranged a visit.
The school was private, not a public charter. Special ed is a notoriously bureaucratic corner of education. The decision to open a private school, he said, was driven by his and his colleagues’ desire to be free to adhere, unfettered, to their approach.
When I got to the school, all I could see were red flags. Texas-sized, fire-engine-red flags. Flags Christos could unfurl across a cattle barony big enough to encircle Delaware. I left. I hit one last taqueria. I flew home. Continue reading