Submitted by Elaine Magliaro, Guest Blogger
In August, I wrote a post about Louisiana’s new school voucher program (Stateside Louisiana: School Vouchers and the Privatization of Public Education) that would use tax dollars earmarked for public education to pay for students’ tuitions to private and religious schools. Last week, State District Judge Tim Kelley “declared the diversion of funds from the Minimum Foundation Program (MFP) — the formula under which per pupil public education funds are calculated — to private entities was unconstitutional.” The voucher program is funded by a block-grant program that “Judge Kelley ruled is restricted by the constitution to funding only public schools.”
“Nowhere was it mandated that funds from [the block-grant program]…be provided for an alternative education beyond what the Louisiana education system was set up for,” he [Judge Kelley] wrote. The state can legally fund vouchers, but the funding “must come from some other portion of the general budget,” Judge Kelley said.
The judge, however, did not issue an immediate injunction to stop the voucher program. “The 5,000 students currently receiving vouchers will be able to continue attending their private schools pending an appeal, state officials said.”
Governor Bobby Jindal, a champion of the voucher program, called the ruling “wrong-headed” and “a travesty for parents across Louisiana who want nothing more than for their children to have an equal opportunity at receiving a great education.” He promised to appeal the judge’s ruling. John White, the state superintendent of education, said, “We are optimistic this decision will be reversed.”
According to reports, Judge Kelley’s ruling is not the only challenge Louisiana’s new school voucher program faces. Last week, a federal judge in New Orleans “ruled that the program had the potential to disrupt the region’s court-ordered efforts to desegregate public schools. The federal judge issued a temporary injunction halting the use of vouchers in Tangipahoa Parish over concern that the program was siphoning off state dollars needed to implement the desegregation plan.” There are at least thirty more school districts in the state that are also under desegregation orders. Voucher opponents said they plan to “bring similar federal court cases in those districts.”
The Times-Picayune reported that the voucher “suit was brought by Louisiana Federation of Teachers (LFT), Louisiana Association of Educators (LAE), Louisiana School Boards Association and 43 local school boards.” In addition to the teachers’ unions and school boards, others have also criticized the program because some of the private and religious schools that receive voucher money “focus on so-called Young Earth Creationism over evolution.”
(Note: The Unites States Supreme Court has “affirmed the right of religious institutions to receive taxpayer funds through vouchers, as long as the state itself isn’t advocating a particular faith.”)
Another criticism of the program is that voucher students who attend many of the private and religious schools will not be subjected to the same standardized testing that students in Louisiana’s public schools are.
From my earlier post on the Louisiana school voucher program:
Casey Michel (TPMMuckraker) reported in July that students in every public school in Louisiana are subjected to standardized testing, but “voucher students — who will bring an average of $8,000 in tuition from ‘failing’ public schools to many that are affiliated with religious denominations — will only need to face testing if their new school has taken an average of 10 students per grade, or if the schools have accepted at least 40 voucher students into the grades testing.”
According to Simon[Stephanie Simon, Reuters], there are private schools in Louisiana that have been approved to receive state funds that “use social studies texts warning that liberals threaten global prosperity; Bible-based math books that don’t cover modern concepts such as set theory; and biology texts built around refuting evolution.” Many of the schools “rely on Pensacola-based A Beka Book curriculum or Bob Jones University Press textbooks to teach their pupils Bible-based ‘facts,’ such as the existence of Nessie the Loch Ness Monster and all sorts of pseudoscience…”
Note: The Louisiana school voucher program not only siphons money away from the state’s public schools to private and religious schools—but also to private businesses and private tutors.
Creationist Textbooks: Darwin Is Wrong Because Loch Ness Monster Is Real
Louisiana Voucher Program Funds Horrible Private Religious Schools With Tax Payer Money
SOURCES
Jindal voucher overhaul unconstitutionally diverts public funds to private schools, judge rules (Times-Picayune)
Louisiana Voucher Program Ruled Unconstitutional (Huffington Post)
Blow Dealt to School Voucher Program (Wall Street Journal)
Bobby Jindal’s school voucher program ruled unconstitutional (Washington Post)
Judge blocks Gov. Bobby Jindal’s signature school voucher program (Christian Science Monitor)
Stateside Louisiana: School Vouchers and the Privatization of Public Education (Jonathan Turley)
Louisiana education case highlights Bobby Jindal’s creationism state
Lawsuit over school voucher programme calls attention to controversial policy, which could hamper governor’s ambitions
Paul Harris in New York
guardian.co.uk, Wednesday 28 November 2012
http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2012/nov/28/bobby-jindal-louisiana-creationism-case
Excerpt:
One of the main Louisiana voices against the scheme is student activist Zack Kopplin. He began protesting the 2008 Louisiana Science Education Act – a law that allowed public funds to be used at schools that teach creationism – as a high school project.
In the wake of the creation of the voucher scheme this summer Kopplin has detailed at least 20 Louisiana schools that teach elements of creationism and are involved in the voucher programme. One school, Claiborne Christian School, has a student handbook that says it will “look to the Bible as the main source of knowledge in all areas”.
A 2010 Claiborne newsletter also questioned current science on the age of the Earth. Another school on the scheme is the Faith Academy, whose student handbook insists students should “defend creationism through evidence presented by the Bible versus traditional scientific theory”.
Other Louisiana schools use textbooks, DVDs and other materials designed by Christian groups that often defend the idea of a young earth created a few thousand years ago or promote so-called “intelligent design” which holds that evolution cannot account for the development of complex biological systems, such as the eye.
“This is ridiculous. When I first heard about it, I thought someone needs to fight it. But no one did,” said Kopplin, explaining why he began his work examining the impact of the voucher system.
The “stealth creationism” has been roundly condemned by numerous education groups, including a letter signed by some 77 Nobel laureates who have won the international prize in fields like chemistry, biology, medicine or physics. “It is vital that students have a sound education about major scientific concepts and their applications,” the letter stated, asking for repeal of the education law that helped pave the way for the scheme.
Other experts are more blunt. While conservatives have argued the voucher scheme is an innovative way of getting pupils out of poor schools – and encouraging needed reforms in the system – critics have said that exposing pupils to creationism gives them a much worse factual education.
“It is not better education. It is inferior when you are teaching kids that the earth is 6,000 years old. A lot of public money is going to schools that teach creationism and fundamentalist science. I think that is dreadful,” said Barbara Forrest, a philosophy professor at Southeastern Louisiana University and an outspoken critic of creationist activists in education.
Bobby Jindal’s Science Problem
Romney’s education surrogate promotes creationist nonsense in schools.
By Kenneth R. Miller
|Posted Monday, July 30, 2012
http://www.slate.com/articles/health_and_science/science/2012/07/bobby_jindal_possible_vice_presidential_pick_but_has_a_creationism_problem_.html
Excerpt:
Jindal has an elite résumé. He was a biology major at my school, Brown University, and a Rhodes scholar. He knows the science, or at least he ought to. But in his rise to prominence in Louisiana, he made a bargain with the religious right and compromised science and science education for the children of his state. In fact, Jindal’s actions at one point persuaded leading scientific organizations, including the Society for Integrative and Comparative Biology, to cross New Orleans off their list of future meeting sites (PDF).
What did Jindal do to produce a hornet’s nest of “mad scientists,” as Times-Picayune writer James Gill described them? He signed into law, in Gill’s words, the “Louisiana Science Education Act (LSEA), which is named for what it is designed to destroy.” The act allows “supplemental textbooks and other instructional materials” to be brought into classrooms to support the “open and objective discussion” of certain “scientific theories,” including, of course, evolution. As educators who have heard such coded language before quickly realized, the act was intended to promote creationism as science. In April, Kevin Carman, dean of the College of Science at Louisiana State University, testified before the Louisiana Senate’s Education Committee that two top scientists had rejected offers to come to LSU because of the LSEA, and the school may lose more scientists in the future.
And now Jindal is poised to spend millions of dollars of state money to support the teaching of creationism in private schools.
The state of Louisiana has had a problem with evolution for a long, long time. In 1981, it passed a “Balanced Treatment for Creation-Science and Evolution-Science Act,” which required the teaching of creation science alongside “evolution-science” in public schools. The Supreme Court struck it down in 1987 (in Edwards v. Aguillard), finding that creationism is inherently religious, and that the law’s “preeminent religious purpose” placed it in violation of the First Amendment to the U.S. Constitution. Case closed? Not really.
When Jindal stepped into Republican politics in Louisiana, he had a choice to make. He could defend mainstream science, which sees evolution as the powerful, strongly supported, and widely tested theory that it is today. Or he could have joined the doubters and deniers that populate the electorate in his party. Campaigning for the governorship in 2007, Jindal touted his Christian faith, shied away from specific statements about evolution, and emphasized his commitment to local control of education. Louisianans didn’t have to wait long to find out what this meant for science.
Jindal signed the LSEA into law in 2008, endorsing the thinly veiled attempt to allow creationism into the science classrooms of his state. The backers of the law made it clear that material on intelligent design would be high on the list of supplemental materials that local boards and teachers could present to their students. Intelligent design is the re-labeled form of creationism that a federal court in Pennsylvania threw out of classrooms in the 2005 Dover v. Kitzmiller decision. The National Academy of Sciences has identified intelligent design as “not science” because it is “not testable by the methods of science.” The National Academy of Science’s opinion carried little weight with the Ivy League bio major.
In a 2008 interview on CBS’s Face the Nation, Jindal said that he wanted students “to be presented with the best thinking, I want them to be able to make decisions for themselves, I want them to see the best data. … I’d certainly want my kids to be exposed to the very best science. I don’t want any facts or theories or explanations to be withheld from them because of political correctness.” The problem, of course, is that if the “best science,” in the view of a local school board, includes creationism, the students in that school system are being cheated. Presenting an idea that has no scientific support as if it were the equal of a thoroughly tested scientific theory is academic dishonesty of the rankest sort. Indeed, this is why Jindal’s own genetics professor at Brown University, National Academy member Arthur Landy, advised him to veto the LSEA, advice Jindal ignored.
Jindal has an elite résumé. He was a biology major at my school, Brown University, and a Rhodes scholar. He knows the science, or at least he ought to. But in his rise to prominence in Louisiana, he made a bargain with the religious right and compromised science and science education for the children of his state. In fact, Jindal’s actions at one point persuaded leading scientific organizations, including the Society for Integrative and Comparative Biology, to cross New Orleans off their list of future meeting sites (PDF).
What did Jindal do to produce a hornet’s nest of “mad scientists,” as Times-Picayune writer James Gill described them? He signed into law, in Gill’s words, the “Louisiana Science Education Act (LSEA), which is named for what it is designed to destroy.” The act allows “supplemental textbooks and other instructional materials” to be brought into classrooms to support the “open and objective discussion” of certain “scientific theories,” including, of course, evolution. As educators who have heard such coded language before quickly realized, the act was intended to promote creationism as science. In April, Kevin Carman, dean of the College of Science at Louisiana State University, testified before the Louisiana Senate’s Education Committee that two top scientists had rejected offers to come to LSU because of the LSEA, and the school may lose more scientists in the future.
And now Jindal is poised to spend millions of dollars of state money to support the teaching of creationism in private schools.
The state of Louisiana has had a problem with evolution for a long, long time. In 1981, it passed a “Balanced Treatment for Creation-Science and Evolution-Science Act,” which required the teaching of creation science alongside “evolution-science” in public schools. The Supreme Court struck it down in 1987 (in Edwards v. Aguillard), finding that creationism is inherently religious, and that the law’s “preeminent religious purpose” placed it in violation of the First Amendment to the U.S. Constitution. Case closed? Not really.
When Jindal stepped into Republican politics in Louisiana, he had a choice to make. He could defend mainstream science, which sees evolution as the powerful, strongly supported, and widely tested theory that it is today. Or he could have joined the doubters and deniers that populate the electorate in his party. Campaigning for the governorship in 2007, Jindal touted his Christian faith, shied away from specific statements about evolution, and emphasized his commitment to local control of education. Louisianans didn’t have to wait long to find out what this meant for science.
Jindal signed the LSEA into law in 2008, endorsing the thinly veiled attempt to allow creationism into the science classrooms of his state. The backers of the law made it clear that material on intelligent design would be high on the list of supplemental materials that local boards and teachers could present to their students. Intelligent design is the re-labeled form of creationism that a federal court in Pennsylvania threw out of classrooms in the 2005 Dover v. Kitzmiller decision. The National Academy of Sciences has identified intelligent design as “not science” because it is “not testable by the methods of science.” The National Academy of Science’s opinion carried little weight with the Ivy League bio major.
In a 2008 interview on CBS’s Face the Nation, Jindal said that he wanted students “to be presented with the best thinking, I want them to be able to make decisions for themselves, I want them to see the best data. … I’d certainly want my kids to be exposed to the very best science. I don’t want any facts or theories or explanations to be withheld from them because of political correctness.” The problem, of course, is that if the “best science,” in the view of a local school board, includes creationism, the students in that school system are being cheated. Presenting an idea that has no scientific support as if it were the equal of a thoroughly tested scientific theory is academic dishonesty of the rankest sort. Indeed, this is why Jindal’s own genetics professor at Brown University, National Academy member Arthur Landy, advised him to veto the LSEA, advice Jindal ignored.
“….Louisiana Rep. Valarie Hodges, R-Watson, is retracting her support for Gov. Bobby Jindal’s voucher program, after realizing the money could be applied to Muslim schools, Livingston Parish News reports….”
That paragraph says it all. You can see the real intent of the plan. You can see who put it together. You can certainly see the contempt for our secular Constitution and the bigotry that drives them. And Jindal wants to be taken seriously as a Presidential candidate? I think not.
“That issue will do more to impact the future of Texas and the quality of education than anything else we could do.””
Oh, yes.
nick,
Who are the dependents in society that you are talking about? You believe that only a few in our society work hard? I think you are wrong. I believe there are millions of hardworking Americans who find it difficult to make ends meet. I think there are millions of Americans like my ninety-four-year- old my mother who worked hard all of their lives and who now depend on Social Security.
shano, Virtually everyone beats us in science, math and food. So, you’re damning w/ faint praise.
Elaine, Discipline and hard work makes for a successful society. Lack of discipline and laziness makes for a dependent society on the few who do work hard. But eventually you run out of other people’s money. I’ll take the former, how ’bout you?
Wonkette has been publishing excerpts from Christianist High School textbooks. This is the second installment- there is a link to the first one, too:
http://wonkette.com/491089/sundays-with-the-christianists-a-world-history-textbook-that-knows-all-science-is-prayer-based#more-491089
Swedes havd free education after merit after basic 9 year program. Same for me as foreign student in ’69.
Competitive to get a place. 5.0 out of 5.0 for doctor slot. Even evening classes at the university are free, but you must have academic qualifications. Like a degree, etc.
Other schools are pay only and no grants. Student loans since before 1968 for cost of living and student subventioned housing (never enough).
Many of my helpers are students or between courses. It is not easy even in a socialist country. We have currently and since over 6 years a right wing multi-party alliance.
OTOTOT
Germany has 3 times as much percentagewise renewable power as the USA. It can be rapidly done if the political will exists. 20 years.
Patrick appointment signals looming voucher fight at Capitol
By Peggy Fikac, Joe Holley | October 4, 2012 | Updated: October 4, 2012 12:13p Houston Chronicle
With the appointment of state Sen. Dan Patrick, R-Houston, as chairman of the Senate Education committee, Lt. Gov. David Dewhurst signaled that he got the message from the Tea Party wing of his party about the priority of school choice.
Patrick, a Tea Party champion who will replace retiring state Sen. Florence Shapiro, R-Plano, has been saying for months that he would push a voucher program this legislative session. Parents would be able to use vouchers to pay for sending their children to schools of their choice rather than public schools.
Gov. Rick Perry’s recent appointment of former Railroad Commissioner Michael Williams, also an advocate of school choice, was another sign that the issue will be a high priority for the Republican majority in the legislature.
“To me, school choice is the photo ID bill of this session,” Patrick said in August. “Our base has wanted us to pass photo voter ID for years, and we did it. They’ve been wanting us to pass school choice for years. This is the year to do it, in my view. That issue will do more to impact the future of Texas and the quality of education than anything else we could do.”
Great job Elaine! The charter and voucher programs are blatant attempts to privatize and add religion to the public school system.
We spend more on education than France and they still beat us in science and math. Viva la France! The food is so much better there is no comparison as well. to each his own:
http://rossieronline.usc.edu/u-s-education-versus-the-world-infographic/
nick,
Homework doesn’t make one smart–and lack of homework doesn’t keep one stupid.
The new French government has proposed banning homework for students K-8. Keep them stupid and dependent on govt. Tax the rich @ 91%. Viva la France!
bettykath,
A few countries do exactly that. You can go as far as your scores will take you.
In my utopia, the state/feds would provide for free education through college. We all benefit from an educated population. We should all pay for it and no one should be left out.
Shano, thanks for the link. That principal should be fired. The school system should bring in experts who can educate the staff and students about homophobia and the inappropriate use of humiliation as punishment.
There was another story linked to on the pages about a girl being punished for intervening against bullies of a special needs girl after repeated attempts to get the bus driver and the administration to take action.
Bullies are being encouraged.
The articles I posted up thread have to do with the school systems bringing police into the schools. In MS, Black kids are being moved to jail without charges.
Ay, Wow!! I’m a big fan of REBT. So much of therapy is pablum. REBT is rational, practical, and effective.
OK, Shano, OK, I read that damn thing and what was the most unbelievable part of it was that there were commenters who condoned it! There isn’t enough wrong with it — I mean — take it from any position.
If it’s OK to be gay then it’s not OK to encourage kids to mock and humiliate people for being perceived as gay.
If it is NOT OK to be gay then it’s not OK to force kids who do not identify themselves as gay rights activists to be identified as openly gay so they can be humiliated and scorned.
If it is heterosexual-like to fight then it is not OK to punish fighting by identifying fighters as gay.
If it is gay-like to fight then you make fighting worse by having students involuntarily identify themselves as …
NEVERMIND this does not need to be analyzed. These thugs who did this “discipline” need to be immediately thrown the hell out of the system. OMG!
NEVERMIND this is beyond unacceptable, beyond intolerable. Tim Richard and Helen Hollands need to be fired and probably sued for intentional infliction of emotional distress. NOT ONLY of these two young men but also of each and every student who was part of the gang who were misused to humiliate the two targeted students. my god, isn’t that obvious?
Perhaps those two should be prosecuted for child endangerment.
OMG look who we have been allowing to exercise authority over our children, OMG OMG OMG!