Brandon TurbevilleEdge Canopy
March 3, 2018
In early February, Ohio Governor Candidate Dennis Kucinich announced his campaign platform point regarding education in Ohio and, more specifically, the issue of charter schools. That announcement drew a great deal of support and criticism as one might expect, but it also brought with it a lot of confusion.
Kucinich’s plan would essentially force charter schools under the control of the local school boards and local governments and restrict government money paid to charter schools. Reactions to his plan have ranged from jubilant to hostile, with the latter generally perceiving that his plan is effectively eliminating school choice and private schools as an option to parents seeking to protect their children from the horror show of the American public school system. No doubt, some supporters of the plan probably believe the same thing.
However, this is where confusion is coming into play in regards to the charter school issue. First, it is important to point out that Charter schools and Private schools are two different things. Private schools are what most people think about whenever they hear the term “school choice.” These schools are sometimes religious in orientation, sometimes based on science, specific studies, or any number of other elements of focus. But they are all run privately by organizations, churches, businesses, or simply by parents. Some are for-profit and some are non-profit but they all fund themselves through tuition, donations, or charity. In other words, private schools fund themselves via the private sector. Clearly, it is important to keep the private school alive in order to provide another option in addition to homeschooling for parents who want to avoid the nightmare of American public schools that exists in every state across the nation. But there is a distinct difference between the private school system and the charter school system.
Charter schools are schools essentially created and developed by corporations for the benefit of corporations and thus function outside of the “public” realm. Most of them have a narrow focus that has come to be known as the “school to work” pipeline, training children for specific jobs as opposed to a general understanding of basic skills such as math, reading, science, and social studies etc. that they will need throughout their lives. However, despite these schools being the product of private industry and functioning outside of the public sphere, they still receive massive amounts of taxpayer money.
