Houston Teacher Certification Scandal

Yes, I get that.

Very likely you’ll get some more terrible private schools open to take advantage of the vouchers too.

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I think the advent and history of charter schools in Texas can offer a glimpse of that. Some have been really good, and some were criminally bad. A big difference is that there are still state and local guardrails operating for charter schools that private schools don’t have, so there would almost certainly be more varied results among these newly-funded private schools.

Exhibit 1
One of the best schools

Exhibit 2
Rich and Famous

3 is the charm

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Why are you assuming they would fail?

You seriously think it only happens at private school? lol. Every week there seems to be a teacher getting caught. Mostly public schools.

Because they’re barely hanging on now, and losing funding would be a kill shot. It’s not an assumption - it’s a fact.

So small districts are just chock full of private alternatives? Doubt it. No one is going to open a private school if there aren’t enough kids to support it. Small districts are safe.

Nope. If they were safe, their Republican representatives wouldn’t be bucking the governor. C’mon.

Texas has a limited amount of money that will fund public schools. Vouchers will only reduce what goes to public schools from the public’s money (which is problematic in itself). And even though there may not be “private” options available now, you know that they’ll pop up out in the boonies when there’s money to be made. There will always be a few parents in these schools who aren’t happy about something and/or like the “prestige” of sending their kids to private school that will funnel off some percentage of students. In schools that have less than 100 kids in high school, even losing 5-10 could crush them, especially if the remaining students have some type of special needs or are low-income.

Another thing about this that is troublesome in any district is that it would create a subculture that has a vote on school bonds and board elections, but they’ve opted out of the public schools. In my opinion, these folks shouldn’t be allowed to vote in those elections because they’ve removed themselves from the process. Letting them vote makes it even more difficult to pass bonds and it allows for non-representative school board members to be elected. If you’re going to have them vote in these elections, then you should allow everyone to vote whether their tax dollars can be spent on vouchers.

Look at the fraud and wasted taxpayer money that has resulted in Arizona’s program like this (Florida, too). Also consider that there’s no way to determine if these programs actually raise the level of education in the state, as privates aren’t required to administer the standardized tests that the state requires of public schools.

The bottom line is that this isn’t a movement rooted in improving student’s educations or raising competency levels. It’s driven by wealthy special interests that are looking for ways to get their hands on public funds and marginalize those who can’t pay the freight by reducing their access to resources.

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I am pretty sure I am more familiar with educator misconduct (public or private) than anyone you ever met or will meet. As a matter of fact, I know more about educator misconduct than everyone you ever met or will meet combined.

I will go even further if you ever read a case about misconduct from my city in any news article there is about a 99.9% possibility that the accused has my direct phone number and has already spoken with me.

And always remember in these articles people are innocent until proven guilty in a court of law.

My original point was about credentials and typically public school teachers have more educational credentials than the vast majority of private school teachers.

Across the nation the majority of public school teachers are much higher paid then privates. They are usually much younger as well.

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So what’s the percentage of misconduct between private and public? Since you’re the expert. You make it sound like privates are the only wrong doers and the hire only non qualified teachers. You know to make vouchers look bad.

Charters are the issue - y’all forgot about them

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I never said that private school teachers were not “qualified”, I said that they were not “certified”.

My main point, it is much easier to teach to a class of 8-10, as opposed to a class of 25-30.

Also in privates most of the kids are relatively on the same level of readiness and intelligence. Yes, there are always the A students and the D- students but for the most part, private school students do not have to deal with a great amount of differentiation and don’t have to deal with a great amount of discipline.

Probably because most private school kids come from relatively the same socioeconomic status?

Actually I’m not so sure about that.

Check out the demographics at Cristo Rey Jesuit
and then compare that to the demographics at St. John’s.

You might find a pretty stark contrast.

Private schools can vary widely in that regard. I venture to say that while those are both private schools
the students at those schools are going to come from quite different socioeconomic backgrounds.

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