November 20, 2014
George Will apparently has a hard time understanding why private schools that receive public school vouchers should have to meet the same requirements as public schools, specifically the requirement that they serve children with disabilities. He calls the requirement “bullying,” and its application to private schools “tortured logic.”
The story is actually a very simple one. Public schools have an obligation to provide an education for our children. That means all of our children, including those with disabilities. The argument made by advocates of vouchers is that the private schools can accomplish this task better. This is of course an arguable point, but the mission at hand is not arguable.
If the advocates of vouchers are saying that private schools can better educate children than public schools if they can dump the expense of educating children with disabilities on the public schools then whoop de doo! The private schools receiving the vouchers are supposed to be providing the same service as the public schools. If they are not open to the same group of students as the public schools, and have explicitly excluded those who are more expensive to educate, then they are not providing the same service. In that case, why should they get the voucher?
It’s really pretty simple, if you’re not George Will.
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