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An Argument against School Vouchers

dmarker

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D
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Sep 6, 2001
Messages
516
I have an argument against school vouchers that I've never heard before. So far I haven't been able to come up with a counter-argument, very important in a debate so no one can surprise you. I've managed to shut down one pro-voucher debater but he always debates from emotion and not from logic so he can't really find the flaws in my argument.

My argument against school vouchers is this:

I am a home owner, I pay local taxes to support schools. Because I do pay taxes, I have the right to elect a school board and the superintendent, to know the curriculum and how money is allocated, to lobby the school board with ideas about allocation and curriculum. And I have no school age children.

With school vouchers, my tax money goes to a private school. I have no control over the curriculum or allocation of funds and no recourse to lobby these schools for changes to either because I have no school age children. In fact, a private school doesn't have to disclose its curriculum or its allocation policies to me.

So essentially the school voucher system taxation without representation for everybody without school age children.

I want a logical counter argument to this. Emotional arguments like "parents have the right to educate children as they wish" doesn't hold water because they are spending my tax dollars to do it. The debate would just end at: "if I pay, I should get a say."

Now, the second counter argument could come from accreditation. Vouchers would only go to accreditated schools. However, accreditation only does so much as input into the local schools. I can hardly lobby the private school about buying a specific text book covering a subject that I think is necessary or adding a class to the curriculum that I think is important. Or spending more money in one area than another. Local taxes mean local control over services or least the right to have input.

So any willing to assail my argument with logic and evidence?
 
I must admit that I don't know much about school vouchers - but I assume that they allow a parent to send a kid to private school, and have the "public school" fee paid by the voucher. Is this correct?

If so, I think that what you need is a tax direction system. In Ontario, you declare on your taxes whether you support the public or seperate (Catholic) school system. In your case, you should lobby for a system that would allow you to direct your taxes to either the public or the voucher system. Only give out vouchers to the level that they are supported.

This would eliminate your "taxation without representation" problem.

Not really a counter-argument, I suppose, but those are my thoughts.
 
A voucher program was just enacted in Colorado. It will use my taxes to send kids to private schools. If that's not bad enough, that money would normally go to public schools, which means, of course, that public schools will get that much less. I fully expect scores will drop, those supporting vouchers (who don't like public schools) will say, see how bad public schools are. A self fulfilling prophecy, which I believe is exactly what our Republican legislator expects (and has planned) to happen.
 
dmarker said:
I want a logical counter argument to this. Emotional arguments like "parents have the right to educate children as they wish" doesn't hold water because they are spending my tax dollars to do it.
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Do they pay into the system?
Do they have children in the system?
If they do, just like you, and they are not allowed to have a voucher system as they want, isn't this also "taxation without representation"?

What exactly do you mean by "representation"? Isn't a choice between public school and a voucher a form of representation? A very direct form at that!
 
The main problem with vouchers is this:
They don't ever throw money in the first place, our school system is pitifully underfunded. So go ahead and siphon all the money so RICH people can send thier kids to private schools at the public expense.

Charter schools are the new Edsel of education!

Peace
 
Representation does not mean that you have a say in how every dollar is spent.

I’m not sure what you mean by accreditation. But parents should only be able to apply the vouchers to schools that taught a curriculum in accordance with a standard set by elected politicians. Then you have taxation with representation.

In addition, if the majority had voted at an election for the party that said it was going to introduce vouchers, then you also have representation.

Do you have any other objections to vouchers?
 
With school vouchers, my tax money goes to a private school. I have no control over the curriculum or allocation of funds and no recourse to lobby these schools for changes to either because I have no school age children. In fact, a private school doesn't have to disclose its curriculum or its allocation policies to me.
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And you feel like you have this kind of control now when it comes to government schools?

Where do you live?
 
Dancing David said:
The main problem with vouchers is this:
They don't ever throw money in the first place, our school system is pitifully underfunded. So go ahead and siphon all the money so RICH people can send thier kids to private schools at the public expense.
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Just a quibble: Rich people already send their kids to private schools -- how many Senators' kids are in public schools now, for instance?

NA
 
With school vouchers, my tax money goes to a private school.
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Here you are wrong. The taxes of the people sending their kids to private school pay for it, not yours. The voucher gives the people back THEIR tax money, not yours, to direct to the school of their choosing.
 
Richard G said:


Here you are wrong. The taxes of the people sending their kids to private school pay for it, not yours. The voucher gives the people back THEIR tax money, not yours, to direct to the school of their choosing.
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Erk, well lets see are vouchers proportional to the amount of taxes paid by individuals, no. In many areas the bulk of taxes are paid by people with a low percentage of kids, so your redistributing thier money to the ones with kids in the first place.

Peace
 
Control

Richard:
And you feel like you have this kind of control now when it comes to government schools?

Where do you live?
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Perfectionist fallacy, he may not have total control now but he has more control then he would have with a private school.

Representation does not mean that you have a say in how every dollar is spent.
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Straw man. He is saying now he has more say over the money then he would with the voucher system. Basically he has more representation.

Apoger:
If they do, just like you, and they are not allowed to have a voucher system as they want, isn't this also "taxation without representation"?
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No. Mainly because they are infringing on many of his rights and the schools can so easily abuse the money.

For example if the parents send their kid to a religious school, the money would probably be spent on purely religious/non-educational as well as education.

Now why should I have to pay for any religious service? Even indirectly? That's like saying we can vote on whether or not people are forced to donate money to a church of their choosing or another person's choosing.

Ultimately the voucher idea is very, very bad.

Basically the rich get extra money to send their kids to school. The program is easily abused, what's to stop someone from spending their kids money on drugs?

Sure there can be precautions, but I imagine people will find loopholes. The private school "here's the money to get your kids supplies"...or they can get alloted 30 grand for a school year and send their kids to a cheaper school. They could also simply find a way to access the funds.

And there can be consequences....IF they get caught. And even then someone willing to rip off the system that badly is probably not too concerned with consequences.

Poorer families will suffer too. The good private schools are quite a distance from poorer neighborhoods. Sure kids could go there, if the school doesn't deny them due to "overcrowding"
and if they can somehow drive for an hour before and after work(IF their job gives them flexible hours). Remember public schools provide public transportation, no way for a kid to get to a private school(maybe the parents are working) the kid is SOL and now public transportation to the school is cut off due to underfunding.

And what if the private schools do become overcrowded? Unlike public schools they don't *have* to take the child. I suppose the market will create new schools, after a year or two. Meanwhile the kid will not get educated or will be forced to go to a now underfunded public school. Private schools can also deny entry for basically any reason, perhaps leading to descrimination and again kids forced to go to now underfunded public schools. I guess if your kid can't get entry you just cross your fingers and hope the "market" creates a new school.

I also don't think people realize how backwards private schools can be. I talked to a girl who went to Catholic school one time, at age 16 she wasn't fully aware of what sex was. Her school never talked about it, her parents never told her and she wasn't allowed to watch movies which included it. Private schools, even accredited ones can also teach creationism and other psuedoscience. They can also teach their own personal political views, like they can say the separation of church and state is a "bad thing". Which is just what we need, more ignorant, scientifically illiterate, propoganda fed fundamentalists now directly supported with state funding.

The funding is also much more complicated. In our current system money goes from tax payer to school. Now money is to go from tax payer, to a chosen school via some means(which must somehow tell what the parent wants) or to the parent then the school. You know how easily abused the latter is so I won't even go there. The former is overly complicated though(who or what's going to keep track of what money goes where?), creates even MORE beuracracy, and is likewise very open to inefficiency.

"Gee sorry sir I though you meant THAT school...well I'll see if I can get the money back."


And there is nothing intrinsically superior about private schools.

If you didn't notice the nations with the highest level of education (Japan,Korea, China, Israel) tend to be almost totally dominated by public schools. In China's and Korea's case(Korea is said to in fact have the highest level of education in the world) they have no private schools because they are socialist. Japanese schooling is mostly public. And Israel is a semi-socialist nation.

The US actually has a great deal of private schooling and one of the poorest levels of education for a developed nation.
 

quote:
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And you feel like you have this kind of control now when it comes to government schools?

Where do you live?
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Perfectionist fallacy, he may not have total control now but he has more control then he would have with a private
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Urrhh, Ummm, that wasn't Richard..

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So your assumption that he would not have any, if not more control, of how his money would be spent in a private school, is not fallacious?
 
I'm all for open boundaries. That is, a student can go to any public school at no cost. Allowing them to go to a private school, however, only will siphon off necessary public education funds.
 
I think that taken to its conclusion, the voucher idea becomes absurd. So say, hypothetically, that some students can actually receive better educations in private schools. Then what? What about the kids still in public schools?

Ignoring the flaws of private education pointed out by DialecticMaterialist, this sounds to me like the following:

Problem: Some ships in the fleet aren't sea-worthy.
Traditional Solution: Repair the ships.
Voucher solution: Transfer some people to safer ships.

Which one makes more sense?

Of course, this begs the obvious question of what to do if the repairs are botched.
 
Re: Control

DialecticMaterialist said:

Perfectionist fallacy, he may not have total control now but he has more control then he would have with a private school.

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I'd call this an error of fact -- iff you have children that attend a private school -- since if you can gather a group of like-minded parents who agree that you are right & the school is wrong, they might and actually could change.

Publik skools are run by local, state & federal administrators & the NEA; your input, or the input of every parent combined will make - zero - difference. School boards are a wonderful, meaningless artifice, although they might be able to enter the get-a-kickback-from-the-book-salesman sweepstakes. Just my 2 cts...
 
"Publik skools are run by local, state & federal administrators & the NEA; your input, or the input of every parent combined will make - zero - difference. School boards are a wonderful, meaningless artifice, although they might be able to enter the get-a-kickback-from-the-book-salesman sweepstakes. Just my 2 cts..."

I curious, have you ever attended a school board meeting, or attended a parent-teacher conference, or sat in on a class?

Oh, you might want to run your response through a spell checker ;)
 
Dancing David said:
So go ahead and siphon all the money so RICH people can send thier kids to private schools at the public expense.
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Now there's some brilliant thinking. Despite the fact that their tax bracket is higher than yours and their property taxes most likely are and the fact that they already send their kids to private school, how is it that a 300 dollar voucher comes out of your pocket? They pay more in taxes then you make in a year.
 
hammegk

I'd call this an error of fact -- iff you have children that attend a private school -- since if you can gather a group of like-minded parents who agree that you are right & the school is wrong, they might and actually could change.
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If you say you'll boycott or something I can see this. But this isn't about parents....it was about tax payers in general. This is also more difficult to do as there are no regular meetings and info is harder to get.

Publik skools are run by local, state & federal administrators & the NEA; your input, or the input of every parent combined will make - zero - difference. School boards are a wonderful, meaningless artifice, although they might be able to enter the get-a-kickback-from-the-book-salesman sweepstakes.
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Absurd, the PTA here can actually decide on something as relevant as an expulsion and school book/sex ed. standards among other things.
 
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