Teachers Support School Choice

More than half of American teachers support school choice, a Democratic pollster said at the National Press Club on January 22, 2015.

“Fifty-five percent of teachers support the concept of school choice,” Debbie Beck said. Beck’s previous clients have included the National Education Association (NEA).

“The 2014 election shows that nearly every candidate who campaigned on school choice won,” Kevin Chavous, a former Democratic councilman from Washington, D. C., said at the same event. “Teachers’ unions spent at least $80 million in 2014 to express opposition to candidates supportive of such education reforms—and lost nearly every race,” according to the American Federation for Children (AFC), which hosted the press conference where Beck and Chavous spoke. Chavous serves as AFC’s executive counsel.

“Over two-thirds [of people polled] support the concept of school choice,” according to Beck Research. “When asked, ‘Generally speaking, would you say you favor or oppose the concept of school choice? School choice gives parents the right to use the tax dollars associated with their child’s education to send their child to the public or private school which better serves their needs,’ fully 69 % support school choice, including 45% who strongly support it, while 27% oppose it.”

“School choice support has strong support across partisan lines; 60% of Democrats, 67% of Independents and 81% of Republicans back it.”

“I visited a charter school in Minneapolis that had a waiting list of 1,000,” U. S. Representative John Kline, R-Minnesota, [no relation)]said that same morning in remarks to an audience at the American Enterprise Institute (AEI). Rep. Kline chairs the House Education and the Workforce Committee.

“It’s estimated that one out of every five students drop out of high school,” Representative Kline said. “Yet of those who stay, according to the National Assessment of Educational Progress (NAEP), only 38% are reading at grade level and 26% are proficient in math.”

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