The push to create individual accounts for students with disabilities picked up bipartisan support in its first Senate committee hearing Tuesday. But the bill to create “personalized accounts for learning” that parents could use to pay for tutoring and therapy for their children also attracted opposition from groups like the Florida PTA and the statewide… Read more »
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Florida roundup: Charter schools, testing, teachers unions and more
Charter schools. More could be closing in Broward. South Florida Sun Sentinel. Miami Herald. Tax credit scholarships. Did top Step Up For Students officials need to register as lobbyists? Times/Herald. (Step Up co-hosts this blog.) Testing. Florida Education Commissioner Pam Stewart picks AIR to develop the new wave of tests tied to Common Core. News… Read more »
Florida roundup: Tax-credit scholarships, charter schools, Common Core and more
Tax-credit scholarships. Some fear Step Up For Students could become a “taxpayer-financed monopoly” as the cap on tax-credit contributions increases, bringing in more money under the 3 percent administrative allowance used to run the program. Palm Beach Post. Jason Bedrick of CATO responds to a Miami Herald editorial that opposed legislation expanding the program. The legislation has prompted a… Read more »
redefinED roundup: de Blasio sparks debate on charter schools, focus shifts to FL tax credit scholarships & more
Alabama: A bill advances to increase the individual tax credit for donations to private scholarship organizations (Montgomery Advertiser). Alaska: Vic Fischer, a former delegate to the Alaska Constitutional Convention, opposes any amendment that would allow public funds for private and religious schools (Alaska Dispatch). A bill to allow the public to vote on such an… Read more »
School choice, accountability & the problem with sameness
Accountability in education has been a contentious issue for decades. Unfortunately, the word accountability is too often used to mean “sameness” rather than “to be held responsible for results.” The misuse of the term complicates school choice debates as both choice supporters and critics tend to forget the political and historical context surrounding education “accountability.”… Read more »
With parental school choice, what are we Democrats afraid of?
Education’s parental choice is down to the heart of the matter in Florida. Will it remain a program at the margins? Or will the growing reality of empowering parents actually transform education over the coming years into a system that respond to the needs and desires of society and its families? Into a true public… Read more »
FL Legislature talking charter schools & military families
Update: The bill with the charter school language is headed to Gov. Rick Scott’s desk after the Senate approved it this morning on a 38-0 vote. Florida lawmakers are set to approve a proposal intended to help military bases offer more education options for children of their personnel. The move comes amid a high-profile effort… Read more »
redefinED roundup: charters in NY, virtual schools in ME, tax credit scholarships in FL
Alaska: A bill will allow citizens to vote to remove a Blaine Amendment from the state constitution but it may not have enough votes to pass (Anchorage Daily News, Anchorage Press). A mom says public education needs more money not school choice (Alaska Dispatch). Arizona: House Democrats oppose expanding the Empowerment Scholarship Accounts (Tucson Weekly). Proposed legislation may… Read more »
Florida roundup: Tax credit scholarships, school spending, teacher evals & more
Tax credit scholarships. The Tampa Tribune comes down in favor of the expansion bill. The testing issue for tax credit scholarships is complicated. Gradebook. As she has many times before, Jacksonville’s Julie Delegal says valid comparisons to public school students can’t be made when tax credit scholarship students take similar but not the same standardized tests…. Read more »
FL mom: Without more school choice, we’ll get more welfare
Editor’s note: About 200 people who support Florida’s tax credit scholarship program, including many scholarship students themselves, attended yesterday’s legislative committee hearing on a bill to expand the program. Many speakers made many good points, but a woman from Ocala stole the show. The audience applauded her, lawmakers praised her, reporters quoted her. Here is… Read more »
