Wealth inequality has become an
important challenge currently facing America today. The effects of
the current record level of wealth inequality is felt in almost all
aspects of life in this nation, including educating the children of
America. This is why Donald Trump's choice for U.S. Education
Secretary, Betsy DeVos, who was just confirmed, is probably one of
the worst people to choose to oversee the education system of the
entire nation.
DeVos has been a vocal leader of the
so-called “school choice” movement which aims to implement school
vouchers designed to funnel public dollars to private religious
schools. Voucher programs tend to benefit the wealthy at the expense
of the poor. Usually vouchers are not adequate enough to pay for the
total cost of attending a private school, which leaves only wealthy
families who can make up the shortfall as the only ones able to take
advantage of vouchers, according to The
Progressive. Essentially, the vouchers act as a discount
coupon for wealthy families who already had their children attending
expensive private schools anyways.
Not only are the benefits of school
voucher programs essentially exclusive to wealthy families, they are
also detrimental to the quality of public education provided to
middle class and impoverished families. School voucher programs
utilize public funds which would normally go towards public schools.
This means middle class and impoverished children would be left with
public schools that have less money for essential learning resources.
Additionally, there is a lack of
oversight on private schools to which public schools are normally
subject. Private schools can actually kick out a child based upon any
criteria they choose to use, according to Tashaune Harden, vice
president of the Michigan Alliance of Charter Teachers and Staff, in
an interview
on The Majority Report
posted on January 18, 2017. In Harden's state of Michigan, DeVos
heavily lobbied for private charter schools and now Michigan's
education system is feeling the ill effects of DeVos's lobbying
efforts on behalf of for-profit charter schools.
In Michigan, private charter schools
receive funding from the state government based on what is known as
“count days”. What commonly occurs is that these private schools
will wait until after these “count days” so they can receive
funds for children enrolled in the classroom. However, they then end
up kicking out some children which they deem as being problematic for
one reason or another. This can include any criteria they want to
use, which can unfairly discriminate against children with learning
disabilities.
In the public school system the schools
would normally be forced to take these children as students. However,
since private charter schools avoid most regulations they can kick
these children out while still keeping the public funds received on
“count days.” This leaves the public schools to educate the
children kicked out of private charter schools with less funds, since
the private charter schools keep the funds based upon enrollment on
“count days.”
Now, DeVos will likely want to spread
this effect to the rest of the country with her newly found power as
U.S. Education Secretary.
