Unfinished Business

School Choice: Who Gets to Choose?

Photo by Stephen Harlan on Unsplash

I'm staring at a 14" x 17" file box stashed away in an upstairs closet. It's all that's left from my 9 years of serving as a school board member in Boone County. I tossed the 3-ring school policy binders and other ISBA materials long ago. After 18 years, maybe it's time to let go of a half-dozen folders filled with news clippings and other remnants of my volunteer service.

But there's no way that I can give up on my advocacy of the critically important role of education or the decades-old struggle of rural schools to survive--and thrive. That's why I oppose proposed Iowa legislation to create publicly funded vouchers or scholarships to subsidize private school students. It's a false "choice" in almost every sense of the word. As a board member from 1996-2005, I had a front row seat during the roll-out and early years of open enrollment.

I didn't realize it when I moved here in 1984, but my husband's friends and neighbors were editing their guest lists to avoid volatile combinations of individuals following the school board's recent vote to close the Pilot Mound High School and tuition high school students to a neighboring district. The closure was a financial, but emotionally charged, decision.

Education is an issue close to my heart. In fact, I taught for a year in Nebraska before returning to graduate school in journalism at the University of Missouri-Columbia. In 1986, I wrote a story for Successful Farming titled, "When local schools aren't good enough."

I featured a southern Iowa family who had been rotating their residence from their family farmhouse to a trailer located eight miles down the road so they could live within the boundaries of a neighboring school district. Their concern was educational quality. I also wrote about how 11 Lakota students won an appeal to Iowa's State Board of Public Instruction in 1985, requiring the Lakota School to pay the students' tuition to attend another school.

I could understand parents who wanted the best possible education for their children. I also interviewed families on opposing sides of the fence, who argued that their children who were left behind would suffer the consequences of their neighbor's choice to open-enroll.

---

---

At that time, small rural schools were the target of most of this controversy. The farm crisis of the 1980s had accelerated a steady downward trend in student enrollment, and property tax funding was in jeopardy. As open enrollment became increasingly more common, I began to see the growing repercussions on Iowa's rural schools and communities.

Fast forward to 1996. My husband and I had two children, and I was asked to run for an open seat on the schoolboard. I was naive about what might lie down the road, but I was elected.

Before long, I discovered that most parents who wanted to open enroll their children from our school were doing so to achieve greater convenience, or proximity to their employment. The farm crisis had shuttered rural businesses and manufacturing, so parents had longer work commutes. They wanted their kids to attend school close to their jobs. Educational quality wasn't the driving issue for open enrollment in our community.

My husband and I are graduates of public schools. We sent our children to public schools in four different towns over the years, as our school district switched sharing agreements with neighboring schools and reorganized twice with other districts. Living in a rural area, we had little choice to enroll in a charter school, use vouchers, or attend private schools. The two private religious elementary schools in Boone (18 miles one way) weren’t a feasible “choice” for us. They're still not a feasible option for most Boone County residents today.

Nevertheless, I felt that we had plenty of other choices to enhance our children's education. When our older daughter was in grade school, she participated in the Talented and Gifted (TAG) program. As a high schooler, she was permitted to enroll in an in-person Iowa State University class, and she also completed an online accredited class. Fast forward a few years, and our younger daughter attended school under a different sharing agreement. She and her classmates were encouraged to earn dual credits at Iowa Central Community College in Ft. Dodge during her last two years of high school. As a result, she graduated from college in three years because she had completed so many college credits while in high school.

Our children received excellent educations in their small rural public schools. Both earned master’s degrees in their chosen fields. With help from our Area Education Agency (AEA), our public-school students received Individualized Education Plans (IEPs) and students with very severe disabilities were fully accommodated. Some of our neighbors exercised their choice to home school their children.

But Iowa's open enrollment option still didn't satisfy legislators last year, so they re-wrote it to expand parental rights so that students weren't required to file by March 1 to open enroll the following year. As a former board member, I know the hardship that this imposes on schools that need to finalize their funding and hiring for the next year, based on enrollment numbers. This expanded open enrollment interjects even more unpredictability into school funding and staffing decisions.

Public schools underpin democracy

Public schools are the backbone of our democracy. They're the best avenue to provide equal opportunity to all children, no matter their ethnic background, or income level, to climb the economic ladder. As economic inequality has increased, the role of public schools is more critical than ever. They lay the foundation for fostering tolerance and understanding of individuals who are different from the majority.

I've been alarmed over the past 13 years to see deliberate efforts by the Iowa legislature to under fund public schools and withhold adequate resources. In her new 501(c)(4)-funded TV commercial, the Governor brags about how the state's public-school funding has increased by almost one billion in the past 10 years. Yet the annual percentage increases in Supplemental State Aid have averaged a miserly 2% -- well below the rising costs of inflation.

If passed, SSB1022 and HSB1 would be the crowning blow. Most private schools are not accountable to taxpayers, and aren’t held to the same standards, regarding special education needs, English as a Second Language programs and the rights of LGBTQ students. Private schools will be able to exercise their "choice" to accept students. Public schools would continue to pick up the slack to educate all students--with less funding. Why doesn't this raise questions under the equal protection clause?

Trying to erode public schools by siphoning funds into the private sector is a shameful effort to trash our state's proud tradition of public education, in favor of the private sector.

As farmers and property owners, my husband and I strongly object to this taxpayer-funded private tuition money grab. Public money belongs in public schools—it’s wrong for Iowa, and a betrayal of the trust we place in government to use our taxpayer funds for a public purpose, or the common good.

Message received: "I don't care."

A total of 41 Iowa counties do not have any private schools, according to Common Good Iowa. As a rural Iowan, this legislation sends the message loud and clear: "We don't care if you residents in rural counties don't benefit from this plan, or perhaps, even are hurt by it." It reveals the Governor's blatant disregard for the welfare of students and families living in these 41 rural counties. Allowing public schools to retain $1,200 out of the state's $7,598 per pupil allotment hardly amounts to fair compensation.

Furthermore, $7,598 is not enough to foot the bill for a year of tuition and fees at most private schools. Less wealthy families still will not be able afford it. By the fall of 2025, the Governor's plan opens these scholarships to all families regardless of income. This includes currently enrolled students, whose parents already are finding ways to pay the full freight on their own.

New funding would cover the Educational Saving Accounts (vouchers) in the first year, but in following years, the funds would be redirected from public school districts as students opt into private schools.

I oppose the Governor's push for an even more fundamental reason: the separation of church and state. I have no objection to families sending their children to a church affiliated school. But they should pay for it. How can it be legal to use public money to pay for students to attend schools that are free to discriminate regarding student admission? What about the establishment clause in the First Amendment of our Constitution? From my perspective, if you want to instill your child with a religious education, take them to church or Sunday School weekly, and as parents, reinforce these teachings at home. Not at school.

Just what is conservative about this legislation?

Looming like a thundercloud above our capitol's Golden Dome is the question: Where did this idea of subsidizing private schools originate? Surely, it's being pushed by out-of-state special interest groups? Indiana has implemented an expansive school voucher program. Are our legislators taking the time to study its impact on public education? From what I can find out, it increasingly has benefitted white, higher-income students already enrolled at private schools, and at the same time, diverted funds from public schools. Taking cookie-cutter policies, and cramming them down the throats of the majority of Iowans who never asked for them isn't the Iowa way.

I've written my House and Senate state legislators, telling them that I oppose this ill-conceived plan. Rep. Phil Thompson has not responded. I'm horrified by the efforts of House GOP leaders to bypass an assessment of its financial impact by the budget committee. Just what is conservative about its price tag?

In her re-election campaign, Governor Reynolds made it clear that educational "choice" would be her priority again. In fact, she aggressively targeted incumbent Republican House members who had opposed her earlier efforts. Some were defeated.

Most of the 41 counties left high and dry by this school voucher scheme likely voted overwhelmingly for Gov. Reynolds. I don't believe that they agreed with her on this issue. But they voted for her anyway.

Were they counting on their Iowa House representatives to have the courage and integrity to vote down this legislation? If so, we'll find out before long whether their confidence was well-placed. Rural Iowans will be living with the repercussions of their vote for decades to come.

I’m delighted to be part of the Iowa Writers’ Collaborative.

Iowa Writers’ Collaborative Columnists 

Laura Belin: Iowa Politics with Laura Belin, Windsor Heights

Doug Burns: The Iowa Mercury, Carroll

Dave Busiek: Dave Busiek on Media, Des Moines

Art Cullen: Art Cullen’s Notebook, Storm Lake

Suzanna de Baca Dispatches from the Heartland, Huxley

Debra Engle: A Whole New World, Madison County

Julie Gammack: Julie Gammack’s Iowa Potluck, Des Moines and Okoboji

Joe Geha: Fern and Joe, Ames

Jody Gifford: Benign Inspiration, West Des Moines

Beth Hoffman: In the Dirt, Lovilla

Dana James: New Black Iowa, Des Moines

Pat Kinney: View from Cedar Valley, Waterloo

Fern Kupfer: Fern and Joe, Ames

Robert Leonard: Deep Midwest: Politics and Culture, Bussey

Tar Macias: Hola Iowa, Iowa

Kurt Meyer, Showing Up, St. Ansgar

Kyle Munson, Kyle Munson’s Main Street, Des Moines

Jane Nguyen, The Asian Iowan, West Des Moines

John Naughton: My Life, in Color, Des Moines

Chuck Offenburger: Iowa Boy Chuck Offenburger, Jefferson and Des Moines

Barry Piatt: Piatt on Politic Behind the Curtain, Washington, D.C.

Mary Swander: Mary Swander’s Buggy Land, Kalona

Mary Swander: Mary Swander’s Emerging Voices, Kalona

Cheryl Tevis: Unfinished Business, Boone County

Ed Tibbetts: Along the Mississippi, Davenport

Teresa Zilk: Talking Good, Des Moines

To receive a weekly roundup of all Iowa Writers’ Collaborative columnists, sign up here (free): ROUNDUP COLUMN

We are proud to have an alliance with Iowa Capital Dispatch.

.