Competition makes for better schools

As a product of parochial schools and a Chicago high school teacher for 10 years, a union representative and a principal in various Chicago schools for 37 years, I have witnessed many educational systems from all sides.

I have been retired for years and as I look at the controversies surrounding schools today, I have come to one conclusion — vouchers for everybody. We need more competition.

A single government school system doesn’t work. Some schools are great; others are terrible. Some teachers are outstanding; other teachers are incompetent or worse. Tenure is a disaster as it is now used. Principals should be able to choose their teachers. Parents should have more control over their schools, teachers and principals.

Let’s consider a voucher for parents that would provide 50 percent of per-pupil cost for home-schoolers, 75 percent for private and parochial school parents and 90 percent for parents of children with special needs, all to be adjusted as required. Some such system would result in an immediate improvement for all schools.

If a voucher system were introduced, private and parochial schools would flourish, home-school parents would devise imaginative inter-home arrangements, and within two years there would be a whole different complex of public school-private and parochial and home-school patterns.

One of the greatest beneficiaries would be the public school systems as these new options evolve. Additionally, the child destined to go to the local inner-city school that has never produced any results would finally have a chance of finding an effective school.

William C. McNerney

Batavia