School choice
Do-It-Yourself Vouchers
Over the next few months, Nevada’s legislators will consider a school voucher program for the Silver State. The taxpayer-funded voucher movement continues to make headway across America, particularly since the U.S. Supreme Court’s recent decision not to examine the constitutionality of the state of Wisconsin’s program.
Nevada’s Most-Overlooked Stories
Last month "Project Censored," an annual public relations stunt by the far left, revealed its list of the top censored stories of 1997. The list is comprised of trendy liberal topics that are largely overlooked by the mainstream press. The list’s name is disingenuous—the stories are not "censored" at all, but regularly see print in ultra-leftist publications such as The Nation and Mother Jones. The Reno News & Review compiled its own list covering subjects within the state, including "overpopulation" in Washoe Valley and Nevada’s "rule by the rich." NPRI has a somewhat different take on the types of stories to which Nevada’s media turns a blind eye. Herewith, NPRI’s list of the most-overlooked stories of the last 12 months.
Too Cool for School
As Nevada children return to school over the next few weeks, over 3,000 of their fellow students will not be joining them. Nevada’s home-school movement has grown considerably in recent years, from 365 students in 1987 to over 3,000 in 1996. As the public education system continues to perform poorly, many parents are taking it upon themselves to educate their children at home. Nationally, there are now an estimated 1.23 million home-school children. That figure is greater than the combined enrollments of public schools in Alaska, Delaware, North Dakota, Rhode Island, South Dakota, Vermont and Wyoming.
What is a Charter School?
Discussions of education reform often include the term "charter schools," but misconceptions and misunderstandings often accompany this term. Simply put, a charter school is a publicly-funded entity operating free of many of the regulations under which traditional public schools operate. Specifically, they are legally and fiscally autonomous educational entities operating within the public school system under charters or contracts. The charters are negotiated between organizers and sponsors. The organizers may be teachers, parents, or others from the public or private sectors. The sponsors may be local school boards, state school boards, or other public authorities such as universities. The concept is aimed at producing increased responsiveness to the demands of parents, students and teachers, and greater opportunities for innovation in school management and education. Twenty-six states as well as Washington D.C. have passed varying types of charter school legislation. Nevada Senate Bill 220 reintroduces potential charter school legislation for our state. The following is a list of the main components of an ideal charter school model compared to S.B. 220 as well as case studies from California and Arizona.
Designing A Public School Choice Program That Can Pay For Itself
Proposals for an educational choice program that would allow parents to choose among public and private schools with the aid of a state scholarship have reached considerable support among parents, businessmen and some teachers.
