Disruptive ESA’s
Could Hasten Failure Factory Exodus
Chuck
Muth
July 3, 2015
They’re
called “disruptive innovations.”
A
disruptive innovation is something unexpected that disrupts an existing product
or service market and creates a new one, complete with an entire new batch of
customers and usually lower prices. “Ride-sharing,”
which has totally disrupted the moribund taxicab industry, is a perfect
example.
But
Nevada’s Republican-led 2015 Legislature could be responsible for the most
significant and meaningful disruptive innovation on the planet today, thanks to
passage of a bill creating Education Savings Accounts (ESA’s), which are an
expanded variant of school vouchers worth around $5,000 per year per student.
Nevada’s
first-in-the-nation universal ESA program holds out the potential for
disrupting and breaking the stranglehold the teachers union and government
bureaucrats have on the failure factory public schools our kids have been
trapped in for decades. And all manner
of low- and middle-income families will now have both the right to send their
kids to a private school, as well as the financial means to exercise that
right.
Of
course, Republicans never blow an opportunity to blow an opportunity, so it’s
no surprise that they blemished the bill with this: “A parent may not establish
an education savings account for a child who will be homeschooled.”
Go
figure. The ultimate in “parental
involvement” is specifically banned from participating in the program despite
being taxpayers and incurring considerable out-of-pocket costs for books,
curriculum, tutoring, etc.
But
hold on there, Bubba-looey. Although a “homeschooled”
child isn’t eligible for an ESA, an “opt-in” child is!
“What
the heck is an ‘opt-in child?” I hear you ask.
An
opt-in child is a student not enrolled in either a public or private school “who
receives all of a portion of his or her instruction from a participating
entity.” And get this: The definition of
“participating entity” includes “a parent” who fills out a government
notification form.
In
other words, um, homeschooling.
But
there’s a catch. Homeschoolers – sorry,
opt-inschoolers - as well as kids already enrolled in a private school, are not
eligible for an ESA until they serve a 100-day penalty in public school
purgatory.
That’s
right, these taxpaying Nevadans are required to yank their kids out of their
present private school or homeschool and enroll them in a public school for an
entire semester in order to qualify for the ESA. A ridiculous and totally unwarranted
inconvenience, but one many parents will surely suffer in return for the
financial school choice support they so richly deserve.
Combined
with the number of parents of public school kids who will now be able to afford
private school tuition – and prices will surely come down - ESAs hold out the
potential for dramatically disrupting the current government monopoly over
education and creating a totally unexpected new market.
Let
the failure factory exodus begin!
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(Mr.
Muth is president of Citizen Outreach and the publisher of www.NevadaNewsandViews.com. He personally blogs at www.MuthsTruths.com)
You can read this column online, as well as access archives
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