Why are liberals so against charter schools?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:The point of charter schools is to discriminate. It is why they exist. They may also make money, but they exist only for the purpose of discrimination.

Sometimes it is racial discrimination. Mostly it is discrimination against physically and mentally handicapped kids.

The ones into it for the money are often simple to see. They don’t offer high school. High school education is expensive. Grade schools are the “profit centers”.

Obviously charters almost never - and I mean actually never but I can’t say there are not 1 or 2 in the country that focus on providing education to physically and mentally handicapped students. Handicapped kids are very expensive to educate. God bless the schools and districts that work hard to provide as good as education as possible for those kids. It might easily be $150K a kid.

My approach would be easy: if a charter school wants public funding then they must either educate the same proportionate share of the kids with handicaps and learning disabilities as the traditional public schools in the same geographic area the charter school is located, or the charter school must pay the offsetting cost to the public school district that is educating those kids. So, for example, let’s say a charter school is located in school district “A”. And, let’s say the public high school serving in area “A” has 25% of its students qualifying in some way under IDEA. While the our hypothetical charter has 5% of its students qualifying under IDEA. Add up the direct non-federally reimbursed costs incurred by each school, and have the one pay the other 50% of the expense. Kids get needed services. Costs are appropriately shared. Obviously if the charter school takes on more handicapped kids they pay out less money.

Thinking like this is how movies like Spiderman and Forrest Gump get claimed as losing money.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:People need to know the totality of what they’re demanding and advocating for.

The increase of charter schools is part of the agenda and trend of privatization of what is supposed to be a public good.

It’s sad that people can’t see the bigger picture.

But never in practice has that worked out to the publics benefit. Just a way for some to line their pockets at the public's expense.

Arguably the rise in DC's charter schools has worked out to the public's benefit.

Charters got MC people to stay in the city to raise kids; there's an argument that improved test scores resulted overall. I believe that made DC non-charter publics improve. You have more people that are now willing to stay in the city for middle and high school, whereas before charters they would leave the city or go private.

[Anonymous]

I'll note that at least in DC, a place that votes 90% Dem, that about half of public school kids attend public charters.

Which would suggest that liberals are not all against charters.

[Anonymous]

Liberals want a poorly educated population with no critical thinking skills because then there is less pushback on their policies.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I'll note that at least in DC, a place that votes 90% Dem, that about half of public school kids attend public charters.

Which would suggest that liberals are not all against charters.

+1
Liberals aren't generally against public charters with appropriate requirements (on performance, not excluding people, hiring practices) and thoughtful expansion (e.g., overpopulation of schools leads to starvation of all). I would say liberals tend to be against vouchers as they siphon funds away from public schools to private schools that have exclusionary practices. That said, analysis suggest that charters are no more effective than public schools on average even though they tend to draw more engaged parents.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Why not? If you are against charter schools because the money can go to religious schools, then you should be against these as well.

DP- but can you explain how research, which has empirical guidelines and that can benefit society/discover new information as a whole should have the same funding guidelines as religious training/education which has no empirical guides and in fact is based on religion. The guidelines in receiving funding grants is based upon using the SCIENTIFIC method which is agreed upon as empirical evidence and doesn’t involve religion.

A religious school is teaching religion which brings the separation of church and state into question.

Explain how those are the same to you.

Religious colleges also teach religion. Not sure if any have a mandatory component for all schools.
I also mentioned student loans for attending religious schools.
If the parent can take funds and use at a private school, was objected to because it would go to religious schools. The same applies for a lot of government funds at the collegiate level.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Liberals want a poorly educated population with no critical thinking skills because then there is less pushback on their policies.

Yes that’s why liberal states like Mississippi & Alabama are so highly-educated & elicit high levels of political participation from their residents.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Liberals want a poorly educated population with no critical thinking skills because then there is less pushback on their policies.

Educational attainment is one of the best predictors of party affiliation. Shockingly, the less educated voters are trending republican

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Why not? If you are against charter schools because the money can go to religious schools, then you should be against these as well.

DP- but can you explain how research, which has empirical guidelines and that can benefit society/discover new information as a whole should have the same funding guidelines as religious training/education which has no empirical guides and in fact is based on religion. The guidelines in receiving funding grants is based upon using the SCIENTIFIC method which is agreed upon as empirical evidence and doesn’t involve religion.

A religious school is teaching religion which brings the separation of church and state into question.

Explain how those are the same to you.

Religious colleges also teach religion. Not sure if any have a mandatory component for all schools.
I also mentioned student loans for attending religious schools.
If the parent can take funds and use at a private school, was objected to because it would go to religious schools. The same applies for a lot of government funds at the collegiate level.

Most (all?) religious colleges are private. The student loan argument does really apply as a direct comparison because the money gets paid back.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Liberals want a poorly educated population with no critical thinking skills because then there is less pushback on their policies.

Educational attainment is one of the best predictors of party affiliation. Shockingly, the less educated voters are trending republican

+1

[Anonymous]

I lean liberal and I am pro-charter. I don't think everyone fits into a neat box of ideology.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Why not? If you are against charter schools because the money can go to religious schools, then you should be against these as well.

DP- but can you explain how research, which has empirical guidelines and that can benefit society/discover new information as a whole should have the same funding guidelines as religious training/education which has no empirical guides and in fact is based on religion. The guidelines in receiving funding grants is based upon using the SCIENTIFIC method which is agreed upon as empirical evidence and doesn’t involve religion.

A religious school is teaching religion which brings the separation of church and state into question.

Explain how those are the same to you.

Religious colleges also teach religion. Not sure if any have a mandatory component for all schools.
I also mentioned student loans for attending religious schools.
If the parent can take funds and use at a private school, was objected to because it would go to religious schools. The same applies for a lot of government funds at the collegiate level.

Most (all?) religious colleges are private. The student loan argument does really apply as a direct comparison because the money gets paid back.

No it doesn’t.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Why not? If you are against charter schools because the money can go to religious schools, then you should be against these as well.

DP- but can you explain how research, which has empirical guidelines and that can benefit society/discover new information as a whole should have the same funding guidelines as religious training/education which has no empirical guides and in fact is based on religion. The guidelines in receiving funding grants is based upon using the SCIENTIFIC method which is agreed upon as empirical evidence and doesn’t involve religion.

A religious school is teaching religion which brings the separation of church and state into question.

Explain how those are the same to you.

Religious colleges also teach religion. Not sure if any have a mandatory component for all schools.
I also mentioned student loans for attending religious schools.
If the parent can take funds and use at a private school, was objected to because it would go to religious schools. The same applies for a lot of government funds at the collegiate level.

I would say that almost all colleges teach religious classes. I went to a Big10 university a long time ago and comparative religious classes, eastern religion classes. and historical religion were all popular humanities classes. I would add that all art history course work and pretty much all choral course work will basically be 80 percent religious focused.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Because it will defund/make public schools worse for most “poor people” who can’t snag a seat at a charter.

A better question is why do conservatives want to end public education?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:The point of charter schools is to discriminate. It is why they exist. They may also make money, but they exist only for the purpose of discrimination.

Sometimes it is racial discrimination. Mostly it is discrimination against physically and mentally handicapped kids.

The ones into it for the money are often simple to see. They don’t offer high school. High school education is expensive. Grade schools are the “profit centers”.

Obviously charters almost never - and I mean actually never but I can’t say there are not 1 or 2 in the country that focus on providing education to physically and mentally handicapped students. Handicapped kids are very expensive to educate. God bless the schools and districts that work hard to provide as good as education as possible for those kids. It might easily be $150K a kid.

My approach would be easy: if a charter school wants public funding then they must either educate the same proportionate share of the kids with handicaps and learning disabilities as the traditional public schools in the same geographic area the charter school is located, or the charter school must pay the offsetting cost to the public school district that is educating those kids. So, for example, let’s say a charter school is located in school district “A”. And, let’s say the public high school serving in area “A” has 25% of its students qualifying in some way under IDEA. While the our hypothetical charter has 5% of its students qualifying under IDEA. Add up the direct non-federally reimbursed costs incurred by each school, and have the one pay the other 50% of the expense. Kids get needed services. Costs are appropriately shared. Obviously if the charter school takes on more handicapped kids they pay out less money.

People could argue that spending $150k of taxpayer money on one kid is discriminating against all the other kids.