School Voucher Programs - Literature review Example

Name: Tutor: Task: Date: One of the contentious issues within the education sector facing the government today is the issue of school vouchers. School vouchers are basically vouchers that provide disadvantaged students with the opportunity to have access to private school education. The government implemented the School vouchers system as a new form of tax reimbursement as it seeks to allow parents who can only afford public education to raise private tuition fees (Teachnology 1). Some parents believe that since they are paying property tax their children should be given a chance to attend private schools, yet again a certain section of politicians disagree. This has therefore resulted to great contention concerning the adoption of school vouchers. This particular paper therefore seeks to critically analyze why school vouchers are a good thing. According to Lester (2011), the benefits of school vouchers are relatively well-spread. One of the major benefits accrued from the government’s implementation of the school vouchers is based on the fact that it allows those from low income families or those from unprivileged family backgrounds to have the opportunity to benefit from private schooling which could provide them with a more intensive tutoring. Moreover, proponents of this system argue that it will enable poor students to attend good schools that were in the past only available to students from middle-class families. For this reason, the voucher system seems a reasonably benign way of increasing options for poor parents to educate their children. Lester (1) highlights further that more than 170,000 students this academic year have employed the use of vouchers in various states in which it is operational, also enabling a number of students to attend specialized educational schemes which are tailored around individual needs-something that was not possible in the past. On the other hand, there are indifferent reactions to this initiative that has been witnessed across the country. According to Anti-Defamation League (1), the voucher system offers nothing of value to poor families. This is based on the fact that information related to these programs tells a totally different story. According Anti-Defamation League (1), a $ 2,500 voucher complementary may possibly make a difference for some families, providing them with just enough to cover the tuition fee at a private school. However, with a number of schools charging more than $ 10,000 annually, they will still be forced to pay several thousand dollars. As a result, the voucher system offers nothing of value to poor families. In my opinion however, the voucher system is a superficially benign way of increasing options for poor parents to educate their children. Whatever the case may be, the top priority for any government at the state, federal and local levels should be improving the system of educations and ensuring equal and better education opportunities for all .Government implementation of the voucher program is therefore a significant as well as an innovative idea towards rescuing children from the failing school systems, especially in troubled inner-city school districts. Another reason why the voucher system is good is based on the fact that it has provided a great push towards choice. Choice is a very positive factor especially in a democratic society like ours. In addition, it is essential to our democratic roots as it generates competition, creativity and high quality results. The implementation of the voucher system by the government is therefore beneficial as it enhances parents’ ability to go for schools that are most appropriate for their children (Coulson 1). In a typical voucher program, government would first hand over the vouchers to parents who then present them to whichever school they wanted their children to attend. Proponents believe school choice made possible through the school voucher legislation is capable of revitalizing America’s schools. According to Nasstrom (1), two unconnected but interdependent themes arouse school reform proponents’ interest in the voucher system. First; proponents think parents, not public administrators and politicians, should decide on schools their children attend. According to school voucher proponents, parents are best able to establish the educational needs of their own children. The second idea emanates from the freedom given to parents to decide on schools their children will go to. Competition among schools therefore enhances teaching effectiveness in addition to financial efficiency. School voucher proponents emphasize that public schools normally have an unfair price advantage as compared to private schools. The implementation of the school voucher programs would therefore level the education playing field by calling for private and public schools to survive entirely on school vouchers. When on equal footing, competition between public and private schools would set free markets forces hence better quality (Nasstrom 1) On the other hand, opponents of school vouchers argue that proponents of vouchers are only forcing Americans to do something different to the very principles upon which the country was founded. For this reason, school vouchers are constitutionally suspected. According Anti-Defamation League (1), Thomas Jefferson, one of the primer movers of religious freedom in America alleged that the idea of school vouchers is sinful and dictatorial as it compels citizens to give contributions of money for the proliferation of opinions which they are suspicious of. This therefore seems contrary to the arguments by school voucher proponents that they provide a great push towards choice, yet voucher programs force Christians, Muslims, Jews and even Atheists to pay for religious teaching of school children at schools with narrow parochial agendas. In most cases, 80% of vouchers would be used in schools whose major mission is religious training. In majority of such schools, religion saturates the classroom, lunchroom and even the football practice fields. Redirecting public money to private schools therefore flies in the face of the constitutional authorization of separation of church and state (Anti-Defamation League 1). In my opinion however, school vouchers are a good thing. Other than supplementing families with a given amount of money to put towards private school tuition, they provide a great push towards choice, implying that parents find schools that would provide first-rate education for their children. By providing a great push for choice, school voucher programs enhance competition between public and private schools, as a result, setting free markets forces for better quality education. Another reason in support of the fact that school vouchers are good is that they raise students’ academic achievement. According to the Economics Resource Centre (1), proponents of school vouchers have cited various studies hinting that low-income students enrolled in various private schools, achieve higher performance levels on standardized tests as compared to students with similar observed characteristics enrolled in public schools. They also contend that private schools cope with market pressures thus obliging them to utilize resources more efficiently than public schools. In addition, the fact that a large number of experiential studies reveal that students enrolled in private schools have higher educational achievement as compared to those in public schools is presented by school voucher proponents as clear evidence that school vouchers enhance student achievement for all (Rouse & Barrow 7).Rouse & Barrow (7) argue that public schools do not educate children well, as proved by stagnant scores in addition to poor performances in international comparisons. On the other hand opponents of school vouchers contend that they do not improve the quality of education as purported by their proponents. They argue that the higher level of education performance in many private schools is the result of a bias sample selection. They also argue that a large number of students in private schools tend to come from well-off families in which parents have higher levels of education achievement. Those who volunteered to take part in voucher programs, they argue, are not random students from the population. Instead; they are individuals who most likely come from families where parents place greater interest in academic achievement. This therefore makes comparison between private and public schools outcomes challenging. The bias sample selection argument insinuates that the poor academic performance in majority public schools is a result of the differences in ability as well as the family background factors rather than the results of lower education quality. A related argument also suggests that the alleged inefficiency of public schools is the outcome of a broader range of services needed to provide for their more diverse mix of students. In addition, according to Baxtrom (107), a number of experimental voucher programs introduced in the last decade have hinted little or no improvement in education quality as the result of voucher system. An example of such a program is the pilot program that began in 1990 in Milwaukee, Wisconsin. Initial analysis of the data hinted little or no improvement in education quality as the result of voucher system. The results, however, were rather controversial and are still a subject of a good deal of debate. However, in my opinion, school vouchers are without a doubt, more effective than public schools as their students are generally known to have higher levels of academic achievement levels than those enrolled in public schools. Moreover, private schools do better than public schools as their existence depends on providing a good product. The implementation of school vouchers is therefore good as they raise students’ academic achievement. Conclusion Basing on the above analysis, and in my opinion, school voucher programs are possibly the most effective way of helping low-income earning families become active consumers within the educational market place, enabling them to acquire control over their children’s education in addition to encouraging them to get more involved. Vouchers are therefore a viable solution towards enhancing the education level of America’s students. References Anti-Defamation League. School Vouchers: The Wrong Choice for Public Education, 2011, Pp1, Retrieved on May 7, 2011 from http://www.adl.org/religious_freedom/resource_kit/school_vouchers.asp Baxtrom, Wayne. America Hanging by a Thread, 2007, Pp107, Xulon Press. Coulson, Andrew. School Vouchers, Issues and Arguments, 1998, Pp1 Retrieved on May 7, 2011 from http://www.schoolchoices.org/roo/vouchers.htm Economics Resource Centre. Policy Debate: Do School Vouchers Improve the Quality of Education? 2009, Pp1, Retrieved on May 7, 2011 from http://www.swcollege.com/bef/policy_debates/vouchers.html Lester, Duane.U.S. Supreme Court Upholds School Vouchers, 2011, Pp1. Nasstrom, Eric. Casenote: School Vouchers in Minnesota: Confronting the Walls Separating Church and State, 1996, Pp1, Retrieved on May 7, 2011 from https://litigation-essentials.lexisnexis.com/webcd/app?action=DocumentDisplay&crawlid=1&doctype=cite&docid=22+Wm.+Mitchell+L.+Rev.+1065&srctype=smi&srcid=3B15&key=818570b450b0592dec1827b475fcd75b Rouse, Cecilia & Barrow, Lissa. School Vouchers and Student Achievement: Recent Evidence, Remaining Questions, 2008, Pp7-47. Teachnology.What Are School Vouchers? 2011, Pp1, Retrieved on May 7, 2011 from http://www.teach-nology.com/edleadership/school_vouchers/ Read More