What Happened in the Bayou? Examining the Effects of the Louisiana Scholarship Program

Autor/in	Wolf, Patrick J.
Titel	What Happened in the Bayou? Examining the Effects of the Louisiana Scholarship Program
Quelle	In: Education Next, 19 (2019) 4, S.49-56 (9 Seiten) PDF als Volltext Verfügbarkeit
Sprache	englisch
Dokumenttyp	gedruckt; online; Zeitschriftenaufsatz
ISSN	1539-9664
Schlagwörter	Scholarships; Educational Vouchers; State Programs; School Choice; Private Schools; Tuition; Tax Credits; Low Income Students; Public Schools; Urban Schools; Accountability; Program Evaluation; Scores; Racial Segregation; School Segregation; Educational Attainment; Louisiana + Suchen Sie Ihr Suchwort? Scholarship; Stipendium; Educational voucher; Bildungsgutschein; Regierungsprogramm; Choice of school; Schulwahl; Private school; Privatschule; Unterweisung; Unterricht; Steuerermäßigung; Public school; Öffentliche Schule; Urban area; Urban areas; School; Schools; Stadtregion; Stadt; Schule; Verantwortung; Programme evaluation; Programmevaluation; Rassentrennung; Bildungsabschluss; Bildungsgut
Abstract	Student performance on standardized tests in Louisiana has trailed national averages for decades. In the 2017 8th-grade reading results on the National Assessment of Educational Progress, Louisiana public schools tied for 42nd in the nation and rated significantly higher than only one jurisdiction, the District of Columbia. Only 25 percent of Louisiana 8th graders scored as proficient or above in reading, similar to the 23 percent rate in 2015 but higher than the abysmal 17 percent rate in 1998. NAEP reading scores for Louisiana 4th and 12th graders have been similarly disappointing, as have their math and science scores. In 2005, Hurricane Katrina raged in, devastating the city of New Orleans and environs. The flood damage to more than 300 public schools was so extreme they had to be condemned. In the wake of Katrina, Louisiana lawmakers established two major private-school choice programs. The first was the Elementary and Secondary School Tuition Deduction policy, enacted in 2008. This initiative allows families to deduct on their state income-tax return up to $5,000 per child in private-school educational expenses. The families of more than 106,000 of the 112,000 students attending Louisiana private schools in 2012 claimed the deduction. The second program was the Student Scholarships for Educational Excellence Program, which in 2009 began providing private-school vouchers to 624 low-income students in the parishes of Orleans and nearby Jefferson. This program served as a pilot for the larger, statewide Louisiana Scholarship Program, launched in 2012. State policymakers also dramatically refashioned the public-school system in New Orleans. Gone were residential attendance zones, the teacher collective-bargaining agreement, and almost all of the public schools the Orleans Parish School Board directly operated. In their place arose a new kind of urban public school system, dubbed the Recovery School District. Overseen by state education officials, the new district was composed almost entirely of public charter schools that would be held accountable for student achievement on state tests. Patrick Wolf writes about what his research team found when they evaluated the Louisiana Scholarship Program, a statewide school-voucher initiative: the program satisfied some of its goals but fell well short of others, including that of raising student scores on state tests. Wolf describes this article as a cautionary tale about good intentions and seemingly reasonable decisions resulting in unintended consequences. (ERIC).
Anmerkungen	Hoover Institution. Stanford University, Stanford, CA 94305-6010. Tel: 800-935-2882; Fax: 650-723-8626; e-mail: educationnext@hoover.stanford.edu; Web site: http://educationnext.org/journal/
Erfasst von	ERIC (Education Resources Information Center), Washington, DC
Update	2020/1/01