Facts about school choice
By Erik Telford
Last week, Steve Nelson of the Calhoun School in Manhattan penned a jeremiad against school choice, charter schools and private schools, including the one that signs his paycheck.
The occasion? He received an email supporting National School Choice week.
THEY WANTED CHOICE: Advocates of school choice fight for the chance to choose the right education path for their child.
School choice advocates fight for each family’s ability to choose the right education path for their child, whether that lie in a traditional public schools, publicly supported independent charter schools, vouchers for private schools, or homeschooling.
Underlying this is the ideal that no cookie cutter system can serve all students and that competition between systems encourages all to perform better.
Mostly Nelson complained about school choice supporters. He included Big Pharma and Grover Norquist, but forgot to mention a few names — including the head of his own state’s government, Gov. Andrew Cuomo.
Last February, Cuomo met with school choice advocates and surprised them with warm support of their movement and shared concerns about New York City mayor Bill de Blasio’s hostility to educational choice.
