New Politico Story Reveals $1 Billion in Voucher Spending Nationwide Has Resulted in Little Evidence of Academic Gains
BATON ROUGE — Louisiana Gov. Bobby Jindal is flying to New York today to raise money and demagogue about school vouchers, but his talking points on Louisiana’s “failing schools” fail to mention there is little evidence his voucher scheme is resulting in higher academic performance for the students “escaping” public schools.
“Bobby Jindal has appeared on every news program available, robotically echoing his tired talking point that our poorest children are ‘trapped in failing public schools,’ but the only thing failing Louisiana’s public schools is Bobby Jindal,” said Louisiana Democratic Party Executive Director Stephen Handwerk. “The facts remain that students in Louisiana voucher schools do no better than kids in our public schools — and quite often, they do worse on standardized tests. If Jindal were actually interested in helping Louisiana’s kids, he would focus on investing in high-quality public schools to help all of our children and stop wasting tax dollars on vouchers.”
A new Politico story reveals that, despite the fact that U.S. taxpayers will soon be spending $1 billion annually on voucher programs, there is little evidence that children benefit academically. The story noted that voucher students in New Orleans have not advanced to grade-level work any faster than their public-school peers over the past two years. It also highlighted the Jindal administration’s decision to keep sending taxpayer dollars to seven voucher schools that performed so poorly, they are barred from accepting new voucher students.
Today the Louisiana Democratic Party released a response video, “Jindal’s Failing Schools,” that emphasizes the fact that the governor has failed to offer any solutions for the public education system, which serves 99 percent of Louisiana’s school children.
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