History of IDEA
Jeannie Oakes, Founder and Former Director
Youth Voice in School Finance
NEW REPORT: Los Angeles' road to A-G for all
Without Dollars and Sense Powerpoint
Past Educational Opportunity Reports
School vouchers: No clear advantage in academic achievement
- 08-01-2011
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Blog by Jack Jennings/Huffington Post
In the 1950s, 1960s, and early 1970s, private school advocates tried to build support for tuition vouchers, payments of public tax funds for private school tuition. President Richard Nixon most notably endorsed this idea. Proponents of vouchers argued that parents who sent their children to private schools were "taxed" twice -- once by paying regular public school taxes and again by paying tuition for their children's private schools. That proposition did not carry in the public debate, and vouchers were not enacted. In the late 1970s, voucher proponents shifted tactics and found a new argument: poor children in the inner city deserved the same right to a good education in a private school as did children of more affluent parents who could afford the tuition. This strategy put an "equity" face on vouchers. (more...)
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