Ohio Republican candidate for governor Vivek Ramaswamy. (Photo by Chip Somodevilla/Getty Images.)
At a recent rally in Hilliard sponsored by the Americans for Prosperity PAC, Ohio Republican governor candidate Vivek Ramaswamy launched into a predictable GOP attack on public education.
“We are going to bring a radical revolution of standards to our public schools,” he told the gathering.
If you want to go beyond Ramaswamy’s rhetoric, look at a few key words he used, including radical and standards, in his remarks about student outcomes in reading and math.
Let’s also consider what he didn’t say in the predictable Republican exercise of bashing “failing public schools.”
Contrary to Ramaswamy’s assertion of bringing a radical revolution of standards, in fact it’s the private and religious schools that Ramaswamy and his fellow Republicans favor that mostly lack the kind of common standards that public schools must meet.
In Ohio, for example, there is no requirement for private and religious schools to take state assessments, the very instruments that provide the reading and math data as well as state report cards that provide ammunition for public education critics.
Never mind that all Ohio public school students, unlike students enrolled in the 1,300 non-public schools, are required to participate in state testing.
Back to that word radical for a moment.
Isn’t it extreme to provide $6,166 per pupil for K-8 students and $8,408 for high school students with no required measures in place to assess the performance of the schools receiving taxpayer dollars?
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Ramaswamy, a proud entrepreneur, knows quite well that it’s a radical step for any entity, particularly the State of Ohio, to invest $1 billion on a universal voucher initiative and receive no data about the level of performance or impact such spending might have generated.
Now that’s radical, don’t you think?
So think report cards.
Think reading and math scores for those private and religious schools that accept public money.
But expect them to also say that it’s socialism to have strings attached as part of having access to the public treasury in the form of education vouchers.
Whether it’s private and religious schools, their proponents have mastered the art of having it both ways: ‘Yes, we believe in and promote school choice. But don’t ever ask us to comply with state assessment standards that can assist the public in having a more comprehensive school report card system. Just send the money.’
And don’t talk about “School Choice” when it’s really about the “School’s Choice” as demonstrated by who is and isn’t admitted and by the “counsel out” process for those students who require more services and instructional support.
But wait, there’s more to consider about Ramaswamy’s remarks that focused on reading and math achievement.
In these days of rapidly advancing technology and artificial intelligence, what about instruction in science in private and religious schools?
If non-public schools are exempt from so many of the requirements that are mandatory for public schools, do we have assurances that science is even taught in them, particularly those that are affiliated with conservative Christian and other sects?
This statement published several years ago from Americans United for Separation of Church and State gets to the heart of the issue of bad science or no science in some religious schools that are partially supported by the public treasury:
“There are young people all over America right now learning not just that evolution is weak, but that it’s false. These children are being taught that the Earth, which we know to be five billion years old, is only 6,000 years old. They are being taught that dinosaurs and humans existed at the same time.”
Residents of New York State saw a similar situation a few years back when a group of ultra-religious schools were quick to apply for state funds while ignoring the delivery of a curriculum that would prepare a young person with the necessary tools to be successful – and literate.
One education expert had this observation:
“When the state or city says that the yeshivas should provide an education for their students that is ‘substantially equivalent’ to secular education, their leaders cry ‘separation of church and state!’ But, inconsistently, their representatives in the legislature actively lobby for tuition tax credits and vouchers. They want the state’s money but not its oversight of the education they provide.”
Sounds like Ohio, doesn’t it?
As the debate on no-strings educational vouchers continues, Ohio citizens must be strong in demanding oversight for the expenditure of scarce public dollars that may be going to public and religious schools that lack the transparency needed to ensure that students are prepared for an increasingly complex world.
So, it’s time for the “Science of Reading” to be joined by a new initiative that will ensure that students who receive taxpayer-supported educational vouchers are taught …. science.
Let’s call this new initiative Science in Science, where all citizens are assured that the expenditure of public tax dollars in any school in the state support a proper public purpose and produce an informed citizenry that is literate in science as well as reading and math.
Would that be radical? I think not.