Parents' right to choose hijacked by top schools

By JOHN MINTO*

Act Party education spokeswoman Deborah Coddington says there is a better system for delivering education. Parents would take a cash entitlement - or "voucher" - to the school of their choice, public or private.

She says this will improve educational choice for middle and low-income families and, presumably, would result in improved education for children.

Moreover, "successful" schools from wealthy communities could set up satellite schools in poorer areas.

It sounds so much like motherhood and apple pie it could hardly be opposed. But when the advertising spin is removed and the facts revealed, the gloss comes off vouchers as fast as it does off Act dietary advice.

Vouchers, in fact, represent choice for schools to select the students they want, rather than for families to choose schools for their children. When left to themselves, schools invariably choose those with high academic potential, musical or sporting talent.

Their priority in a market-driven system is to enhance their reputations rather than provide high-quality education for allcomers. This was the situation under the National Party's policy of so-called "school choice" during the 1990s. High achievers from well outside their communities were selected at many popular schools while less desirable local students were turned away.

Greater choice for schools to pick the students they want does nothing to improve choice for parents or better education outcomes.

"School choice" is also a nonsense because no Government voucher system could match the cost of private-school fees, and even escalating fees at state schools in wealthy communities - often now covering up to 10 per cent of day-to-day running costs - mean these schools would be ruled out for most students from poorer communities.

Under vouchers, the concept of education as a basic human right is replaced by education as a marketplace commodity where the quality one receives is based on what a parent can afford to pay.

The "per student" funding model also means that without the benefit of economies of scale available to larger schools in more affluent communities, schools in poorer communities would struggle. Parents in these communities would lose their most important choice - of a high-quality local school for their children.

Deborah Coddington says "successful" schools could set up satellite schools in lower-decile communities and thus improve the quality of education in these areas.

This is deeply insulting nonsense. The single most significant determinant for success at school is what the students themselves bring in terms of prior learning, well-educated, highly motivated parents and so on. Bringing in a "successful" school from a wealthier community would change none of these parameters.

For their part, schools in poorer communities as a group are doing exceptionally well in providing quality education within the resources available from the Government. They are setting high educational standards and have high expectations of their students.

This has been helped over the past few years by a rise in Government funding but it is meagre compared with the educational needs in these communities or compared with the sums available to schools in wealthier communities through economies of scale, large numbers of foreign fee-payers and outlandish school fees.

Vouchers have been introduced in some communities in the United States. The drive has often come from leaders in poor black communities who seek a way out of educational failure for their children.

These parents have been supported by corporate America, but then dropped like hot cakes once vouchers are in place.

Vouchers bring an enticement of choice and quality but a reality of sham and deceit.

Wherever they have been introduced they have benefited middle- and upper-class parents, with the poor, less well-off. For this reason, vouchers have been described as "welfare for the wealthy" in the US.

The picture on vouchers is complete and it is easier to understand where Act is coming from when one realises that the most significant initial effect of vouchers would be that students at private schools would immediately receive a huge increase in their Government subsidy to do so.

Under National this subsidy rose 220 per cent between 1994 and 2000. With vouchers those subsidies would increase a further 200 per cent or so.

Using the poor to advance the agenda of the rich is common in parts of our community. In education it is called vouchers.

* John Minto chairs the Quality Public Education Coalition.