"School Choice": The Home-Fooled Assault On Tennessee Public Education

There is a very weird far-right assault underway against public education as demonstrated by the 2006 campaigns launched by self-described "School Choice" candidates running for state and local offices in Washington County, Tennnessee --- the upshot is that "School Choice" is a political money grab seeking to transfer both tax and grant revenues away from public education in Tennessee and allocated toward subsidizing private home schooling activites. Two emerging School Choice candidates include the Tennessee 6th House District candidate Patti Jarrett and 3rd District Washington County Board of Education candidate Kurt Fagerburg:

School Choice

One of the most important things we can do to improve education in Washington County is to let parents choose the best education possible for their children through a public/private education partnership.

We should allow parents to use a portion of the funds they contribute to the public schools to pay for education in a private school if they feel their child's education needs would be better met that way.

Not only does this make sure every child gets a top-flight education -- whether they stay in the public school or go to a private one -- but it reduces the overall cost of education to the taxpayer and relieves school overcrowding. In fact, this is an alternative to building new schools in the county to accommodate our growing student population.
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Kurt Appears on Good Morning Tri-Cities (mp3)

Kurt appeared on Good Morning Tri-Cities with Timothy Hill on Power Talk 870 on April 17th. Power Talk has allowed Kurt to post the interview on this site. [WPWT very likely provided Fagerburg with a DAT recording of the interview as this file is posted to Fagerburg's server instead of the server for the WPWT web site]

Listen to Kurt explain how our school system can be improved and how school choice will help save Washington County taxpayers from millions of dollars in higher property taxes.
approximately 14 minutes download on dail-up ISP;
"home schooling @6:30,
Washington County taxpayers subsidizing "School Choice" @11:30.


About Kurt: The Fagerburg Family

Kurt works in information technology at Citi Commerce Solutions in Gray. He has worked in technology and marketing for non-profit organizations and technology firms for eight years. He recently earned a Master's degree in Business Administration from East Tennessee State University and he has a Bachelor's degree in Political Science from Brigham Young University.

The first problem that I see up front about the School Choice concept is the pretext that somehow the portion of local/state taxes paid by home schooling parents exceeds the amount of educational state and federal grant monies and local tax revenue per student that are lost when a child is removed from a public school system and placed into a home school situation.

The second problem a see if electing a candidate to a school board or the Tennessee General Assembly who holds a mental reservation against public education in general, and more specifically refuses to enroll his or her own children within the public school system that they are wanting to control through either board management or state legislation:

School Board/County Commission Forum in Jonesborough Tonight
Filed under: Law/Politics — Jama at 8:30 am on Tuesday, May 9, 2006

I just got an email from Kurt Fagerburg concerning the School Board/County Commission Forum going on tonight at the Jonesborough Visitor’s Center from 5:30-9:00. Kurt, by the way, is fantastic - a candidate for school board who supports home schooling (and even home schools his own children) can’t be bad. And, according to his email, he disagrees with the Teacher’s Union on “just about everything,” so, there are couple more points in his favor.

I don't know how the citizens of Utah approach the "School Choice" isssue, but Kurt Fagerburg appears to be the crackpot voters' for four years or so of built-in conflict directed toward students, educators, staff, and administrators working within the Washington County School System.

Score Another One for Kurt Fagerburg!
Filed under: Law/Politics — Jama at 7:11 am on Friday, May 19, 2006

Kurt Fagerburg, candidate for school board in Washington County, is proudly in favor of school choice. As a soon-to-be mom who will be homeschooling [sic], I am thrilled that Kurt is running and sticking to his belief that school choice is the soluction[sic] to the school overcrowding problem rather than building programs. My only question is, what about homeschoolers [sic]? Will we benefit from Kurt’s school choice plan? I know that Kurt homeschools [sic] at least one of his own children, so I can only hope that his plan allows for refunds to homeschooling [sic] taxpayers as well.

School Choice is Solution, not Building Program

Kurt Fagerburg, candidate for the Washington County Board of Education in the 3rd district, believes that school choice is the best way to alleviate overcrowding in the public schools and improve the quality of education.

“If we implement school choice we will significantly improve the quality of education inthe county, fix our overcrowding problem, and save the county taxpayers at least $100 million in unnecessary building program spending,” said Fagerburg.

“Current school board members will tell you that 30% of our high school graduates have to take remedial classes when they get to college. Additional building projects will not solve that. The proposed building program will use up already limited resources, put the county into enormous debt, and give us more of the same mediocre results. We need to try something different to fix our schools – and school choice is a solution,” Fagerburg said.

Fagerburg’s plan is to refund to parents who choose private schools a portion of the per-pupil spending allowance to help pay for tuition at one of the many private schools in the area. Currently Washington County spends over $6,000 per pupil.

“If we give parents a choice, many of them would choose to have their children attend a private school – especially since we have some very good ones in the area. If enough parents made that choice our public school overcrowding problems would be fixed. We wouldn’t need to build those additional buildings,” said Fagerburg.

According to Fagerburg, whenever school choice has been implemented the public schools have benefited. Since private schools cost less to run than public schools, the refund to parents who choose a private school will save taxpayers money. It would also increase the dollars spent per pupil remaining in the public schools.

“This is a win-win situation. Parents get more flexibility for their children’s education and the public schools have more resources per pupil. This is a solution that makes sense for Washington County,” Fagerburg said.

6th House District candidate Patti Jarrett has also been spewing similar School Choice rants through her 2006 campaign web site and telephonic conversations with Timothy Hill during WPWT 870 AM "Guten Morgen Tri-Cities":

Patti Jarrett - Platform.

Patti Jarrett - Qualifications.