You might not think the House Republican Caucus of the Tennessee General Assembly is a hotbed of socialism, but Rep. Bill Dunn clearly does. In his opening remarks in support of HB939 — Governor Lee’s school voucher proposal — Dunn likened opponents of the plan to socialists.
Here’s more from the Nashville Scene on Dunn’s remarks:
Despite the bipartisan nature of the opposition, the bill’s sponsor, Republican Rep. Bill Dunn of Knoxville, was quick to inject partisan politics into the debate. In an opening statement, he said Donald Trump and Mike Pence support ESAs while “Hillary Clinton, Elizabeth Warren, Bernie Sanders and other socialists” oppose it. Later, he compared education savings accounts to the fall of the Berlin Wall.
Dunn’s remarks are noteworthy as four of the nine “no” votes on the bill came from his fellow Republicans. Additionally, one other Republican, Kirk Haston, was “present but not voting” and noted he’s not in favor of the bill.
That makes five potential socialists in the GOP caucus. Further expanding on Dunn’s remarks, perhaps Elizabeth Warren or Bernie Sanders could find support among the Republican members of the House Education Committee? One also wonders if their are more socialists hiding in the midst of the TNGOP. It’s a perfect cover, really.
For more on all the excitement that was Wednesday’s committee hearing on vouchers, check out TN Holler for video clips.
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The Tennessee Council for Exceptional Children (CEC) has announced opposition to school vouchers even as the legislative debate on the issue moves forward. Here’s a general statement from CEC on vouchers and an explanation of the reasons for CEC’s opposition.
CEC opposes school vouchers for children and youth and those with disabilities as being contrary to the best interests of children and youth and their families, the public school system, local communities, and taxpayers. Further, CEC believes that vouchers both contradict and undermine central purposes of civil rights laws designed to protect children and youth with disabilities
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Admitted sex offender David Byrd is out as chair of a House Education subcommittee just one day after his vote against Governor Bill Lee’s school voucher plan. While some had speculated Byrd might vote in favor of vouchers in exchange for cover from Lee, Byrd voted NO on Lee’s plan yesterday in the full House Education Committee.
The move to oust Byrd comes after months of controversy surrounding his appointment to the post. Speaker Glen Casada and Governor Bill Lee backed Byrd despite calls from the public for him to resign. In 2018, both Lt. Governor Randy McNally and then-House Speaker Beth Harwell called on Byrd to resign from the General Assembly. Instead, he ran for re-election and won, then was appointed by Casada to a subcommittee chairmanship.
Citing bipartisan concerns over the controversy surrounding Rep. David Byrd, House Speaker Glen Casada has removed the Waynesboro Republican from his chairmanship of an education subcommittee.
The move, announced by Casada on Thursday, comes just two months after the speaker appointed Byrd — who has faced allegations that he sexually assaulted three women in the 1980s — to serve as chairman of the House Education Administration Subcommittee.
“Following discussions with members of the House and after careful consideration, I have formally asked Representative Byrd to step down from his position as chairman of the House Education Administration Subcommittee,” the speaker said in a statement.
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Governor Bill Lee is pushing aggressively to privatize Tennessee schools — both by creating a new, unaccountable voucher scheme and by expanding the reach of charter schools in our state.
This story out of California should give policymakers pause as they explore the possibility of more charter schools across the state, even in districts where the local school board is not consulted.
Here’s a quick summary:
“The warning signs appeared soon after Denise Kawamoto accepted a job at Today’s Fresh Start Charter School in South Los Angeles. Though she was fresh out of college, she was pretty sure it wasn’t normal for the school to churn so quickly through teachers or to mount surveillance cameras in each classroom. Old computers were lying around, but the campus had no internet access. Pay was low and supplies scarce — she wasn’t given books for her students. She struggled to reconcile the school’s conditions with what little she knew about its wealthy founders, Clark and Jeanette Parker of Beverly Hills. The Parkers have cast themselves as selfless philanthropists, telling the California Board of Education that they have ‘devoted all of our lives to the education of other people’s children, committed many millions of our own dollars directly to that particular purpose, with no gain directly to us.’ But the couple have, in fact, made millions from their charter schools. Financial records show the Parkers’ schools have paid more than $800,000 annually to rent buildings the couple own. The charters have contracted out services to the Parkers’ nonprofits and companies and paid Clark Parker generous consulting fees, all with taxpayer money, a Times investigation found. How the Parkers have stayed in business, surviving years of allegations of financial and academic wrongdoing, illustrates glaring flaws in the way California oversees its growing number of charter schools. Many of the people responsible for regulating the couple’s schools, including school board members and state elected officials, had accepted thousands of dollars from the Parkers in campaign contributions.”
This is exactly the type of abuse of the system that could be on the way to the Volunteer State if Lee’s proposals become law. Key votes are coming in the next few weeks. Stay tuned …
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Governor Bill Lee is moving to create a state charter school authorizer that would usurp the authority of local school boards. The plan would allow charter operators to apply directly to the state board rather than utilizing the local and state accountability measures currently in place in Tennessee.
The idea is strikingly similar to the state authorizer that helped start charter schools in Arizona in the 1990s. I’ve included some excerpts of the Arizona Republic’sreporting on charter schools in that state. The state authorizer has proven to be an avenue for shady operators to gain access to public funds for nefarious purposes. Perhaps the same fate awaits Tennessee should lawmakers travel down this road.
The board was given conflicting responsibilities: Not only would it oversee the new schools, it would also promote them.
Early Fraud:
Citizen 2000 was one of Arizona’s original 46 charter schools. Its founder and operator, Lawndia White Venerable, claimed that almost 500 students had signed up. It looked like an early success story for a charter that was on its way to becoming a longstanding institution.
A few months into the school’s first year, state officials opened an investigation into the school. A state audit said Venerable had used more than $126,000 in state money to buy jewelry and to make a down payment on her mother’s house. The state Board of Education review found the school violated record-keeping, cash-control and bidding rules. Its enrollment figures had been inflated.
When you combine his desire for a state charter authorizer with his push for vouchers, it seems clear Bill Lee is working overtime to undermine Tennessee public schools.
The Tennessee General Assembly can, of course, oppose these privatization efforts. Key votes are happening on both fronts in the coming days. Stay tuned …
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Despite dressing up in farmer clothes and standing next to actual farm equipment every Saturday, Bill Lee still hasn’t been able to overcome significant skepticism about his scheme to use public funds to pay for private schools — a plan he’s calling “Education Savings Accounts.”
Erik Schelzig of Tennessee Journal has more on Lee’s bafflement over school voucher messaging gone awry:
But a lot of the confusion about the proposal comes from members of Lee’s own party. For example, freshman Rep. Robin Smith (R-Hixson) took to twitter to declare a news account a “pure lie” for stating the education savings account, or ESA, program would also apply to students who don’t currently attend failing schools. It would.
Fellow freshman Rep. Scott Cepicky (R-Columbia), a member of the House Education Committee scheduled to vote on the bill this week, said in a Facebook post that “because of the risk of fraud, as seen in other states with Educational Savings Accounts, homeschooling is not allowed in this bill.”
That’s in contrast to what Lee said last week when reporters asked him whether home-schooling would qualify for the ESAs. “If a family is in the district that qualifies, and they are currently in a public school, then they would qualify for an ESA,” Lee said.
Here are some important facts about Governor Lee’s voucher people from the Tennessee School Boards Association – a group that has actually read the bill. It’s not yet clear whether Lee has, in fact, read his own bill or even if members of his own party are reading actual legislation, or just spouting off talking points in order to confuse the issue.
What is clear: Bill Lee and his “team” aren’t quite on the same page. Of course, it may not matter, as they seem to have some tricks up their sleeves.
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Bill Lee has had his eye on the privatizing of Tennessee public schools long before he became Governor. However, when he announced his “Education Savings Account” plan along with a state charter authorizer that would undermine local school boards, many predicted he’d face some difficulty this legislative session. Turns out, Lee may have a Byrd in the hand by way of a clever move to gain a vote for his ill-designed plan.
Recently, Governor Lee met with one of the women who has accused state representative David Byrd of inappropriate sexual conduct when he was her high school basketball coach. Byrd apologized directly and has not denied the conduct. Lee refused to condemn Byrd or suggest he resign. This despite former House Speaker Beth Harwell calling on Byrd to resign and current Lt. Governor Randy McNally have called for Byrd’s resignation in 2018 and more recently, suggesting an ethics investigation might be in order.
Why is Bill Lee reluctant to make a strong statement on Byrd? Well, Erik Schelzig of Tennessee Journal may have the answer:
The charter authorizer bill advanced out of that committee on a 13-9 vote, but only after House Speaker Glen Casada (R-Franklin) came to the panel to personally intervene. Casada was able to get several freshman Republican who voiced concerns about the measure to get on board.
The bill also got the support of embattled Rep. David Byrd (R-Waynesboro), whom school choice advocates have tried for years to to defeat because of his support for traditional public schools.
By all accounts, Lee is working overtime to get the votes he needs to pass his voucher plan. With Byrd’s support, Lee may be able to move the plan one step closer to final passage. Some have suggested Lee won’t criticize Byrd as long as Byrd goes along with a plan to devastate the state’s public school systems.
The next vote on vouchers is Wednesday at 8:00 AM in the full House Education Committee. David Byrd sits on that committee and his vote could be pivotal. Does Bill Lee really have a Byrd in the hand?
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What happens when legislators stand up for their local public schools and also support accountability in charter schools?
They get attacked as tools of “Hillary Clinton’s NEA.”
That’s exactly what happened when two Republican lawmakers opposed Governor Bill Lee’s proposal to allow charter schools to circumvent local school boards.
Supposedly non-partisan group Tennesseans for Student Success immediately went on the attack against Mark Cochran and Chris Hurt.
Apparently, being for student success also means being ok with outright lies and deliberate deception in order to advance an agenda detrimental to the actual success of our state’s public schools.
Here are those ads:
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As Governor Lee’s school voucher proposal begins its legislative journey today, the Tennessee School Boards Association (TSBA) is out with some key facts about the bill as it is currently constructed. These facts expose the plan for what it is: A large scale transfer of public money to fund unaccountable private schools. The plan fails to significantly address fraud and fails to hold schools receiving taxpayer dollars to the same standard as our state’s traditional public schools must meet.
Here’s more from TSBA:
EDUCATION SAVINGS ACCOUNTS (ESA)
This week, the the Administration filed Amendment 005240 to HB939/SB795 by Lamberth/Johnson, a caption bill, which is the Governor’s Education Savings Accounts (ESA) proposal. Click here to view the Amendment. There has been much speculation and reporting over the last several weeks about the details of the bill and we finally have the specific language. Some noteworthy provisions of the ESA bill are as follows:
Accountability. The accountability of participating ESA providers was a point of emphasis for many legislators. The Governor’s proposal only requires the ESA student to participate in annually administered TCAP tests for math and English language arts. There is no requirement for standardized or end-of-course testing in science, social studies, the Governor’s civics program, or the ACT, which is required in 11th grade. Public dollars will pay for education that is inconsistent with what the General Assembly has mandated of public schools. Recent emphasis on accountability has made Tennessee one of the fastest improving states in education. This ESA proposal abandons those efforts.
Zoning. An eligible student must be zoned to attend an LEA with 3 or more schools among the bottom 10%. However, there is no requisite time period for the student to have been zoned in that LEA. It appears a student could move to a qualifying LEA and immediately be eligible for the ESA program.
Postsecondary Funding. The bill defines a “legacy student” as a student who had graduated high school and has funds remaining in their ESA account. A legacy student can utilize the remaining funds for approved postsecondary expenses. This may create an unintended incentive for participants to minimize early education costs in order to save the funds for college.
Approved Expenses. Among the approved expenditures for ESA funds are contributions to a § 529 college savings educational investment trust account. However, there is nothing in the bill that requires the student/parent to actually use the fund for college or that prohibits withdrawal from the college savings account. In theory, a parent could apply all ESA funds from K-12 (approximately $100,000) to a § 529 account, then decide not use the funds for college and pocket the money, subject to withdrawal penalties.
Return to the LEA. A participating student may return to the LEA at any time, at which point, the ESA would be closed and any remaining funds returned to the state. However, there is no requirement that any balance remain in the ESA at the time of return. An ESA participant could use all disbursements up to that point (e.g. approved computer hardware or other technological devices) and return to the LEA without penalty, at which point the LEA bears the entire financial burden of educating the child for the remainder of the school year.
Enrollment Limit. Enrollment is capped at 5,000 in the first year, but will triple to 15,000 by the fifth year and grow by 1,000 each year thereafter, assuming sufficient applications are submitted. The Governor plans to budget $25 million in each of the next three years to fund the anticipated first year of implementation in 2021-2022. It is difficult to image how this ESA program with a maximum enrollment could be funded in five years without significantly reducing the funds available for public education.
LEA Reimbursement. The Governor’s proposal was reported to include a reimbursement model to compensate LEAs for loss of funds associated with ESAs. While the bill creates an annual grant to reimburse LEAs in the amount of BEP funds diverted to ESAs, it limits the reimbursement period to 3 years and restricts the use to school improvements. Following that 3 year period, the grant funding will go exclusively to priority schools. This begs the question, how are LEAs supposed to compensate for the loss of funding due to ESAs? There is no indication that any funding will be provided for the loss after year 3 of the program.
Fraud Prevention. Other states with ESA programs have experienced rampant fraud. Some states only provide funds on a reimbursement basis after receipts are provided. The Governor’s proposal, on the other hand, requires the department to fund the ESA account at least quarterly and not on a reimbursement basis. The Department of Education is required to establish a fraud reporting service and may contract or conduct random, quarterly or annual review of accounts, but it is unclear exactly what monitoring and auditing procedures will ensure appropriate use of ESA funds.
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As Governor Bill Lee’s voucher legislation begins the legislative process this week with a hearing in a House Education subcommittee, this information from Indiana offers a word of caution. The voucher program in Indiana expanded rapidly and now results in a $154 million decrease in state funds available for public schools.
Executive Summary Growth in Indiana’s budget for public school personnel has not kept up with growth in its general fund or even inflation. Specifically, the current budget for public school personnel is almost $300M behind the 2009-10 budget when inflation is taken into account.
Vouchers are also funded from the budget for public school personnel. In 2018-2019, over $150M of this budget was utilized to fund Vouchers — with very little accountability.
The girls and boys attending Indiana’s public schools are currently educated utilizing a budget that is lagging by $450M.
Indiana’s General Fund (i.e., monies legislators control)
The Consumer Price Index (inflation rate) has grown by 16.71% The Indiana General Fund has grown by 20.96% K-12 Tuition Support Budget has grown by only 12.12% Tuition Support funds nearly all personnel working in public schools Considering inflation, but momentarily ignoring the impact of Vouchers, the Tuition Support Budget is $295,031,840 behind 2010 funding for the current school year
How Vouchers Work
Depending on family income, a qualifying child can receive a Voucher worth up to 90% of their local public school’s per student funding Nearly 60% of voucher recipients have never attended a public school, but are now an additional cost taken from the Tuition Support Budget Of the remaining 40%, the majority attended public schools for only one year before the Voucher program, but not the same year The average public school student receives a little less than $6000, the average Voucher student receives $4258 The Voucher money is not taken from the local school, it is taken out of the Tuition Support Budget, (there is not a simple transfer of funds between the two schools) thereby decreasing the dollars for all public schools
Number of students’ educations funded by the tuition support budget
Public school enrollment during 2009-2019 is volatile, ranging from an increase of 3523 students in 2017-18 to a decrease of 4877 students in 2011-12 From 2010 to 2017, the US Census Bureau projects Indiana has lost 20,806 school-aged children. In that same period of time Indiana’s public and charter schools’ enrollment has only dropped by 6,158 from 1,036,839 students to 1,030,681 students. There were 36,328 voucher requests in 2018-19 The 36,328 vouchers in 2018-19 result in a 3.41% increase in students to be funded this year
Impact on the amount of money allocated per student by Indiana
The Voucher Program decreases funding for all public school students In 2009-10, the Tuition Support Budget allocation divided by enrolled public school students was $6,192 In 2018-19, the Tuition Support Budget allocation divided by only the enrolled public school students would be $6998, which is a 13% increase from 2009-10. However, the addition of Voucher students cut the average to $6,826 – only a 10.25% increase while the rate of inflation was 16.71% This results in approximately $154 million taxpayer dollars spent to fund vouchers that could have been utilized for the benefit of girls and boys attending public school
Fiduciary Oversight
There is no fiduciary oversight by the state of the Voucher money There are no requirements that keep Voucher taxpayer dollars from being used to enable the receiving organization to redirect its existing money for non-education purposes
Not only are vouchers costing Indiana taxpayers a lot of money, they simply aren’t getting results for kids.
Tennessee lawmakers would be wise to look at the impact of vouchers in other states. They’ll see a very expensive program that doesn’t get results.
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