front page - search - community

Taking note . . .

Observations about public affairs in the nation’s capital
by the editor of The Common Denominator

VOUCHERS FAIL A TEST: Before Congress rushes headlong to foist a taxpayer-funded voucher program on the District as an experiment in improving student achievement, members should examine the recently released results of a five-year study that found children participating in Cleveland’s voucher program haven’t learned any more than their public school peers.

The Indiana University study, commissioned by the Ohio Department of Education, tracked the test scores of 6,000 students from kindergarten through fourth grade and concluded "there are virtually no differences in performance between students who use [vouchers] and students who attend public schools."

The Cleveland voucher program, which began in 1996 and withstood a constitutional challenge before the U.S. Supreme Court, is often cited by voucher proponents as a prime example of vouchers succeeding. Since its inception, the Cleveland program has taken $42 million away from the public school system’s disadvantaged pupil fund. Most students participating in the program use vouchers to attend Catholic schools.

While the study found a high level of parent satisfaction with the voucher program, it also found little difference between class sizes and teacher experience for voucher students and public school students.

Curiously, in a city that – like D.C. – has a predominantly African-American public school population, most participants in Cleveland’s voucher program were found to be white or Latino.

Mayor Anthony Williams, Councilman Kevin Chavous and school board President Peggy Cooper Cafritz might also want to re-examine their support for controversial school vouchers, which clearly are not achieving their stated purpose in the nation’s longest-running program.

It’s time for Plan B: Stop diverting tax funds to experiments and start investing the necessary funds to fix the public schools.

NOT AT THE TOP: Common Denominator columnist Matt Wennersten, who teaches math at Bell Multicultural High School, has discovered that the oft-quoted statistic showing the District’s public school system spends significantly more per pupil than other school districts is being taken out of context. What D.C. spends on academic instruction is actually significantly less than surrounding public school districts, where students out-perform D.C. public schoolchildren. Click here to read Wennersten’s column or read it on page 19 of the print edition.

MARK YOUR CALENDARS: Two hotly anticipated events are coming up within the next month.

The out-of-boundary registration period for students seeking to enroll in D.C. public schools located outside their neighborhood begins Jan. 28 and continues through Feb. 28. School officials will use a computerized, random selection lottery process if the number of applications exceeds available space at a school.

Mayor Williams’ annual "State of the District" address has been scheduled for 7 p.m. Feb. 3 at Lincoln Theater, 1215 U St. NW. Doors open at 6 p.m.

Copyright 2004, The Common Denominator