Washington, D.C. – Rep. Todd Rokita, Chairman of the Subcommittee on Early Childhood, Elementary, and Secondary Education re-introduced the Creating Hope and Opportunities for Individuals and Communities through Education (CHOICE) Act today to coincide with National School Choice Week. Rep. Rokita issued this statement following the re-introduction:
“I strongly believe that when parents have a choice, kids have a chance. Students’ circumstances or zip codes should not trap them in underperforming schools that don’t meet their needs. The CHOICE Act takes important strides to expand options and flexibility for many non-traditional students across our country, empowering parents instead of federal bureaucrats.”
The CHOICE Act will expand educational opportunities for students from military families, low-income families, and the disabled receiving educational services under the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act (IDEA). This is the second consecutive Congress in which Rep. Rokita has introduced the CHOICE Act, having also introduced in January, 2015.
Earlier today, Rep. Rokita spoke at the National School Choice Rally in the Capitol building. The rally featured hundreds of students, parents, advocates, and Members of Congress celebrating National School Choice Week. Rep. Rokita’s remarks focused on the need to continue pursuing reforms that protect the nation’s most valuable asset: its children.
School choice may be great for the people already sending their kids to private school, they can get the taxpayers to foot the bill. It will even be of some benefit in cases where parents really want their kid in a better school but can’t afford it. It will NOT benefit the kids whose parents don’t want to take them out of public schools for whatever reasons and it will NOT benefit the kids whose parents don’t care enough to put forth the effort to get there kids into private school. It will NOT benefit the kids who won’t be accepted by private schools because of learning disabilities, language problems, a history of discipline problems, physical handicaps or other “special needs” that private schools are not required to address. It will drain away the brightest and best students and the most engaged parents leaving the public schools in an ever deepening spiral of dysfunction that will discourage teachers from entering or remaining in the public school system. In short, school choice plans could potentially destroy the public school system, leaving millions of disadvantaged kids with no education at all.