Full debate still remains vital on governor's A-Plus voucher plan

TROXLER E-mail: Click here Archive

© St. Petersburg Times
published June 17, 2002

When the letter grades were handed out last week showing the performance of each of Florida's schools, every community in the state eagerly pored over its local list of A's through F's.

Schools with A's celebrated. The B's and C's and D's were disappointed or relieved, depending on whether they had hoped for better or feared for worse.

The Republican governor proudly pointed to the percentage of good grades. Democrats blamed him for the rise in F's.

But what was striking, compared with past years, was the relative lack of public debate and discussion of the grading system itself. Now in its fourth year, the letter-grade concept has become a staple of Florida political and educational culture.

This is Gov. Jeb Bush's most important legacy to date. It was his first major piece of legislation, passed soon after he took office in 1999. He called the linking of standardized test scores to performance grades for schools his "A-Plus" plan.

Critics said it was simplistic to sum up an entire school with a letter grade. But Bush tapped into a strong public desire for a clear, firm yardstick to supply what he called "accountability" for public schools.

In general our society likes grades and likes for things to be graded. We want success and failure labeled. Several times in recent years one of our area's school systems has tried a nontraditional grading system, or even just tried to eliminate D's and F's. These efforts have met overwhelming (and usually successful) resistance from parents.

So in assigning letter grades to entire schools, Bush codified what a lot of people already did unofficially. Parents have always talked to other parents, to real estate agents, to friends and relatives, and gotten an idea of which are the "good" schools and which are the ones with problems.

A second major criticism of Bush's approach was that by relying so heavily on standardized test scores, he would force schools to "teach to the test." Teachers would face heavy pressure to drill their students to produce better test scores.

That is exactly what has happened, yet the majority of Florida voters do not appear to be horrified. To them it is the modern version of forcing schools back to the three R's. The more subtle criticism that this takes away from creativity and imagination (not to mention recess) will have to wait for another day.

Bush has carried off the first part of his revolution.

Ironically, that success now will bring about a renewed debate and rising resistance to the second part -- vouchers, giving tax dollars directly to parents of students in failing schools to pay for private school.

Sixty-eight schools in Florida got F's in the latest results. There was a change in the way the tests were graded this year, to include individual student progress over time, and it pushed an unexpected number of schools over the edge.

For the first time, about 8,900 students will be eligible to receive vouchers. Experience suggests that only a fraction of parents will choose to take them, but that still represents a significant expansion. Until now, failing-school vouchers have been barely more than a pilot program.

The conservative leadership of the Legislature likes vouchers. The prospect of giving tax dollars to private and religious schools, as much as "accountability," is why the Legislature passed Bush's plan in 1999. Since then the Legislature has tried to speed things along by creating a tax break for corporations that endow vouchers, and expanding vouchers for special-needs students.

Vouchers are the major remaining political debate concerning the governor's A-Plus plan. Now that a widely expanded program is upon us, the theoretical debate of 1999 will be waged all over again for real.

The Democrats won't score points against Bush by suggesting we ease up on testing, or ease up on schools. But how well they frame the issue of giving tax dollars to private and religious schools -- or how well they let the Republicans frame it as a matter of healthy competition -- will be one of the few wild cards in the coming campaign.

-- You can reach Howard Troxler at (727) 893-8505 or at troxler@sptimes.com.

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