Dan Gibson beat me to the punch with his post about Ed Supe John Huppenthal shilling for the Goldwater Institute. Huppenthal voiced a robocall telling parents how they can use taxpayer money to send their kids to private schools. In his post, Dan includes the video of Brahm Resnick’s news piece about the robocall and a Facebook post by Democratic candidate for Ed Supe David Garcia, so I won’t repeat them. Both are worth a look.
Here’s a bit of the back story on the robocall, and it’s only a bit. There’s lots of unpacking to do about the Arizona’s Empowerment Scholarship Accounts (ESA)— aka Educational Savings Accounts, aka (according to me) Vouchers on Steroids. I did some unpacking in an earlier post, and there’s plenty of material left for later. Now, though, I want to follow the money robocall.
A brief overview. The Goldwater Institute came up with the idea for ESAs as a second workaround (the first is our tuition tax credit law) to make vouchers legal in a state where the constitution prohibits the use of public money for religious instruction. (Did you know over 70% of Arizona’s private schools are religious?) The term of art for this kind of legislation is “backdoor vouchers.” In 2011, Arizona’s Republican-dominated legislature passed the ESAs into law for a limited number of students. In 2013, more students were added, and if a new bill passes this session, half of Arizona’s school aged children will be eligible for the taxpayer-funded private school vouchers. The conservative’s ultimate goal is vouchers for all.
The Alliance for School Choice, a Washington, D.C., agent of the vast privatization/corporate complex, put together a script for a robocall to go out to Arizona parents whose children qualify for the ESAs. Huppenthal lent his voice to the robocall. Actually, he lent more than his voice. He lent the power and authority of his office to the message, making it sound like an official public service announcement. Huppenthal’s call sent interested parents to a website about ESAs created and funded by — get ready for it — the Goldwater Institute. And so the private-to-public-to-private-to-public-to-private cycle that begins and ends with the Goldwater folks comes full circle.
Huppenthal has established himself as the Arizona Superintendent of Education Privatization, a mantle he wears proudly. “I’m the superintendent of public instruction, not the superintendent of public schools,” he told Resnick in the news story. In Huppenthal’s view, private schools are public schools. They serve the public, don’t they? Making, I guess, Walmart a public department store and Tucson Country Club a public golf course. Taxpayer funded vouchers for private golf courses, anyone?
In a press release, Garcia responded to Huppenthal’s robocall.
Dr. David Garcia, an Associate Professor at ASU and candidate for Superintendent of Public Instruction declared, “This is outrageous. The head of public schools should be working to improve our public schools, not abandon them. If Mr. Huppenthal has neither the will nor the expertise needed to help our public schools, then it’s time he step aside and let someone qualified get to work.”
This article appears in Feb 6-12, 2014.
And what is wrong with Mr. Huppenthal empowering parents and letting them know their options as well as supporting them in making choices about what is best for their kids?
What’s wrong is the voice of PUBLIC education is working to destroy the public school system by encouraging parents to go elsewhere. Our tax money should not go to private and charter schools. There extremely scarce funding amounts for schools and every district has had to cut programs. Now tax money is being taken off with Huppenthal as a spokesperson. He should resign and go work for the Goldwater Institute.
Oh gee…posting about public education with grammatical errors. I am embarrassed, but I was mad and typing as fast as I could!
Pathetic.
Well said #DavidSafier!
RE: commentor above that asked, “what’s wrong with empowering parents and letting them make choices that are best for their kids?” In my mind, what’s wrong with it is much of what is wrong with our country today. Whatever happened to a concern for the public good? What each of us wants for our own child should be what we all want for every child. Continuing to starve tradition public schools and robbing good students from them just makes things that much worse for those children who don’t (for various reasons beyond their control) have the option to go elsewhere. It’s not just about you and yours! It’s about the success of our state and our nation and quite frankly, our world.
The real thing that is wrong is that the proposed funds would NOT cover the costs of placing the various kids he is talking about in private/religious schools or charters, which wouldn’t accept the kids with difficulties anyway. It is all a scam to give more money to people who already have more and to take it away from those who have less. I speak from professional experience of how religious schools get rid of low-achieving and kids with disabilities and private schools say they don’t have the facilities or staff to help, so the kids are shuffled back to K12.
If you think the public schools are fine then would u send your kids to Sunnyside District?…No, didn’t think so.
Buyer Beware: Supporters of certain “charter schools” would do well to investigate the creation of these “schools” before considering enrolling their child. In many cases, they are created by prominent individuals under a veil of secrecy… then run by a “for hire” management company with a constant eye on the bottom line. They are not held to the same standards (including teacher qualifications and student achievement) as public schools and if/when they go out of business, all capital (property, equipment, etc.) is owned by the founding individual. Your tax dollars are gone, period.
The children enrolled in many of these schools are often sent there as a last resort for variety of reasons. This leaves the staff unprepared to handle unthinkable situations and no recourse for improvement.
It is true that there is a huge disconnect here – private schools being christian schools, do not want to open their doors to children with special needs even if they hire a special education teacher for their “accelerated programs”. Education to them is all about test scores. Period.
A school Superintendent should have some teaching experience. If he or she does not have teaching experience then how can that person know what he/she is talking about?
It would be the same as if an Army General had no experience digging a fox hole or firing an Army weapon! Generals Eisenhower, Patton and Schwarzkopf knew everything about Army life from the ground up! You can’t be a Nursing Administrator if you don’t know how to make a hospital bed! It is the same—experience!