Yesterday the New York Times profiled a school district in which the democratically elected school board is dominated by a group that places its financial interests ahead of the educational interests of children in the district. And that group easily wins school board elections because they are well-organized, have cohesive interests, and turn-out to vote in much higher numbers than parents of children in the schools.
No, the NYT hasn’t suddenly decided to publicize the money-grabbing, electoral bullying of teacher unions in large numbers of school districts all around the country. Instead the NYT is concerned about the money-grabbing, electoral bullying of a community of Orthodox Jews in Rockland County, NY.
Well, the NYT didn’t exactly describe the Orthodox Jews as money-grabbing: “Many of the Orthodox here and elsewhere feel crushed by the weight of high school taxes and private school tuition.”
The problem, as the NYT piece suggests, is the sense that schools ought be controlled by the families that send their children to those schools: “But increasingly, others are chafing at the idea that people who don’t send their children to the public schools are making the decisions for those from very different cultures who do.”
I have to say that I am sympathetic to this concern. There are problems with control over schools being located outside of the families whose children attend those schools. But, unlike the NYT, I don’t restrict my concern to instances involving Orthodox Jews.
It concerns me that President Obama, who has never sent his children to public schools, and Arne Duncan, who intentionally avoided placing his children in DC public schools, are making decisions to compel children to return to D.C. public schools.
It concerns me that teacher unions dominate school board elections all over the country, placing their financial interests ahead of the educational interests of children. In many urban school districts disproportionate numbers of teacher union members also don’t send their own children to the public schools.
The obvious solution is to increase control over schools by the families that attend them by giving those families vouchers. Empowered with vouchers, schools will be responsive to the interests of current and prospective students rather than the interests of people whose children do not attend those schools is order to attract and retain the revenue those vouchers bring.
Of course, the general regulatory framework governing schools could still be under democratic control, including non-parents. But let’s restrict the general public’s involvement in controlling schools to the broad regulatory issues that affect the public’s interests as opposed to the operational details of individual schools.
Jay P. Greene's Blog 
So let me see if I understand. If these parents are coerced into government monopoly schools and respond by organizing themselves in order to take back control of their children’s education from the state, that’s bad, because they share a religious affiliation and religion is icky.
But if they ask the state to give them back control over their children’s education through vouchers, so that they’ll be free to do things their way and everyone else will all be free to do things in their own respective ways . . . well, that’s also bad, also because the parents are religious and religion is icky.
It seems that anything religious people do other than “lie back and take it” is sick, evil and wrong.
Am I missing something here?
NYTimes = Eric Cartman: http://www.dailymotion.com/video/x1m6iq_southparkjewgold_fun