The politics of special-ed vouchers

[Guest guest]

Article published May 1, 2008

The politics of special-ed vouchers

May 1, 2008

By Marcus A. Winters and Jay P. Greene - The last of three.

With some courage, Sen. McCain has made school choice a pillar of his

presidential campaign's education platform. However, to date it is unclear

what type of school choice policy he might consider as president. Heated

opposition from the teacher unions would almost certainly block or subvert

any proposal for a national voucher program of the conventional style.

Instead, Mr. McCain should consider embracing a fresh approach to school

choice that would allow parents of disabled students to use federal

special-education dollars in any public or private school they see fit.

Altering the federal special-education law in this way overcomes both vested

and principled forms of opposition and would dramatically expand school

choice without substantially increasing the federal role in education.

Federal spending for the nation's nearly 7 million disabled students under

the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act (IDEA) currently goes to

state school systems based on their special-education enrollments. We could

instead redirect this more than $11 billion to parents and allow them to use

the money to pay tuition at a public or private school of their choice. No

additional taxpayer dollars need be raised and few new federal regulations

would be required. In fact, since private-school tuition is routinely lower

than public-school per-pupil revenues, we could save millions of taxpayer

dollars.

In the previous two days, in this space generously provided by The

Washington Times, we have argued that school choice can improve the academic

achievement of disabled students and help reform the legalistic burdens of

the current IDEA system. We have pointed to evidence, including our new

study for the Manhattan Institute, finding that Florida's voucher program

for special-education students improves the academic gains of those who

remain in the public schools. But even we social scientists realize that it

is not enough for a policy to be effective; it must be politically viable as

well. Reforming IDEA to target its dollars into the hands of parents passes

this political test.

Voucher programs for disabled students are more politically popular than are

universal programs or those constrained to low-income students.

Special-education voucher programs have spread to five states in less than a

decade at a time when the growth of traditional voucher programs for regular

education students has slowed. Another sign of their political appeal is

that while other voucher programs face legal challenges from the unions, and

courts have thrown some of them out, special-education vouchers have mostly

escaped challenge. Teachers' unions don't relish the image of dragging

disabled kids into courts to compel them to return to public schools that

were serving them poorly.

Another important political virtue of special-education vouchers is that

they benefit the rich and poor, minority and white students, alike. Voucher

programs for low-income students have clienteles with little political

power. But special education, like Social Security, touches the lives of

Americans of all incomes, creating powerful constituencies for support.

In 2003, we surveyed parents participating in Florida's special-education

voucher program. The demographic profile of families receiving

special-education vouchers was roughly representative of all families in

Florida. About a quarter of enrolled parents reported that they had a

household income above $60,000 and about a third of them had earned at least

a college degree. If presented to them properly, there is a natural support

for special-education vouchers among this all-important middle-class

demographic, many of whom have struggled with the current system themselves.

Finally, once enacted a federal special-education voucher program would have

little to fear from the legal challenges that are the bane of statewide

voucher programs. Recent court cases against voucher programs are now most

often filed when the state has what is known as a Blaine Amendment;

amendments present in many state constitutions, which are the product of

anti-Catholic sentiment in the 19th century, explicitly banning taxpayer

dollars flowing to religious institutions in any way. But a federal program

would be immune to such challenges since the U.S. Constitution does not

contain such an amendment and the U.S. Supreme Court has ruled that federal

law does not prohibit taxpayer dollars from being spent on religious private

school tuitions if that is the uncoerced choice of parents.

The teachers' unions would almost certainly deter any Democratic nominee

from campaigning for such a sensible rethinking of policy and reallocation

of resources, so the proposal will probably have to come from the Republican

nominee. If Mr. McCain is serious about school choice, he would do well to

consider targeting IDEA dollars to parents as part of his education policy

platform.

Marcus A. Winters is a senior fellow at the Manhattan Institute. Jay P.

Greene is a senior fellow at the Manhattan Institute and head of the

Department of Education Reform at the University of Arkansas.

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Amy

Fighting the fight for all our children's rights...