My colleague Trish Crain, who runs the Alabama School Connection blog, does a super job of digging deep into numbers and coming up with graphs, charts and maps. (She is obviously far more proficient with a computer and all of its bells and whistles than I am. But then, she ain’t nearly as old and tech deficient as I am either.)
Last week the Alabama Department of Revenue released the first info showing which private schools are receiving scholarship students through the Alabama Accountability Act.
So Trish has mapped both the locations of “failing schools” and private schools benefiting from AAA.
It is very insightful and again raises questions about how well the accountability act is doing in helping students in failing schools.
The red dots represent failing schools. Green dots are private schools getting scholarships. Notice the red dots across the Black Belt and the fact there are no green dots nearby. Since students moving from a failing school to a private school must provide their own transportation, this distance is a HUGE issue and one that was totally ignored when this law was crafted.
Warren Callaway runs the Scholarship for Kids scholarship granting organization (SGO) in Birmingham and tells me that even for students in urban locations, transportation is an issue and that unless a private school is within just a few miles of the public school the student presently attends, they are unlikely to go to the private school.
Also note where the green dots are located and how many of them are not in counties that have failing schools. For instance, a private school in Dothan has gotten 86 scholarships, yet the closest failing school is in Abbeville, some 25 miles away. And while three private schools in Cullman County received 108 scholarships, the nearest failing school is 35 miles away in Decatur.
A quick review of Trish’s map shows at least 19 private schools in counties where there are no failing schools have received 363 scholarships.
Remember when this law was passed in 2013 and we were told by legislative leadership that it was all about “helping kids stuck in failing schools by their zip codes?”
It is hard to look at this map and believe what we were told.
That is astounding. It is also interesting that all 86 chose one particular private school when there are several more options in the area.
Funny how things work sometimes. There is only one other private in Dothan (Westgate Christian) singed up for the program. There are about 500 privates in the state (hard to come up with an exact number), but less than 200 in AAA.
Thank you Larry for telling our story. We as educators, both active and retired, have done a poor job of educating the people about this crime. Granted telling our story to folks that don’t want to listen is difficult and frustrating. But it’s like teaching a child to read, they don’t get it the first time, but we have to keep trying. Larry, you are a hero. The rest of us need to follow your lead. Last night, a group of 20 of us retired school administrators met for two hours organizing a plan to get out the word to our parents. We are selecting a dozen key movers and shakers at each county school and are going to educate them on what they are doing to our public education. Three of us have written local paper pieces about the theft. I shared several of you blogs with the group. they were impressed. Keep ’em coming!!!
Thanks so much. Yes, we are woeful at telling our story. And I understand why to a certain degree. Most who go into education feel that they were “called” to work with children. They were not called to deal with politics, endless reports, committee meetings and the like. And to ask them to step outside of that realm is often like trying to push a rope. But if we don’t push back we will wake up and what folks like you worked to achieve for so many years will not exist as we have known it. Children are a poor rope in a political tug of war. But in too many cases nowadays, that’s about all they have become.
Good Work again Larry!
Appreciate your efforts to keep us informed.
I wonder how much of this program is more about the success of private schools athletic programs and not helping students on to future success. We continually see recruiting of underprivileged student athletes at the middle school level by private schools – and not for their chess team.
I also wonder what happens when a failing school is no longer failing – do the scholarships continue?
Thanks again!
Here, let’s translate this: legislative leadership says it’s all about “helping kids stuck in failing schools by their zip codes”… and this means…?
”helping parents with kids in THESE schools by funneling money away from THOSE schools”
“So, the system’s working just like it’s s’posed to!” (can’t find a sarcasm tag)