There is no surprise several teachers unions and school boards are against the bills that would allow for scholarships for special needs children. To me, it is a no-brainer! Special needs children require a variety of special services and there is no way every district can provide those services in the public schools. Therefore, those children will be left without getting the education, services, and attention they need. The Scholarship Tax Credit Program would provide scholarships to special needs children to use at other public schools or accepting private schools. The money will all be collected privately, and donors will have added incentives to give from tax credits for up to 80% of their donation. Public funds will not be given to these students so the old argument of using public money for religious schools is invalid.
The Special School District (SSD) in St. Louis was present at the hearings in Jefferson City last week testifying against the bills. While they were discussing the several points they had about how they could educate these students, one senator strongly pointed out the special school district does not cover all of Missouri. Even if they could provide for every special needs child in St. Louis (which they cannot), it still would not help the other children around the state. I felt as though they were only concerned with their district and were not even trying to look outside the box. I am not trying to say I feel they are entirely bad, I just think they need to be open to the idea, an idea that has the potential to help many more students.
The SSD has a few other arguments I would like to confront. According to their http://www.ssd.k12.mo.us/sb993.html website:
“Private schools accepting scholarship money would not be required to guarantee that the quality of educational and related services to be provided to students would exceed the quality provided by the public schools and would not be subject to the strict accreditation standards of Missouri's public schools."
As I read the rest of the complaints, this one was repeated many times in various ways. First off, the program only allows for choice. The parents are in no way forced to use these options, or even consider them. If they are happy with their current school, then they would have no reason to leave. Secondly, if there are such strong standards for special education programs, why did we hear parents from all around the state crying, begging, and pleading for choice? Why were they so unhappy with the education their children were getting? Obviously, not every public school is doing that great of a job. Additionally, if a parent chose to use this program and decided it was not any better, or was worse, they can easily put their child back where they were.
“The Missouri Constitution prohibits using public money to support or maintain religious organizations or private schools.”
As I already mentioned, it will not be using public funds. Private donors will be the funders for this program.
“The fact that there is no deadline for notifying a public school that the student is leaving or that the student is transferring into another public school is troubling. It creates a significant hardship on the public schools, as it will be difficult to plan programs, hire staff, and maintain class sizes, without sufficient advance notice.
Shouldn't this be about the children getting an education not about what may or may not happen? I thought our main goal here was to educate the children not make every one's job easier.
The arguments against the bills are just not string enough to convince me the program is a bad idea. In fact, I think most of their arguments do not even make sense or apply to this situation. I hope these bills pass and we can give more hope to those parents who are fighting for their child!
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