Essay: The Politics of Market-Based School Choice Research: A Comingling of Ideology, Methods and Funding



The Politics of Market-Based School Choice Research: A Comingling of Ideology, Methods and Funding

Julian Vasquez Heilig, California State University Sacramento

T. Jameson Brewer, University of North Georgia

Frank Adamson, California State University Sacramento

I. Introduction

To conceptualize the politics of research on school choice it is important to first discuss the politics of market-based approaches to public policy. Notions of ‘markets’ and ‘choice’ in schooling stem back to libertarian ideas espoused by Milton Friedman in the 1950s. Bolstered by the escalation of those ideologies in the 1980s under the auspices of neoliberal theory and Republican orthodoxy, the argument that parents should have ‘choice’ between competing schools within an education market with little regulation began to crack the schoolhouse door to allow an increasing influx school vouchers and charter schools.

The ideology of a competitive education market supposes  that competition and deregulation are necessary and fundamentally positive forces that will ‘fix’ the ‘failed’ public school sector (Vasquez Heilig, 2013). Mundy and Murphy (2000) argued that to build public support for their approaches, neoliberal proponents focus on three organizing economic rationales: 1) efficiency; 2) the axis of competition-choice-quality, and 3) the apparent scarcity of resources. On the supply side, neoliberals argue that private firms deliver goods and services more efficiently than the government. On the demand side, neoliberals “promote competition as a means to deliver more consumer choice, which theoretically leads to higher quality products” (Adamson and Astrand, 2016, p. 9).

Because school choice is a policy prescription, research and evaluation of the effectiveness of the policies often follow soon after their initial implementation. While new policies and reforms should be piloted, researched, and then determined to what extent they can— or should— be scaled. The research conducted by school choice advocates works backwards in that school choice advocates/researchers conduct multiple experiments on policies in an attempt to find justification for what has always been a policy centered on ideology rather than empirical evidence. In fact, Lubienski and Weitzel (2010) found that many states passed laws supporting charter school expansion at a much faster rate than charters were being built and faster than could be supported or justified by the normal research cycle to determine their effectiveness. The ideology that presupposes the efficiency and effectiveness of educational markets requires education to be understood as an individualistic enterprise and good rather than a public good.

The dichotomy between what is conceptualized as a public or a private good is at the center of school choice approaches. The conception of education as a public good, or as the common good, conceives of education and schooling through the lens of the collective and, theoretically, ensures equal access and equitable experiences. Conceptions of education as a common good— in the same way we conceptualize military protection, police/fire protection, public libraries, public roads, etc.— stems from the understanding that society not only shares a obligation to one another but that there is an understanding that if we collectively focus on improvement, we collectively benefit. Contrasting this view is the ideology rooted in Friedmanism’s rugged individualism where there is a limited conception of public or common goods. According to this line of logic, there is no collective obligation to one another and a self-interested focus of personal improvement will, theoretically, improve the collective. It should be understood that within Friedmanism the byproduct of collective improvement is not necessarily a result of a spillover from the individual to the collective, rather, through hyper-individualistic accountability, if it is everyone for him or herself, the atomized improvement of individuals will, taken as a whole, represent the improvement of the masses.

Conceptualizations of education as an individualistic good— a commodity to be bought, sold, and traded in educational markets— require a reliance on a theory of meritocracy whereby success is ‘attainable’ through education and ‘hard work’ and, by definition, success is the result of making use of such things. Whereas poverty, for example, is evidence of poor choices and a failure to pull oneself up by their bootstraps. The notion of meritocracy and ‘hard work’ is deeply embedded in the American psyche given the influence of the Protestant ‘work ethic’ and associations of hard work with morals (Weber, 1930). This myth not only allows for the crass dismissal of systemic poverty and racism that are endemic in American society but also informs how we are to conceive of educational choices within an educational marketplace. That is, if the choice exists for a ‘better’ education in a charter school or by use of a school voucher, then generational poverty shifts the locus of accountability on the individual and family for failure to take advantage of choices rather than understanding the greater collective common good and connection to a greater society.

Considering the underlying politics of school choice, it is important to discuss implication of neoliberal and collective ideology on market-based school choice research. In this chapter we point out that much of the research suggesting positive findings is continually conducted and promoted by neoliberal ideologically-driven organizations. We begin with a ynthesis of the pertinent literature on the conceptions and the funding of market-based school choice research to establish a background of understanding. Next we discuss the role of the production and politics of market-based school choice research for conceptualizing the current educational policy environment. In the third section, we delved into the politics of market-based school choice research use. We conclude by discussing the implications of how the comingling of ideology, methods and funding informs the public discourse about market-based schools choice and fit into the larger conversation about education reform.

II. Politics, Conceptions, and Funding of Market-Based School Choice Research

In the quest to determine if, and to what extent, a policy is effective, there remains the possibility that the types of questions, methods employed during research, and the funding of that research can be ideologically tainted. The first decade of the 21st century revved the quantitative and qualitative debate that has divided the social science community for decades. More precisely, No Child Left Behind (NCLB) reified a commitment towards quantitative ‘objective’ scientism while relegating qualitative and contextual understandings to a subpar practice. The National Academy of Sciences held that,

“Federal and state agencies should prioritize the use of evidence-based programs and promote the rigorous evaluation of prevention and promotion programs in a variety of settings in order to increase the knowledge base of what works, for whom, and under what conditions” (Boat & Warner, 2009, p. 371).

That is, educational research and social inquiry are to be approached in systematic experiential trials (often with the so-called “gold standard” of Randomized Controlled Trials, or RCT) that create the foundational for universality and generalizability. There has long been a push to assert RCT or the “gold standard” in research as the pièce de résistance in educational research as the most ideal setting as it represents “random assignment” to the treatment or control group and eliminates selection bias (Mosteller & Boruch, 2002).

For example, in the quest to determine whether school choice models such as vouchers “work,” researchers (largely funded and supported by ideological organizations such as EdChoice and the University of Arkansas— a point we take up below) have increasingly proposed the use of RCTs to compare variance of outcomes among students receiving the school choice treatment and those remaining in public schools (Abdulkadiroglu, Pathak, & Walters, 2015; Barnard, Frangakis, Hill, & Rubin, 2003; Bitler, Domina, Penner, & Hoynes, 2015; Chingos & Peterson, 2015; Cowen, 2008; EdChoice, n.d.; Greene, 2001; Greene, Peterson, & Du, 1998; Howell & Peterson, 2002/2006; Jin, Barnard, & Rubin, 2010; Krueger & Zhu, 2004; Mills & Wolf, 2016; Rouse, 1998; Wolf et al., 2013). Though, despite the glaring possibility of bias developing as pro-charter organizations like EdChoice (formerly the Friedman Foundation) and the University of Arkansas (heavily funded over th years by the Walton Family Foundation) promoting such research, there remains a considerable level of skepticism surrounding the unwavering power of RCTs in educational research (Lubienski & Brewer, 2016) and the elevation of quantitative over qualitative methods in general (Berliner, 2002).

In the age of hyper-accountability and assessment, policy makers have increasingly linked funding to the results of evaluations. Given the rampant existence of the “Protestant Work Ethic” dispositions outlined by Max Weber (1930) that has informed the myth of meritocracy, it has become commonsensical in our rhetoric and practice that one should be held accountable for the practices and monies to which they have been made responsible. In education this is manifested as students being held accountable for their grades, teachers for the production of good and better grades, administrators for the reduction in documented discipline problems, and school districts being expected to do more despite having less money. And if everyone is to be held accountable, everyone must be evaluated by test scores. In turn, these various outcomes serve as a guiding example— or exemplars— of “best practices,” or to the contrary, become negative examples. This myopic quest for certainty can be seen in school choice research that seek to ignore contextual factors in favor of generalizability across contexts.

Yet, while statistical inquiry can provide legitimate insight into some social phenomena, it stands little chance of drowning out the realities of contextual factors that are, to be sure, the most important factors in the development of lived realities and shared understandings.

The practical consequences of scientism in education are that it will institute a notion of the curriculum as “cookbook,” teaching and learning as “proven method” or “best practices,” research as “funded enterprise,” and educational inquiry as only “what works” (Baez & Boyles, 2009, pp. 51-52).

In sum, the quest for a-contextual certainty lies social inquiry that not only acknowledges context but also understands its powerful force in shaping outcomes. Given the political foundations and rationales of school choice, there remains an insatiable requirement to conduct experimental and non-experimental research that justifies school choice expansion. The expansion effort has required significant levels of funding to create a body of quantitative research and an appearance of a predominance of objective observation.

Policy Patrons: Ideological Intermediary Organizations and Funding

The “policy patrons” are a cabal of philanthropic organizations that use funding to influence educational reform (Tompkins-Stange, 2016) and, in the process, bolster support for private control and privatization of public goods such as education by propping up market-based education ‘choice’ (Vasquez Heilig & Clark, 2018). The policy patrons draw from a shared ideological commitment to capitalism and free-markets. They are ideologically committed to enacting and overseeing the shift from conceptions of education as a public good to an individualistic commodity whereby education is a service, students and parents are customers, and the service provider (the charter or voucher school) compete with public schools over customers (Scott, 2013).

For example, The Walton Family Foundation (WFF) has a long history of promoting market-based reforms throughout every level of educational policy. Drawing its financial support from the profits from Walmart, the WFF has leveraged hundreds of millions of dollars in the quest to project business and market-oriented ideology into the public sphere (Strauss 2014). The groundwork laid by the release of A Nation at Risk provided— and continues to provide— impetus for the argument that government is woefully inefficient and ineffective at providing public goods. As such, school choice proponents have argued that the remedy is transferring oversight into private hands. If we are to reimagine public education not as a public good that is to be delivered, managed, and regulated through governments but rather through private business ideology inspired by a foundation that benefits from the world’s largest corporation?  

The WFF is certainly not alone when it comes to funding not only school choice mechanisms, but the research that purports to justify the practices. The past few decades have seen a rapid increase in the amount of, and total dollar investment from the Gates Foundation and a myriad of intermediary organizations (IOs) and think tanks that produce and promote educational research (Tompkins-Stange, 2016). Other notable policy patrons within the education reform network promoting school choice include the Hastings Fund, the Broad Foundation, and the Bezos Foundation. Ken Saltman (2010, 2011) suggested that the hands-on approach to modern philanthropy by way of IOs and think tanks differs from the more hands-off approach to philanthropy of decades past. Again, IOs that have no meaningful connection to education other than they are funded and led by successful business tycoons who, operating within the thinking that businesses are better suited to provide and manage educational choices, because of their financial success are considered proficient in generating success writ large.

The Walton, Hastings, Gates, and Broad philanthropic organizations are heavily intertwined within the broader network of market-based education reform organizations (See Figure X). Notable direct connections to intermediary organizations include: Students for Education Reform (SFER), Center for Reinventing Public Education (CRPE), Charter School Growth Fund, NewSchools Venture Fund (NSVF), Teach For America (TFA), National Association of Charter School Authorizers, Educators 4 Excellence, New Leaders for New Schools, Relay Graduate School, Teach Plus, Center for Education Reform, National Alliance for Public Charter Schools, Teach For All, Center for American Progress, 50CAN, and Education Trust.

Figure 1. Pro-Choice Intermediary Organizations and Philanthropic Donors

Figure 1 also shows that there are notable direct connections to charter school chains such as Rocketship Education, Knowledge is Power Program (KIPP), Noble Charters, 4.0 Schools, and Green Dot Schools. While IOs are not directly involved in the creation, management, and oversight of charter schools, the ones listed above are heavily involved in providing political clout as well as policy and governance structural support to expand school choice options. What is notable about the politics of school choice, and the research that accompanies it, is the presence of a diverse set of politically diverse individuals and organizations. Namely, the school choice reform network receives a substantial amount of financial and political support from individuals such as the far-right wing Koch brothers as well as organizations that are purportedly on the left side of the political spectrum (i.e Democrats of Education Reform).

The Policy Patrons have generously funded peer reviewed and advocacy-based research examining charter schools and school vouchers. Venture philanthropists have channeled their funding through IOs to fund education departments and, specifically, education research departments focused singularly on school choice. For example, The University of Arkansas’ Department of Education Reform (UADER) promotes its School Choice Demonstration Project (SCDP) as an unbiased evaluation process of school choice reforms but seeks to “[raise] and [advance] the public’s understanding of the strengths and limitations of school choice policies and programs” The advisory board of SCDP includes connections to Bellwether Education and the American Enterprise Institute— many of these organizations are as staunch of advocates for school choice as they are critics of climate change science (Lubienski, Scott & DeBray, 2014). The UADER has been heavily funded by the Walton Family Foundation. In fact, some UADER faculty have even proudly displayed online the various school choice supportive organizations that have funded their research. As a result, the politics of educational research in higher education has become more blurred at the institutional level when considering the increasing role that the policy patrons have played in funding research.

III. The Politics of Production and Response to Market-Based School Choice Research

During the past two decades, there was an acceleration of research generate examining market-based school choice. While it is difficult to estimate the total amount of research generated examining market-based school choice, it is possible to use ERIC to track the total amount of peer reviewed research conducted about charter schools and school vouchers (See Table X).

Table X

Pace of Peer Reviewed Research about Market-Based School Choice

Charter Schools

School Vouchers

1999-2009

533

205

2009-2018

1191

228

2009-2014

550

121

Since 2014 (last 5 years)

641

107

2017

168

22

First half of 2018

53

6

Source: ERIC search keywords “charter schools” and “school vouchers”

Research examining charter schools and school vouchers has accelerated during the past two decades. Table X shows that the number of peer reviewed articles about charter schools more than doubled (1,191) compared to the prior decade (533). In fact, since 2014, there were more peer reviewed articles published (641) about charter schools than during the entire ten years between 1999-2009 (533). Perhaps owing to the more limited use of vouchers across the United States compared to charter schools, there were only 25 more articles published about school vouchers between 2009-2018 than the prior ten years (1999-2009). At the current pace of about 128 per year, peer reviewed studies about charter schools far outpace (about 610%) the average of 21 articles published about school vouchers.

Probably the most cited non-peer reviewed research in policy conversations about charter schools is produced by Center for Research on Education Outcomes (CREDO) at Stanford’s conservative leaning Hoover Institute. CREDO uses student-level data to compare the achievement of students attending charter schools and neighborhood public schools. Their studies typically find that students in charter schools display slightly greater overall gains (typically in the hundredths of a standard deviation) in performance than their peers in neighborhood public schools. Notably, when disaggregated by race/ethnicity, the achievement effects in charters reported by CREDO are often negative for African American and other groups when compared to neighborhood public schools (Vasquez Heilig, 2018). There is one other exception to the typically positive findings. CREDO’s students of online charter schools posited that they were performing poorly (Woodworth et al., 2015). Nevertheless, five reviews (Maul, 2013; Maul, 2015; Maul & McClelland, 2013; Miron & Applegate, 2009; Miron, & Shank, 2017) have critiqued the methodological choices of CREDO and suggested that their work overstates findings, ignores relevant literature, and “fails to address known methodological issues, suggesting an agenda other than sound policymaking” (NEPC, 2017).

FRIEDMAN FOUNDATION HERE

In responses to the waves of research from the University of Arkansas, CREDO, EdChoice and other advocacy organizations, the National Education Policy Center (NEPC) has organized approximately 150 of North America’s top academics and educators as fellows to peer review reports and studies. NEPC (n.d.) describes the fellows as having “a wide range of expertise bearing on education policy issues. They also have considerable experience speaking with members of the media, policy makers, and community members about their work.”

In Vasquez Heilig (2018), a recent NEPC brief, the author peer reviewed a UADER research report that utilized CREDO charter school research. The UADER report contended that charter schools produce more achievement per dollar invested, as compared to public schools. This report was the second in a series that used cost-effectiveness and Return on Investment (ROI) ratios to attempt to demonstrate an economic benefit of charter schools. Vasquez Heilig (2018) found that the UADER report repeated many of the subjective methodological decisions already highlighted by Glass (2014) analysis of Wolf et al. (2014), an earlier cost effectiveness report released by UADER. The report’s comparison of achievement scores between charter schools and neighborhood public schools also suffered from multiple sources of methodological invalidity and questionable data. Vasquez Heilig (2018) concluded,

This second report in the [charter school] versus [neighborhood public school] productivity series from the University of Arkansas Department of Education reform will likely be cited by supporters of the [charter school] movement when they are lobbying for increased funding and favorable legislative treatment. Unfortunately, the evidence in this report is so flawed that it provides no valid guidance to educators or policymakers who aim to evaluate cost effectiveness or return on investment for either charter or [neighborhood public] schools. (p. 12)

Other NEPC reviews have found that school choice researchers have engaged in extreme cherry-picking to make ideological claims (Lubienski & Brewer, 2013, 2014), often ignore research findings that challenge their ideological assumptions (Brewer & Lubienski, 2017), and engage in moving the goalposts and using questionable methods in an effort to justify, by whatever means and measures necessary, that school choice works (Lubienski & Brewer, 2018).

VI. The Politics of Market-Based School Choice Research Use

Discussing research use specifically regarding school choice requires some understanding of the broader dynamics of education research use. In particular, education research contains inherent tensions between evidence and democracy. Researchers often produce knowledge without much attention to impacted communities, aside from their role as research subjects. While some researchers are expanding their approaches, communities often remains external to conversations about the overall agenda, research questions, decisions about what counts as evidence, and the knowledge production process. An additional problem is that research often resides behind paywalls, further isolating it from the public. In an applied field like education, this problem is a core issue as practitioners face barriers to improving practice or making effective decisions; in the heavily politicized space of school choice, the power dynamics discussed above further exacerbate the issue.

The general disconnect between research and practitioners, and research and communities to an even greater extent, has resulted in a relative paucity of peer reviewed research use. This disconnect occurs despite mandates for community engagement in both the 2015 Elementary and Secondary Education Act (ESSA) and within California’s Local Control Accountability Plans (LCAP). For instance. ESSA delegates significant decision-making to the states and local communities, requiring that “stakeholders”—from state and local agencies to parents and community members—be engaged in making decisions about a wide range of policies. Furthermore, it also requires that decisions related to implementing many aspects of the law be “evidence-based.” Thus, the mandate for greater stakeholder involvement that explicitly using research exists; however, in reality, both community engagement and evidence-informed decision making varies in uptake and quality.

What does this context mean for communities within the domain of school choice? Importantly, it means that school choice policies are often enacted without a strong research base, as occurred in the largest U.S. market-based school choice adoption to date in the city of New Orleans. Paul Vallas, former head of the Recovery School District in New Orleans, framed the takeover of the district by stating, “‘This will be the greatest experiment in choice, in charters, and in creating not only a school system, but also a system of schools’” (Hendrie, 2007). This decision was not made with democratic community input; rather, it occurred through state takeover and included the firing of over 7,000 teachers (Adamson et al., 2016). In fact, then Governor Kathleen characterized the Hurricane Katrina disaster as “a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity” that could “turn a failing system into a model for the nation” (Robelen, 2005). The example of New Orleans is instructive because it shows how choice policies have been scaled without examining the research or authentic community input. In fact, data was purposefully only given by the Louisiana Department of Education to organizations deemed to be political friendly (CREDO, to the market-based reforms in New Orleans. Independent researchers had to sue the Louisiana Department of Education in court to obtain data to analyze reform (Andrews, 2013). This lack of publicly available data led to a paucity of independent, peer reviewed research about New Orleans until recent year.

The most prominent example of voucher implementation in the world has taken place in Chile (Portales & Vasquez Heilig, 2014, Portales & Vasquez Heilig, 2015). There is little evidence that vouchers have a positive effect on student performance. Carnoy (2017) concluded in a recent Economic Policy Institute report that the predominance of peer-reviewed research over 25 years shows vouchers don’t improve student success. Peer reviewed research on large-scale choice implementation actually provides a cautionary tale of Chile’s decades-long voucher experiment, including its designation as an “apartheid” education system by the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (Hidalgo & Gomez, 2016). Yet vouchers are supported by well-heeled conservative philanthropists and conservatives including the Koch brothers, American Legislative Executive Council, Walton Foundation and Heritage Foundation.

As outlined above, policy decisions to deploy choice models either lack a research base since politicians are either experimenting at scale or the research base does not support the policy decision. Therefore, the policy decisions are based on other factors, including but not limited to politics, profit, and even anti-labor motivations. Within the political sphere, the “policy patrons” described above have contributed to political campaigns in races from local school boards to the state house, with the politicians then enacting school choice policies. Examples include Oakland’s school board races, with over $200,000 in 2014 and over $700,000 in 2016 spent by school choice proponent groups (City of Oakland, 2016; ACOE, 2016). In Los Angeles, charter school support groups spent over $9 million in 2017, while the California governor primary race attracted over $17 million from the “policy patrons” in support of Antonio Villaraigosa (Blume & Poston, 2017; Hart, 2018). Of these examples, only Villaraigosa failed to win, while education decisions in both Oakland and L.A. continue to enact school choice policies, primarily in the form of charter schools.

Astroturfing organizations, fake grassroots, have sought to create connections between policy patrons and communities, yet their use of pro school research does not necessarily represent authentic community engagement according to parents and community members that have expressed concern about organizations that receive hundreds of thousands of dollars from policy patrons such as the WFF. They relayed,

Right-wing billionaires and Silicon Valley technology investors have helped fund advocacy groups like Innovate, a San Jose group that pushes the charter agenda and denigrates public schools. Innovate is paying for Facebook and Twitter ads and hiring “community organizers” to convince parents of color that charter schools are on their side. (Collins & Adamcikova, 2018)

Similar concerns about funding and intent have been expressed about Parent Revolution, an organization funded by millions in Broad, Walton and Gates and at least fifteen other education reform foundations, which has purveyed research about market-based school choice into policy conversations in California and across the nation (Cohn, 2013). Parent Revolution initially lobbied for California’s 2010 Parent Trigger law that allows for a majority of parents to vote to turn over a neighborhood public school to a charter school. Center for Education Organizing at Annenberg Institute for School Reform (2012) reported that the American Legislative Exchange Council (ALEC), a coalition of legislators, businesses, and foundations that promotes conservative, corporate-supported policy proposals, also voted to embrace the Parent Trigger which led to its introduction in seventeen states and becoming law in five states (Texas, Ohio, Indiana, Mississippi, and Louisiana). Rogers, Lubienski, Scott, & Welner (2015) argued that parent trigger ultimately thwarts continued, sustained community and parental involvement because it outsources school governance to Educational Management Organizations (EMOs) who have no obligation to (and often no physical presence in) the community. Despite the critiques of their agenda, Parent Revolution continues to creating and disseminating research focused on encouraging market-based school choice “for all families.”

How have communities responded to astroturfing organizations heavily funded by policy patrons and purveying market-based school choice research? At the local and national levels, community-based organizations have recognized how school choice policies adversely impact public education. In 2016, the NAACP called for a moratorium on charter schools until the impact is better understood and more transparency and accountability can be integrated in the public policy. The Alliance to Reclaim Our Schools formed a national coalition of community and labor groups to advocate for a variety of policies, such as investment in public schools (AROS, 2018). Within the AROS umbrella, a community-based organization called Journey for Justice (J4J), comprised of community members and grassroots organizations in 21 cities, has set out to halt this progression of school choice models, demanding “community-driven alternatives to the privatization of and dismantling of public school systems” (J4J, 2018).

J4J’s membership list illustrates the documented footprint of school choice and privatization across the country: Atlanta (GA), Baltimore (MD), Boston (MA), Chicago (IL), Detroit (MI), Eupora (MS), Hartford (CT), Los Angeles and Oakland (CA), Newark, Patterson, Camden, Jersey City and Elizabeth (NJ), Minneapolis (MN), New Orleans (LA), New York City (NY), Philadelphia and Pittsburgh (PA), Washington D.C., and Wichita (KS). J4J (2018) explained their approach,

The policies of the last fifteen years, driven more by private interests than by concern for our children’s education, are devastating our neighborhoods and our democratic rights…. Across our cities and school districts, our public schools are being closed. Students are being displaced and families are losing access to neighborhood schools. Sometimes, closure is based on student academic performance. Sometimes it is rationalized by under-enrollment or financial needs. But in every case—every time a neighborhood public school is closed—students’ education is disrupted and communities are destabilized.

The coalition has sought to engage academics to present their research to create an important counter-narrative to the political framing and research being utilized to justify school closures and charter and voucher proliferation. For example, J4J has highlight the work of XXXXXXXX which found that school closings disproportionately impact African American and Latino students, schools and communities in Chicago.

A number of community-based organizations, such as the NAACP, have also filed complaints under Title VI of the Civil Rights Act with the Department of Education’s Office of Civil Rights and utilizing research to demand that the Department investigate and research the racial impact of public school closings in these cities (Citation, XXXX). However, with the appointment of school choice advocate Betsy DeVos to U.S. Secretary of Education, even the federal oversight role, especially in the area of civil rights, has been diminished as choice policies remain a top priority (Citation, XXXX).

I didn’t discuss the following, because I don’t have the research at hand:

– Media about research paid for by policy patrons (Edweek, Ed Post)

– Talking heads and other advocates (DFER) of research (now pulling back from using research)

– BAEO DFER vs Civil Rights responding now

– ALEC

I. Conclusion

Thus, the use of research within the domain of school choice in communities is often a more severe case of the disconnect between research, practice, and policy. The lack of strong, positive research evidence on school choice does not support its implementation at scale. Yet, countervailing interests of profit and labor disruption, with the political support of the “policy patrons” and their local allies, has created an environment of expanding school choice policies. This unsubstantiated displacement of public education has galvanized community organizations, both locally and nationally, to attempt to preserve public education as an American institution by engaging in the political discourse using research showing the increased stratification that often accompanies school choice programs. Furthermore, these organizations cite the racial and socio-economic targeting of these policies on minority and marginalized populations as a continuing threat to the American ideal of meritocracy instead of monarchy.

The disruption of labor also has motivated groups that support school choice. As noted above, the social network of school choice supporters reveals different agendas that have joined under Friedman’s ideological approach. Some groups, such as Learn Capital, see the education as an industry worth over $600 million per year in the U.S. and over $5 trillion per year globally. They seek profit streams from these secure, long-term government expenditures. Because teachers represent, by far, the largest percentage of expenditure in education, profit-seekers often look to reduce teacher labor cost (while not reducing government expenditure). Such methods include displacing professional teachers with cheaper, uncertified ones (as happened in New Orleans) or replacing them partially or entirely with technology (Adamson et al., 2016). Then, because teacher displacement reduces teacher union power, organizations with anti-labor models, such as the Walmart Corporation, may take an interest in school choice policies from a labor perspective. Indeed, the Walton Foundation, run by the heirs of Walmart, supports school choice policies and their anti-union impacts, even if such an explicit link remains unstated (Rich, 2014).

Trump and DeVos has cause them to focus on choice generally. All choice is good if its quality choice.

Parent Revolution’s Choice4LA program partners with community and non-profit organizations to provide families in Los Angeles with information and direct support to find and enroll their children in quality K-12 public schools. Although there are almost 300,000 families utilizing various types of public school choice in Los Angeles, and many public schools providing an excellent education, there are still roughly 160,0000 students attending persistently low-performing schools. The majority of these students are low-income, students of color.   

This report examines and analyzes the qualitative and quantitative findings of the first year of Choice4LA, highlighting seven lessons learned from families attempting to access school choice. It also includes four subsequent recommendations for implementation by the Los Angeles Unified School District and Los Angeles’ charter school sector to increase accessibility to quality school choices for all families. Those recommendations include a greater focus on quality choices, simplifying all steps of the school choice process, improving families’ access to school quality data, and strengthening the role that interpersonal networks play in supporting families as they choose schools for their children.

Education reform has found momentum from a comingling of ideology, methods and funding fomented by disparate political actors. The movement has provided a strong foundation for the expansion of school choice during the past two decades and has sought justification of that support through research funded by and within the reform network (Vasquez Heilig & Clark, 2018). However, the election of Donald Trump and his selection of Betsy DeVos at US Secretary of Education has made education reform more partisan as Democrats have become less likely to support charters schools. EducationNext (2017) found that informing respondents that “President Donald Trump has expressed support for charter schools” lifted Republican support by 15 percentage points while reducing it by 3 percentage points among Democrats. Furthermore, education reformers are reporting that they are finding it increasingly difficult to foment the market-based school choice agenda on the left of the political spectrum (Bradford, 2017).

Considering that the quantification of the human condition and experience purports to provide efficient understandings that support legislative and financial changes proffers the opportunity to cast social phenomena into the realm of hard sciences in the never satiable quest for certainty and generalizability.

The very suggestion that schools ought to be understood in terms of deregulated choices within a marketplace re-situates the onus of responsibility onto the individual family. If educational success is not found, then it becomes easier to blame ‘poor choices’ rather than understand and ameliorate systemic inequalities that inform disperate educative experiences in the United States.

Could use this paragraph to frame “choice” from Global Ed Reform, or at least situate choice within the choice-competition-quality axis.