Huge Arizona school voucher plan in effect after foes fail

[Yo_Mama_Been_Loggin]

Source: LA Times

All Arizona parents now can use state tax money to send their children to private or religious schools or pay homeschooling costs after an effort by public school advocates to block a massive expansion of the state's private school voucher law failed to collect enough signatures to block it.

Arizona Secretary of State Katie Hobbs announced Friday that her office's review of signatures turned in a week ago to refer the expansion to the ballot came up short of the nearly 119,000 that were needed. Hobbs is a Democrat running for governor who opposed the plan.

Republican Gov. Doug Ducey championed the plan and signed it into law in July. He celebrated on Twitter, saying, “Let's Roll!” and “Parents Prevail.”

Arizona now has the nation's most expansive private school voucher law. It allows parents of the more than 1.2 million school-age children to get 90% of the state money that would normally go to their local public school and use it for private or other school costs. That amounts to about $7,000 for a non-disabled student.

Read more: https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/politics/huge-arizona-school-voucher-plan-in-effect-after-foes-fail/ar-AA12s6Ro

[bucolic_frolic]

1. Will the kids be able to read, write, and use logic? Or only just "believe" in everything?

We spend more money and only produce the dumbest kids ever.

[Mr.Bill]

2. Gee, I can't wait to see

what pops up and calls itself a school.

[Archae]

17. I know, so many "charter" schools fail, and the people running it take off with the money.

Students and teachers are left in the lurch with no where to turn.

https://www.populardemocracy.org/news-and-publications/charter-school-vulnerabilities-waste-fraud-and-abuse

[Evolve Dammit]

3. Fascism is here in AZ, as stated previously by AZ former party leaders. Bye to public ed.

[Loki Liesmith]

20. Why are voucher-based school choice programs fascist?

I don’t think they are a good idea but I don’t think they are fascist.

[former9thward]

22. Some are calling anything they don't like "fascist".

Soon the word will have no meaning if that has not happened already.

[certainot]

30. it's a talk radio state, with the anti immigration racism on those stations playing a big part

get AZ state to drop the ex-limbaugh station it broadcasts sports on and a lot of those stations will start losing advertisers

[Evolve Dammit]

32. Damage done. They have been indoctrinated.

[certainot]

34. one way to fix some of it might be to expose/investigate how much putin used it/limbaugh

[Evolve Dammit]

35. I've always wondered why it was all "un-checked" for 40 years. Very strange IMHO

[Lonestarblue]

4. One more nail in the coffin of public schooling.

The goal is extremist Christian schools only, funded by taxpayers. Within a couple decades of that, we’ll be Afghanistan for all women—no education needed when all you’re allowed to do is be raped and make babies.

[certainot]

29. 30 years of ignoring 1500 radio stations manned by a few hundred coordinated dropouts yelling

to defund it because education and teachers suck - what else was supposed to happen?

ironically, hundreds of those stations depend on hundreds of universities and college sports programs while they do it - including 5 universities in florida that endorse 20 of those stations that have also been denying global warming for 30 years.....

[Evolve Dammit]

33. And Armed Forces Radio (for 40 years)

[BOSSHOG]

5. I guess churches are all for doing away with the separation of church and state

Since they have no respect for it now. Ya want more tax money for your theocratic studies, welcome assessors into your cathedrals. I

[TheRickles]

6. I wonder if there were any shenanigans in counting the 119,000 signatures, even with a Dem SoS.

Usually petition drives aim for far more than the minimum of signatures required. What happened here?

[marybourg]

8. I'm registered Dem. Nobody came to my door to try to get a petition signed, nor

did anyone who knows I’m a Dem call me to arrange for me to sign a petition, nor did I ever see a petition table at my local supermarket or pharmacy. And that’s pretty much as far as I go nowadays. So, not a sufficiently aggressive petition drive. And that’s pretty much been my experience with petition drives in AZ

[dsc]

10. They only had 80 days thanks to Ducey delaying the signing of the law

and this was a second time since they had done this once before in 2018 meaning it was likely harder to get signatures.

[former9thward]

23. Who is going to do all the things you mention?

Its volunteer work. In the hot Arizona summer. Would you want to go door to door in the heat? Sit at a supermarket parking lot table in the heat?

[marybourg]

24. Then phone calls to registered Dems to sign by arrangement. I check my L.D.

website from time to time. Never saw anything about it. And yes, I did walk my precinct here in the heat when I was younger (drove from block to block, and walked the block).

[former9thward]

25. Somebody has to do the "arrangemnt".

Someone has to get into their car and travel to a home to get one or two signatures. Out of about 200,000 needed to get past a challenge. Who is going to do that? All in a very short time period. Most LD meetings are full of older people. Young not so much.

[iluvtennis]

7. We need public schools. These vouchers only benefit the rich as

the vouchers aren’t enough to cover private school education for even a full semester,let alone the entire school year. At least that was the case for me in San Jose, CA. Private school was $36,000 for the year and the voucher was for as for $3000.

Needless to say we enrolled our two kids in a public charter school where they got an very good education.

[NullTuples]

26. That's where pop up schools come in. Also, note that homeschooling was included.

The numbers from a recent Census Bureau report said Arizona spent $8,785 per pupil in 2020, ahead of only Utah and Idaho that year. And it was dead last – 51st among states and the District of Columbia – when it came to the amount spent on actual instruction, at $4,801 per pupil.

https://www.bizjournals.com/phoenix/news/2022/05/24/arizona-near-bottom-per-pupil-spending.html#:~:text=The%20numbers%20from%20a%20recent,instruction,%20at%20$4,801%20per%20pupil.

[iluvtennis]

28. Thanks for the link. n/t

[raging moderate]

9. Will these schools teach students that the Earth is flat?

These schools won't have to try to explain how cell phones and other modern world communication systems work, if the round Earth theory is as false as they claim it is. They can just omit that uncomfortable truth from the curriculum. The same goes for the germ theory of disease. And the theory that humans are all members of the same species. They could teach the children that the smallpox vaccine caused tiny cows to pop out all over people's skin. Etc. Etc. This is not good.

[BOSSHOG]

11. And the only text needed for sex education

Will be the Old Testament.

[Sky Jewels]

12. Fuuuuuuuuuck.

[cbabe]

13. No jobs for the poorly educated in high tech economy.

[ashredux]

14. That's just bullshit.

[mountain grammy]

15. I listened to an interview with

the president of the Florida Education Association, Andrew Spar. Great interview.

He talked about the effect of vouchers and other attempts to change public education. The bottom line, he said, was decades ago 90% of students attended public schools. Today 90% of students attend public schools.
Most Americans aren't rich. A $7000 voucher will not pay for private school. It's a terrible idea because republicans only have terrible ideas. The best way to educate the populace is in public schools. Most Americans know that.

[ZonkerHarris]

16. I guarantee tuition at every private school in AZ just went up $7,000.

[twodogsbarking]

18. It ain't just about the money.

[hunter]

19. This seems like a good business for the drug cartels to get into.

It would be a great way to launder money and create new customers.

[BlueIdaho]

21. Killing public education

Means killing America. Greedy assholes. 😡

[LuckyLib]

27. Arizona has a history of devaluing education. At the bottom of teacher salaries in the 70's,

I read it was a state that had a difficult time recruiting teachers. Probably still does.

[sakabatou]

31. More bloodsucking private schools to suck public school money dry