Louisiana Aims To Privatize Its Entire Education System

From LezGetREal: Louisiana Aims To Privatize Its Entire Education System

In the novel Going Postal, Terry Pratchett makes the real point about the privatization of the government. The character of Lord Havelock Vetinari, in a discussion about the Royal Post Office, states ‘Unfortunately the Post Office came to be seen not as a system for moving the mail efficiently, to the benefit and profit of all, but as a money box. And so it collapsed, losing both mail and money.’

This is what the government has become to so many Republicans- a money box. Money is going to benefit businesses and such and not benefitting the taxpayers in the form of protections, education, proper incarceration and so forth. What is more, often times, these private enterprises actually end up sapping money from the government as the bidding is usually done lower than the actual cost will be or the private businesses will do things like charge the government far more than the items are worth.

The Huffington Post has reported that Louisiana is all but going to privatize their educational system. They report that:

Louisiana is embarking on the nation’s boldest experiment in privatizing public education, with the state preparing to shift tens of millions in tax dollars out of the public schools to pay private industry, businesses owners and church pastors to educate children.

Starting this fall, thousands of poor and middle-class kids will get vouchers covering the full cost of tuition at more than 120 private schools across Louisiana, including small, Bible-based church schools.

They also noted that:

Yet at some private schools with low tuition, administrators contacted by Reuters said they would also ask the state to cover additional, unspecified fees, which would bring the cost to taxpayers close to the $8,800 cap. The law requires the state to cover both tuition and fees.

May of the schools that are setting up to rake in the government cash want desperately to push their own agendas. The HuffPo noted:

At Eternity Christian Academy in Westlake, pastor-turned-principal Marie Carrier hopes to secure extra space to enroll 135 voucher students, though she now has room for just a few dozen. Her first- through eighth-grade students sit in cubicles for much of the day and move at their own pace through Christian workbooks, such as a beginning science text that explains “what God made” on each of the six days of creation. They are not exposed to the theory of evolution.

“We try to stay away from all those things that might confuse our children,” Carrier said.

Other schools approved for state-funded vouchers use social studies texts warning that liberals threaten global prosperity; Bible-based math books that don’t cover modern concepts such as set theory; and biology texts built around refuting evolution.

In other words, many of these schools will not prepare these children for college all the while draining the state of much needed monies. Oh, and let us not forget just how dangerous these schools can be for LGBT youths. While education can be done better in this nation, the fact that they aren’t willing to put things in to actually improve education including things like ability grouping and telling parents that, quite frankly, it isn’t the school’s job to make sure that their kid’s self esteem is raises through falsified means, they aren’t being implemented at all.

Smaller class sizes, better teacher pay, and so forth would also help a lot. Welcome to the worst education that money can buy.