Republican Club

by Brian Harmon

LW contributor

After looking at the election results in Virginia, in which the GOP captured the posts of governor, lieutenant governor and attorney general, leaders and members of the LW Republican Club are looking more closely at education issues.

In every public school district and each individual school, there are hundreds of issues that have to be sorted out.

There will always be people who disagree on many of these issues. Amid the debates about what should be taught and how, a partial solution is picking up steam.

It is called school choice. The Republican Club will circulate a petition supporting an initiative that would allow any parent of a school-age child to choose what school they want their children to attend. The measure would provide $14,000 per child for parents who send their children to a non-public school. This could be a private school, charter school, homeschool, parochial school or a charter school that converts to private status.

Some government sources report that public schooling in California costs about the same amount, about $14,000. According to the California Policy Center, however, this figure does not include payments that must be made to pay off school bonds or state contributions to the teachers’ retirement system (CalSTRS). Adding in these factors brings the total cost to over $20,000 per year, per student.

One benefit of school choice is that parents would become more involved in their child’s education. Parents have more intimate and detailed information about their child’s needs than a government institution such as a public school. Study after study has shown that when parents are more involved in a child’s education, the child usually does better.