Arizona: A school board member in Gilbert proposes a district-wide voucher program (East Valley Tribune).
California: Charter schools now enroll 8.4 percent of the state’s student population (Ed Source).
Colorado: Big bucks back education reformers in school board races (Denver Post, Daily Sentinel, Politico). Education reformers in Douglas County and Denver win re-election (Denver Post, Education Week, Our Colorado News). Voters turned down a tax increase that would have allowed non-profit charter schools to share in capital funds (New York Times). Could the Douglas County School Board move school choice mainstream (Daily Caller)?
D.C.: School choice is changing one life at a time (Daily Caller). D.C. charter school rankings have been released, showing 12 percent are low-performing with more than a third scoring as top performers (Washington Post).
Florida: Education reform and school choice may have played a role in Florida’s continuing improvement on the NAEP test (redefinED, redefinED). Low-income children attending Florida’s charter schools outperformed the statewide public school average for their peer group (Jaypgreene.com, Edfly). 10 lessons from Florida Virtual School (Education Week). Online courses with unlimited enrollment, called MOOCs (massive open online courses), are becoming popular in Florida (Tampa Bay Times). The state run Florida Virtual School is suing Florida Virtual Academy, arguing the similar name will confuse parents and students (WFTV).
Hawaii: An audit revealed the Department of Education was wasting millions on the food service program so the state told charter schools to find their own source to provide nutrition programs for low-income students (Huffington Post).
Kansas: The Friedman Foundation and Kansas Policy Institute testified before the state board of education on the need for school choice and education reform (Topeka Capital Journal).
Louisiana: U.S. House majority leader Eric Cantor visited New Orleans and expressed support for school vouchers while blasting President Obama over the lawsuit trying to stop vouchers in the state (The Advocate, Times-Picayune). Gov. Bobby Jindal said President Obama can learn a lot from New Orleans education system (Times-Picayune). New charter schools in New Orleans are trying to enroll a more diverse student population (Hechinger Report).
Illinois: The Illinois Policy Institute says school choice will improve Chicago public schools (Watchdog).
Indiana: The state makes big gains on the NAEP test just two years after it enacted a statewide voucher program (Herald Online).
Missouri: School choice supporters start gathering signatures to put tax-credit scholarship program on the ballot in 2014 (Heartlander).
North Carolina: The state’s opportunity scholarship program empowers low-income parents (News and Observer). A panel of education leaders say school choice is playing a growing role in Charlotte (Charlotte Observer).
Nevada: The editorial board of the state’s largest newspaper calls for the state to drop barriers to opening charter schools (Las Vegas Review-Journal).
New Jersey: Chris Christie won his election by a large margin and may use the victory to revive the voucher debate (Newsworks, NJ Spotlight). Wallkill Valley Regional High School’s open enrollment policy has been capped by the state at eight students, prompting school leaders to cancel open enrollment for the next school year (The Advertiser News).
New Mexico: The president of the Rio Grande Foundation says school choice will be key to improving education quality (Deming Headlight).
Pennsylvania: A mother fills a need for school choice by founding a new charter school in south Philadelphia (The Inquirer). Due to inequality in funding and a recent federal indictment for theft, the state legislature will be looking into how charter schools are funded in the upcoming session (Education Week). Another charter school is under scrutiny for some unusual expenditures, with some members of the state leadership even calling for an FBI investigation (KDKA Channel 2).
Rhode Island: Vouchers can improve public schools in Rhode Island (Providence Journal). The Charter School Growth Fund awards Blackstone Valley Prep Mayoral Academy a $2.2 million grant (Providence Journal). Achievement First charter school is finally operational after critics tried to keep the school from opening (NPR).
South Carolina: School choice is gaining support among the public (The State). The Greenville editorial board believes vouchers for low-income kids would be good but says the state should not expand vouchers beyond that narrow mission (Greenville Online). A new report says 70 percent of charter schools have to pay capital costs out of their operating budgets (Post and Courier).
Tennessee: School choice groups will push for vouchers in the state legislature again this year (Tennessean).
Texas: Parents in San Antonio learn about new charter schools opening up in their city (New York Times).
Virginia: PolitiFact gives Gov. Terry McAuliffe a “Mostly False” for this argument that “vouchers would take money away from public schools” (PolitiFact Virginia). Students will have to take at least one virtual course before graduation (Virginia Pilot).
Wisconsin: Without an enrollment cap, students with vouchers in Racine jumped from 520 last year to 1,245 for the current school year (Journal Times). Parents choose vouchers because they are concerned about large class sizes, bullying and poor academic performance (Journal Times). Take a look inside Madison’s first voucher school (Wisconsin State Journal). School voucher backers are supporting school choice candidates for open seats in the state legislature (Express Milwaukee). Critics of vouchers continue to argue that vouchers should not go to people who can already afford private school (Wisconsin State Journal, Beloit Daily News).
Nation: Christopher Lubienski, a professor at the University of Illinois, says private schools are not better than public schools when controlling for demographic factors (Washington Post). School choice has been an issue for elections in 2013 (Education Week). Education leaders get nasty with each other, writes Stephanie Simon (Politico). Education is a civil right, says Gloria Romero, who wrote the nation’s first parent trigger law (Education Week). A school choice critic latches on to anecdotes about badly behaving charter and private schools and concludes school choice is about serving business interests, not students (Salon). Reforms in D.C., Florida, Indiana and Tennessee are working (Edfly, USA Today). The number of students taking virtual courses is rising but the number of states offering virtual schools has declined (Hechinger Report). The Friedman Foundation opposes Common Core (Friedman Foundation). Taking the counterpoint, the Black Alliance for Educational Options supports Common Core (Times-Picayune).
World: The Taliban tried to assassinate Malala Yousafzai, a young Afghan girl promoting education rights for women. You may not know it, but Malala is also a big supporter of school choice (Spectator).
