Are public school teachers more likely than the general public to send their kids to private schools? The Washington Times says yes:
More than 25 percent of public school teachers in Washington and Baltimore send their children to private schools, a new study reports.
Nationwide, public school teachers are almost twice as likely as other parents to choose private schools for their own children, the study by the Thomas B. Fordham Institute found. More than 1 in 5 public school teachers said their children attend private schools.
In Washington (28 percent), Baltimore (35 percent) and 16 other major cities, the figure is more than 1 in 4. In some cities, nearly half of the children of public school teachers have abandoned public schools.
In Philadelphia, where 30.9% of all parents choose private schooling, 43.8% of local public school teachers do so.
Some of these teachers, I'm sure, have special needs children who can benefit more from private schools. And while teachers at the low end of income are more likely than all families to use private schools, teachers at the high end of income are less likely to use private schools.
But one conclusion to be drawn from this is that public school teachers are as well-aware, if not more so, than the general public of the differences in quality between public and private schools as one goes up and down the income ladder. I don't really see these results as damning to teachers; I see these results as yet more data supporting parental choice in the school system. These conclusions certainly don't support the educational status quo which states all parents, including low-income ones, should be satisfied with government-run public schools. If the teachers aren't, there's no reason parents should be.
What's more, when teachers DO start to prefer public schools, it just might be because there are more choices in that area:
The report says the school choice movement has begun competitively forcing public school improvement, particularly in cities like Milwaukee, called "a hotbed of school reform," where 29.4 percent of public school teachers sent their children to private schools, the study finds.
"Narrow the search to teachers making less than $42,000 and the percentage enrolling their children in private schools drops to 10 percent. Because Milwaukee is a hotbed of school reform, it's possible that teachers making less than $42,000 are beginning to favor the public school system."
"If so, it might be evidence that choice is having the intended effect of spurring improvements in public education there. Or perhaps the emergence of [public school] charters has provided another free option to lower-income teachers who might otherwise choose private schooling."
An interesting note: 11 of the 21 schools for which teachers are less likely to send kids to private schools than the general public are in the South. But of the 29 schools where teachers are more likely, only 7 are in the South. It could be just a trick of the sample surveyed, but also might support the idea that the South has more functional urban public schools (or just fewer private schools from which to choose).
Also - hmmm:
Michael Pons, spokesman for the National Education Association, the 2.7-million-member public school union, declined a request for comment on the study's findings. The American Federation of Teachers also declined to comment.
Posted by kswygert at September 22, 2004 11:35 AM