Virginia has a top-down public educational system in which many policies and procedures are dictated by a large educational bureaucracy in Virginia. The Old Dominion, which professedly believes in competition, has among the fewest charter schools of any state in the country. And automatic funding formulas (the Standards of Quality) ensure that taxpayers ratchet state aid for K-12 public education relentlessly higher with little accountability: The main impact of the Standards of Learning, implemented with the dream of creating accountability, has been to incentivize schools and teachers to “teach to the test.”
Despite these obstacles, some public school systems manage to accomplish remarkable things. I’m impressed by the quality of the education provided by Henrico County schools, for instance, on a shoestring — with significantly less spending per pupil than the neighboring City of Richmond. While students in suburban school districts fare reasonably well, students in municipalities like Richmond and Petersburg are terribly short-changed. Worse, they have no option — other than moving into neighboring jurisdictions, which many cannot afford — to improve their lot.
That’s why I’m delighted to note the appearance of a new group on the scene, School Choice Virginia, a non-partisan not-for-profit organization dedicated to expanding “educational choices for Virginia families.”
Founded by Del. Chris Saxman, R-Staunton, the group is supported by the Family Foundation, the Thomas Jefferson Institute for Public Policy, the Virginia Council for Private Education, the Home Educators Association of Virginia, the Virginia Catholic Conference, the Old Dominion Association of Church Schools and even a representative of the Richmond City School Board.
At the moment, School Choice Virginia’s main presence in the marketplace of ideas is a blog, which tracks the “school choice” movement in Virginia and across the country.
The unwillingness to explore alternatives to the bureaucratic — nay, sclerotic — public education system we have in Virginia is, to my mind, one of the greatest indictments that can be leveled against Virginia’s political class. Let us hope that this new group can re-frame the educational debate from “mo’ money” to “mo’ reform.”