Oklahoman: Voters Want Reform, Accountability In OK Education

In opposing education choice, Oklahoma lawmakers run counter to constitutents’ wishes
by The Oklahoman Editorial Board

MANY Republican lawmakers in the 2014 legislative session opposed efforts to increase educational opportunities for students. In doing so, those lawmakers voted against the wishes of their constituents.

A new poll of Oklahoma Republican primary voters, commissioned by the Oklahoma Federation for Children, shows overwhelming support for education savings accounts (ESAs), charter schools in rural communities, taxpayer scholarships for children with special needs to attend private schools, and tax breaks supporting scholarship programs that help needy children attend private schools.

While the latter two proposals are currently state law, the first two items were rejected by Republican lawmakers this year. Scott Jensen, government affairs senior advisor for the American Federation of Children, said the poll shows Oklahoma Republican voters “are ahead of many of the people they have elected to the Legislature.”

Indeed. This year in committee, seven House Republicans helped kill legislation to authorize ESAs. The bill would have provided students a portion of the state aid dedicated to their schooling to use for tutoring, virtual school, higher education courses or private school. The legislation was limited to low-income students attending “priority schools” (the worst-performing sites). Only low-income students attending 179 schools out of 1,744 statewide would have qualified for an ESA.

Yet even this modest proposal was too much educational freedom for some Republicans. In contrast, the federation’s polling found 64 percent of Republican primary voters support ESAs.

In similar fashion, lawmakers killed a bill to give rural students the same access to public charter schools that urban students enjoy. Half of House Republicans voted against rural education choice. Yet 82 percent of Republican primary voters think rural children should have charter school options.

Jensen said the polling disproves the myth of rural Republican opposition to school choice. Instead, polling showed 83 percent of rural Republicans favor educational choice, 78 percent support charter schools, 76 percent support the state’s Equal Opportunity Scholarship Tax Credit Program, and 78 percent support the scholarship program for students with special needs.

Critics of education choice will no doubt claim the recent GOP primary for state schools superintendent undermines the federation’s polling. The GOP nominee, Joy Hofmeister, has been cool to school choice and supported efforts to gut the special-needs scholarship program. But Jenson notes Hofmeister “didn’t run on those things,” instead focusing on personality and her opposition to Common Core academic standards.

To help elect lawmakers who actually represent their constituents, the federation was involved in four primary elections in June. It will support candidates in several more legislative races in August and November. At the same time, Jenson said his group is working to “build an army of moms” in Oklahoma to lobby for greater educational opportunity, countering well-heeled status-quo forces.

Jenson notes Oklahomans are used to having many consumer choices in their daily lives. They see no reason why a one-size-fits-all, government-mandated option should be their only choice when it comes to education.

He’s right. Republicans who espouse a “Big Government knows best” philosophy for education are doing so at their peril.