Weather | Sports | Forums | Comics | Classifieds | Calendar | Movies
U.S. Sen. Diane Feinstein is by far the most popular political figure in California, which is why Gov. Gray Davis is featuring her in television ads urging voters not to toss him out of office in next month's recall election. Right now, however, she is not very popular with liberal Democrats in Washington. Maybe if she succeeds in saving Davis from angry voters Democrats will forgive her for breaking ranks on one of the party's litmus-test issues - school vouchers.
On Friday, Feinstein and Sen. Robert C. Byrd, D-W.Va., crossed over and voted with Republicans in the Senate Appropriations Committee for what would be the country's first federally funded school voucher program. Later the same day, the House narrowly approved its version of the voucher experiment in the District of Columbia, a school disaster area. Feinstein, who insisted on amendments to provide accountability and oversight of the program, is not the only convert. Washington Mayor Anthony Williams and the chairman of the D.C. School Board also have come around, much to the horror of congressional Democrats.
The small voucher experiment, Feinstein concluded, is worth trying in a school district where nothing else seems to have worked. The five-year program would give private school tuition grants of up to $7,500 each to about 2,000 students from low-income families, with priority given to students in failing schools, which is most D.C. schools. As a gesture to antivoucher lawmakers, the Senate bill also would provide about $26-million in additional funding for D.C. public schools.
The extra money for the city's public schools, however, did not sway Sen. Ted Kennedy, D-Mass., who is threatening to lead a filibuster to stop the voucher plan on the Senate floor. As usual, the rhetoric on both sides of the debate is tired and overblown. Vouchers will neither save our public schools nor destroy them. The voucher issue is more about education ideology than it is about rescuing poor children from failing schools. For Democrats, it's about appeasing the National Education Association, the teacher union that sets the education agenda for the Democratic Party. For Republicans, it's about privatizing education. (Is there anything they don't want to privatize?)
One reason Democrats are losing the voucher war is that their only solution to failing schools is to pump more money into them. Lord knows, our schools need more money, but Feinstein believes money alone will not improve inner-city schools. In an op-ed piece in the Washington Post this summer, the California Democrat said although the D.C. public school system spends $10,852 per student annually - the third highest per-pupil spending in the nation - its test scores are among the lowest in the country. Seventy-six percent of the district's fourth-graders tested below grade level in math, and only 10 percent read proficiently. Seventy-seven percent of eighth-graders performed below grade level in math, and only 12 percent were proficient in reading.
"Based on the substantial amount of money pumped into the schools and the resultant test scores, I do not believe that money alone is going to solve the problem," Feinstein wrote. "That is why I believe the District should be allowed to try this pilot - particularly for the sake of low-income kids."
Unlike Kennedy and other liberal Democrats, Feinstein is willing to give vouchers a chance. She knows even if the pilot program is successful, it will help only a few thousand children. Most students will remain trapped in the city's failing schools. Kennedy apparently believes that if there are not enough lifeboats on a sinking ship, everyone should stand on deck and go down together. Or to put it another way, if you can't save all the children in a failing school, you shouldn't save any.
"I have begun to rethink public education, and I think we spend too much time supporting old structures and not enough time on what works for children," Feinstein said before the committee vote. "If we look at what works for children, we would probably agree that different models have to be provided, because what works for one child may not necessarily work for another."
Chip Mellor, president and general counsel of the Institute for Justice, a legal group that has defended voucher programs against legal challenges around the country, told the Washington Post that Feinstein's defection illustrates "the kind of ferment that is inevitable in the Democratic Party if they are ever going to honestly confront the issue of school choice."
Maybe Feinstein should make Kennedy an offer: She will drop her support for the voucher experiment if he will come up with a specific plan to improve D.C. schools. The Kennedy plan must offer more than additional dollars, and at least one of his ideas must offend the National Education Association.