Don’t be fooled by advocates of ‘school choice’

In the midst of National School Choice Week, students, parents and community members across our state shouldn't be fooled by some of the pro-corporate, partisan messaging hiding under the banner of "school choice." Specifically, Nevadans should know that National School Choice Week is a publicity stunt to increase public support for a "school choice" umbrella that includes not only Nevada's extreme new voucher law — currently under legal challenge — but also other schemes to maximize corporate profits at the expense of students and teachers, undermine public education altogether, and launch partisan attacks meant to undermine Democratic candidates and their allies.

Those diverse, and sometimes disturbing, agendas are the reason the leaders of National School Choice Week are purposefully vague about what "school choice" is. Of course, public charter and magnet schools, many of which have proven success in strengthening educational opportunities, are forms of school choice. But school choice can and does include a plethora of strategies in which taxpayer dollars meant for public schools are instead directed to CEOs' pockets and failing schools — by not improving children's learning.

For example, voucher programs often give taxpayer money to unregulated schools, where students perform far worse than those at traditional public schools. School choice can also funnel money into for-profit cyberschools that too often put corporations' profits, not students' learning, first. Our tax dollars meant for our students shouldn't be going to corporations running ineffective schools that fail our children.

Key figures involved in the school choice movement also have radical ideas about ending the public school system in America for good. The president of the Heartland Institute, one of the sponsors of National School Choice Week, has advocated for "the complete privatization of schooling." Getting rid of public education in America flies in the face of everything our country and our communities stand for.

And far too many of those who parade school choice seem to be doing so only to score political points, not actually improve our children's schools. For example, on Dec. 6, the Koch brothers' LIBRE Initiative national spokesperson, Rachel Campos-Duffy, penned an op-ed in the Review-Journal slamming Hillary Clinton for supposedly opposing school choice and thus turning her back on students and parents. (Campos-Duffy also wrote the commentary opposite my piece today.) The problem with her argument? Clinton is and has always been a strong advocate for proven reforms to improve education — including high-achieving public charter schools — but she's certainly against many of the pro-corporate measures that fail students yet fall under the banner of school choice.

Clinton is a champion for children, and she's pushed hard throughout her career and during her campaign for measures that will actually work to strengthen our schools, such as improving teacher training, lowering class sizes, guaranteeing public preschool for every child and more. Like the LIBRE Initiative, far too many supposed "school choice" advocates use the cause as a front for attacking Democrats. We shouldn't allow anyone to play politics with our children's future.

Pushing school choice because it's an opportunity to benefit corporations, get rid of the public school system in America or attack Democrats is fundamentally wrong, yet unfortunately that's exactly the goal of the financiers of National School Choice Week. As Nevada and the country move forward on strengthening public and charter schools, let's not be fooled by any deceptive stunts.

— Chris Giunchigliani represents District E on the Clark County Commission.