Rick Scott's Education Plan

[Sophus]

The crazy Tea Party conservatives are trying to take over Florida's educational system. From Mother Jones:

Conservatives have been plotting for years to blow up the public school system. Now, Florida's incoming governor Rick Scott is poised to light the fuse.

During his campaign, Scott pledged to overhaul the state's schools while simultaneously reducing school property taxes by $1.4 billion. How to accomplish both? Privatization, of course. His plan, which promotes online schooling along with other educational options, may actually pave the way for the elimination of such pesky budget busters as buses, cafeterias, teachers, and, well, school facilities themselves...

Far-right conservatives have been pushing vouchers for years as a way to dismantle public schools and fund parochial schools. But Scott's proposal may be the first to propose using vouchers as a way of also cutting taxes. The plan is modeled on one proposed by the conservative Goldwater Institute in Arizona, which last year posited that the state could save a significant amount of money if it gave parents a spiff to opt out of the public school system.

It goes on...  

[karadan]

These are the sorts of schools that would likely be on the receiving end of Scott's universal voucher program. It might help him cut property taxes for the state's rich seniors and wintering hedge fund managers, but it's hard to see how the plan does much to improve "accountability" as he's claimedâ€"or more importantly, improve the fortunes of Florida's school children.


And people in Florida voted for this guy... Do they think they are untouchable or something? I simply do not get how criminals such as Scott can get away with it.  

[KDbeads]

FL schools used to be some of the top in the nation  :mad:

[SSY]

I have always thought a voucher system for schools has many positives, that site seems to be more than a little biased.

[Sophus]

I have always thought a voucher system for schools has many positives, that site seems to be more than a little biased.

Sure it's biased. It's commentary.

What good would you expect to come from this education system?

[terranus]

In certain limited situations school vouchers can be a good thing, such as when students are assigned to failing public schools. And honestly I don't see the problem with incorporating more of an online presence in schoolwork. Nearly every college course nowadays requires you to do something online in order to complete the course. High school kids should be prepped for that so they won't be lost their freshman year.

As far as Rick Scott goes, I didn't vote for him. But all the gullible retirees living here in FL got caught up in the Tea Party crap and were scared to vote for a Democrat, even though she was a moderate.

[LegendarySandwich]

I have always thought a voucher system for schools has many positives, that site seems to be more than a little biased.

Sure it's biased. It's commentary.

What good would you expect to come from this education system?

Ideally, a system like this would cause competition and thus better the schools, which ultimately betters the children.

[Recusant]

Ideally, a system like this would cause competition and thus better the schools, which ultimately betters the children.

I agree, but the operative term here is "ideally."  In practice, as outlined in the Mother Jones piece, this sort of thing is wide open to fraud unless there's a whole layer of governmental oversight added (which of course would tend to negate any tax savings accrued and is something that "anti big government" types would tend to avoid).  Scott is just fine with fraud though.  As also mentioned in the MJ article, he was the head of a company that got caught defrauding the government and had to repay $2 billion in stolen funds.  He had sufficient deniability to get away with saying that he knew nothing about the ongoing fraud.  However, he has chosen to put Dennis Bakke who is running shady charter schools on his transition team, and you can be sure Bakke is there to help push this idea forward.  No conflict of interest there at all.

Despite Dr. Pangloss, we don't live in the best of all possible worlds, and the ideal outcome is rarely seen to occur.