In this episode, Kurt interviews Lennie Jarratt on the topic of school choice.
Listen to “Episode 79: School Choice” on Spreaker.
Kurt: Good day to you and thanks for joining us here on another episode of Veracity Hill where we are striving for truth on faith, politics, and society. It’s very yet cold again here in January although we had just a quick break from the cold. We had one day of 58 degrees, right Chris? I know you loved that warm weather that day.
Kurt: I know I give you beef for the weather all the time. We’ve been a bit in a rush here today. I had the funeral of a friend that passed away, an elderly fellow who’s sought of an honorary grandfather to me, Jim Wellwood. Jim was a very great man, generous spirit, a humble heart, and Jim actually got me interested in media when I was in high school so I volunteered. Instead of going to the high school sunday school, I decided to participate in the church tape ministry so recording the sermons and then duplicating them and selling them to people that wanted them. I did that. That’s where I really got my start in media stuff and learning more about those sorts of things in that field and then I ended up getting a job at the church in the audio/visual department so I owe a lot to Jim and he was a great person. It was a wonderful opportunity to see a number of friends and family gather together this morning to honor Jim. Nevertheless, we are here now and I have made it here just barely in time and we’ve got a guest today in studio which is just an awesome opportunity. I am joined today by Lennie Jarratt who is the project manager for the Center of Transforming Education at the Heartland Institute. Lennie. Thanks so much for joining us on the program today.
Lennie: Thanks for having me on, Kurt.
Kurt: Yeah, so we’re going to be talking school choice today and what that entails in sort of a basic sense. I perceive that in my experience, a lot of people don’t even know what school choice is or that it’s even an option on the table.
Lennie: That’s correct. Most people don’t understand it and the way it’s become it’s I can only choose another school, when actually, it’s becoming more of the norm where you can choose multiple schools. You can choose a class at the public school, a class at maybe at a charter school, a class at a private school, or even use a private tour, so it’s becoming more broadening to education choice rather than just school choice at this point. A lot of people don’t know that yet.
Kurt: Yeah. Gotcha. Before we continue, I’ve already had someone comment, what is that orange thing around your neck? So here, I have a scarf which is for the National School Choice Week which is coming up I believe.
Lennie: Yes. January 21st-27th is National School Choice Week and it’s also School Choice Week in Illinois. Governor Rauner has proclaimed January 21st-27th School Church Week in Illinois.
Kurt: Ah. Is that right? So, here in Illinois, we don’t have school choice.
Lennie: We do a little bit. It’s limited. We have charter schools, mostly in Chicago and there’s some in Rockford and a few others, but they’re very very limited as Chicago’s the main one that has charters. The other thing we do do here is we have a really vibrant homeschool market which is really, that’s still about parental choice and they can take advantage of an individual education tax credit for homeschooling. It’s max of $500 per family so it’s very minimal, but it still helps and then last year, that just is going into effect now, is the tax credit scholarship which is a program where a lot of private schools can be used for public schools as well where people can donate money and then get 75% of that off on their tax liability through the state of Illinois based on the 75% of whatever they donate up to a million dollars, so that’s going to open up for a lot more kids to be able to get these scholarships to be able to go to a different school.
Kurt: Sure. We’re already moving forward here pretty quickly. Let’s take a step back. We have different types of schools, okay, for different ages, right? Starting with maybe even preschool, Elementary, I went to a middle school, I’m not sure what the difference is between a middle school and junior high, and then of course high school, so you, of course, I’m going to take notes here, I grew up in the public school system. Of course, a lot of people know that there are private schools out there, okay? Usually the only way you can do that is if you get a scholarship or if your family pays out of pocket for that private education. You mentioned another type of school here called charter schools. Help me understand. What is a charter school?
Lennie: Charter school is a public school, but it doesn’t have all of the same regulations that a straight public school would have. It’s got more autonomy and is usually run by a third party group instead of being run by the actual state or the district, normal districts are not running it.
Kurt: So it’s not under the oversight of a governmental body. Is that right?
Lennie: There’s a contract between the local district and the charter school so they have authority back and forth via a contract, but it’s totally managed by a separate identity.
Kurt: Got it. So it’s managed by a private company.
Lennie: In Illinois, it’s a not-for-profit. It can only be not-for-profits running charters in Illinois.
Kurt: Gotcha. Right. But they do receive taxpayer dollars because of the contract.
Lennie: Yes. They receive a certain amount per student from the local school district and flow through from the state typically into those charters. It’s typically about 75% of what the local public school is receiving that the charter school is receiving. There are instances, mostly Chicago has actually gone to a per student refunding, so in Chicago it’s 100%, so whatever the public school is getting there, the public charter is getting the same amount per student.
Kurt: Okay. So then what would be a benefit for a government body to contract out the job that many people see as the job of the government?
Lennie: It’s typically because the charters have more flexibility. They can do things, they can specialize. There’s a charter school in Michigan, for instance, is a flight school. As well as going to school is teaching all their kids how to fly at the same time, and so it can be more specialized. It can be different things. There’s a charter school, Urban Prep in Chicago is an all-male school, so they have the ability to do that where a regular public school wouldn’t, a public charter can do that and work, and actually the urban charters also has every student for the last seven years, I believe, 100% of their kids have been accepted at a college.
Kurt: Is that right? Wow. Okay. So we’ve got public school. We’ve got private school. We’ve got charter schools. There’s homeschool. Okay? Homeschooling, of course, is just when a parent would provide and have their child go through the curriculum like one would at a school and of course, even homeschools, there are still state standards.
Lennie: Yeah. The standards for homeschooling in Illinois is you have these subjects you have to teach. You have to teach the same subjects that’s being taught in the public schools. That’s as far as you go. You don’t have to look at the actual standards or anything. You can do it how you want it. There’s even as you go into homeschooling, there’s even differences. There’s unschooling where the kids learn on their own without a strict curriculum so they can fluctuate up and down, so basically there’s no grade level so you’re not going through a strict curriculum each year. They’re kind of learning at their own pace thing, and then there’s home school co-ops where a group of parents get together and trade off teaching kids so they’ll trade off everyday teaching different subjects. Once a week they’ll teach, and there’s a lot of co-ops around that actually have their own sports teams that play against a lot of the private Christian schools and stuff like that. There’s a lot of nuance even in homeschooling.
Kurt: I see four categories. Did I get them all?
Lennie: Well, inside the public schools there’s actually magnet schools.
Kurt: A what?
Lennie: A magnet school.
Kurt: I have never heard of that.
Lennie: They’re basically really our specialized schools, usually magnet schools are typically for gifted students. They’ll be an arts magnet school or a technology magnet school, stuff like that, inside the public school district which that kind of competes with the charter schools and kind of that model, but they still have all the exact same regulations as the local public school has for everything. Then there, well, I guess with charters you have different kinds, public and private charter schools, we don’t have any private charter schools in Illinois. There are privately run charters in other states.
Kurt: What does that mean?
Lennie: Basically, it’s run by a private corporation typically where most charters are run by not-for-profit and then there’s virtual schools or online schools as well.
Kurt: How are those categorized? Public or private or that’s just a different type?
Lennie: It’s a different type and they are actually instances where the public schools will allow virtual schools, but then there’s virtual charter schools, so they kind of cross boundaries and even a lot of homeschoolers will actually do virtual schooling as well.
Kurt: Yeah. I can see that making sense. If you’re already home, and especially for people that live out in rural areas maybe where the homeschooling in addition to like a virtual school and makes sense.
Lennie: Yeah and there’s actually some homeschooling groups I know that they’re specialized virtual education for kids with special needs where they can’t go out and do stuff. There’s one, I know of this story where the homeschooling group that actually help