This op-ed, written by John E. Coons and Peter Hanley with the American Center for School Choice (which co-hosts redefinED), was published in today’s USA Today.
Supreme Court Justice Sonia Sotomayor was asked recently by CNN’s Anderson Cooper whether she’d have become who she is without the help of a faith-based school, Blessed Sacrament in the Bronx. Sotomayor said, “Doubtful.” In an interview with The New York Times, she said the school was “a road of opportunity for kids with no other alternative.”
Now it’s gone. Like more than 1,300 other Catholic schools in the past 20 years, Blessed Sacrament fell victim to sweeping social and economic forces — and to education policies that blind themselves to the value of faith-based schools.
The U.S. lacks a surplus of high-quality schools, especially that serve the urban poor. Yet year after year, we have watched as thousands of faith-based schools have been forced to close. America is losing a valuable national asset — not because it has become obsolescent or because the demand for it has disappeared, but because of a needlessly narrow view of which families should have the choice in education that is so dear to the middle class.
Charter and magnet schools have diversified public schools. Parents in select states and areas can opt for schools that stress language immersion, math and science, the arts. But parents who cannot afford a faith-based education routinely are told the state will offer no support. Only 16 states and Washington, D.C., have scholarships that empower parents to choose a faith-based school, and most of those are small and targeted. This is a costly mistake. Full column here.
