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Our Ed Supe, “Good Ole John” Huppenthal, has spent $900,000 a year more on our vouchers-on-steroids bill, euphemistically titled Empowerment Scholarship Accounts, than the law allows by giving some students between $1,684 and $1,963 more than they should have received.

We need to rewrite Huppenthal’s voucher-friendly robocall to reflect his generosity. He said, if you remember, “You may be able to send your child to private school for free!” He should have added, “And I’m gonna give you an extra two, thousand, dollars!” To which a happy mother exclaims, “Thank you, Good Ole John!”

Republicans recently added a funding amendment to their attempt to expand the voucher bill. Currently, students moving from charters to vouchers get more money than students moving from district schools because charter schools get more state money per student. Republicans wrote the language that way so they could declare the bill revenue neutral. Now that the voucher program is established, they have no problem with it costing the state more than sending kids to public schools.

But Huppenthal admitted through his spokesman, he’s been giving that extra money to students all along, saying that the bill’s current language is “muddled.” It may sound muddled to someone who thinks “Superintendent of Public Instruction” means the same thing as “Superintendent of Instruction for the Public” — it doesn’t — but in this retired English teacher’s reading, the clear intent of the original bill is to have two different funding levels.

The current wording states voucher students will receive:

an amount that is equivalent to ninety per cent of the sum of the base support level and additional assistance prescribed in sections 15‑185 and 15‑943 for that particular student, if that student were attending a charter school.

If the original bill meant to give all students the same amount of funding, the phrase, “if that student were attending a charter school” would be unnecessary.

If the amended language is passed (the crossed-out words are omitted and the all-caps words are added), students will receive:

an amount that is equivalent to ninety per cent of the sum of the base support level and additional assistance prescribed in sections 15‑185 and SECTION 15‑943 for that particular student, if that student were attending a charter school PLUS THE AMOUNT OF ADDITIONAL ASSISTANCE PRESCRIBED IN SECTION 15‑185.

This time the reference to charter schools is taken out, meaning all students will get the higher amount.

If Huppenthal was truly confused about the meaning of the passage, he could have consulted a legal expert. But he preferred to be “Good Ole John” and play fast and loose with taxpayer money.

This article appears in Mar 20-26, 2014.

12 replies on ““Good Ole John” Huppenthal Put State Money Where His Voucher-Robocall Mouth Is”

  1. So I am guessing (this is an honest guess, because I have no idea how this stuff works) that all of this voucher noise is about breaking the teacher’s union so that they can’t give money to the Dem. party? Let me know.

  2. Gandalf, you need to be careful what you wish for. Anyone who puts partisan politics to the side and pays attention to student performance would hesitate to weaken the power of teacher unions.

    There is a strong correlation between the states where students are successful and strong teacher unions. There is an even stronger correlation between lousy student performance and right to work states…where teacher unions have no real clout. The teachers’ union in Arizona has no real clout and student performance is mediocre. Other right to work states do an even worse job with their kids. Mississippi, South Carolina and Louisiana have schools that are close to the level of third world countries. And their teacher unions are almost completely powerless. Contrast that with states like Massachusetts, Minnesota, Connecticut, and Maryland where student performance is comparable to the best student performance in the world. If Massachusetts and Minnesota were countries their students would rank among the top five countries in the world. It is not surprising that all these top performing states have strong teacher unions.

    This is not magic. Strong teacher unions do not automatically equate to better learning. But there is a huge correlation between teacher quality and student performance. The market for teachers is much like the market for other products and services. It is controlled by the law of supply and demand. The states offering the best wages, benefits and working conditions are able to hire and keep the most qualified teachers…and that translates into the best student performance. And the states where teachers can earn a competitive salary all have strong teacher unions.

    The only reason the political action committees of teacher unions donate more money to Democrats than Republicans is because Democrats have been more likely to oppose nonsense like giving public money to private schools without any accountability for student results. In an earlier era, when elected officials from both parties were likely to support public schools the distribution of campaign donations was much more evenly split between Rs and Ds.

  3. Nicely put, Marty. Let me just add, Finland, whose students generally score the highest in Europe and often surpass students in Asian countries on international tests, has a very strong teachers union. It works together with the country’s education ministry to strengthen education.

    Gandalf, I would say that union busting is definitely a part of the education privatization movement, both private and charter schools. But it’s only one of a number of reasons the leaders on the right favor vouchers and charters.

  5. That may be Mr. Safier, however the teachers in Finland do not teach their far left liberal views into the classroom either. I am a living historian and visit schools on a regular basis and am amazed at the liberalism in the classrooms in the state. This political ideal has no place in the classroom.

  6. markus_jim says, “This political ideal has no place in the classroom.”

    Personally, I think any and all political ideals belong in the classroom with the giant caveat that they are not being promoted in any way by the teacher.

    Based on the syntax of your sentence it is clear you believe that some political ideals belong in the classroom…just not liberalism. Apart from the issue that liberalism is a very large tent containing a multiplicity of views, are you suggesting that the ideals put forward by John Stuart Mill, John F. Kennedy, and Vlacav Havel do not belong in the classroom?

  7. Lynn Marble says, “Arizona doesn’t HAVE a union. AEA is an ASSOCIATION; nowhere NEAR a UNION!”

    Practically all the state affiliates of the National Education Association label themselves as “associations.” In states where public employees have the right to bargain collectively…New Jersey, California, Massachusetts, Minnesota, Washington, etc… these “associations” are very much unions. The label is pretty meaningless. What matters is whether the members of the association have the right to bargain or only the right to beg.

  8. John Huppenthal is despicable and unfit to be Supt of Public Instruction. It’s amazing to me, that so many misfits end up in elected, executive positions in Arizona. Of course, when you read a comment like Gandolf’s, and you see the massive misconceptions and outright lies carried by the public about schools, teachers, and teaching, I guess it should be no surprise that charlatans get elected.
    So sane people, we have to work really, really, hard this summer and fall to unelect Huppenthal and elect David Garcia. Our public schools will depend on it.

  9. I resent my tax dollars being used in any school system outside where we as the taxpayers and financial supporters with our meager incomes have no control. So called district schools have elected school boards, our neighbors willing to serve, without pay, elected by us, meeting in public and where we have an opportunity to participate.
    Vouchers, home schooling, private and religious schools are just fine as long as they are paid for by the people that choose them. That to me is school choice. The Constitution calls for establishing of public schools, that is why we call them public schools. Taxes are levied to pay for them. Private school owners and their friends in the Legislature can come up with gimmicks to transfer money to them, but to me that is dead wrong. That’s like George Washington saying he didn’t chop down the cherry tree, the ax did.
    You have the choice, the schools we all pay to maintain or a different education opportunity that you personally fund by choice.
    Isn’t it about time this baloney about choice be you choose public or other. You know in Arizona there are hundreds of parents sending their children to public schools then on their own resources supplementing their children’s education in private facilities such as their place of worship.

  10. Pima Mujer, one reason is that we sane people don’t want to deal with the politics of politics. It’s hard to find intelligent, honest, caring people willing to do the almost completely thankless job of public service. Was just having this conversation with a friend down here in Bisbee about her turning down the invitation to run for city council. There are two types of people taking office: those few caring, intelligent, honest folk willing to take the beating and those power-hungry morons like this Sup.

  12. We cannot afford school vouchers until public education is fully funded. Arizona public education has been underfunded for years. It is time we elect an actual educator as state superintendent rather than yet, another unqualified politician aiming for power and higher office.

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