"Invest in Kids," read the signs held by educators at a recent rally at the state Capitol. The rally, organized by the Virginia Education Association and the Virginia PTA, called for more school funding.
We wonder if it's really kids that the teachers want the state to invest in.
Del. Jimmie Massie is sponsoring legislation (HB321) offering corporate income-tax credits to companies that help fund scholarships for poor children. That's an investment in kids, right? Well, the VEA opposes such tuition tax credits, and the president of the Virginia PTA sniffs that they "look a whole lot like vouchers to me."
The VEA argues such tax credits drain money from the public schools. But (a) 70 percent of the General Fund goes to non-education purposes, and (b) under Massie's proposal a company gets a tax credit of only 70 cents for each scholarship dollar. So if a company provides a $100 scholarship, the money available for public K-12 schools would decline by only $21.
That makes the tax credit a clear net gain in terms of total education spending. In fact, it's a nearly 5:1 return. Sounds like a good investment to us. Yet the VEA doesn't like it, because the tuition money is controlled by the student, not the system.
So here's a question: Suppose the General Assembly were to cut state aid to local school systems in half, then give every student in Virginia $9,670 — twice the current state expenditure per student — and allow each student to either give the money to the public school he attends, or spend it on tuition at a private school. That would be a big investment in kids, too. But would the VEA and the PTA approve?
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