Center for School Transformation

Education

Since the 1970s, American students have averaged the same flabby test scores, while federal and state spending and regulations have increased madly in an attempt to boost them. Average per-pupil spending has risen about 300% during that time period. Public school enrollment has increased about 10% since 1970, while public school employment has doubled. 

Everyone knows we must try something better and different, and fast. The Heartland Institute's Education Issue Suite not only aggregates decades of the latest school reform news and research, but reaches behind the scenes to bring you experts analyzing which of these expanding options actually do expand the options for students and their families. No other think tank or publication instigates and investigates education reform this way. Browse by daily for the best and latest in student-centered education policy.

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Featured Works

The Common Core: A Poor Choice For States

The Parent Trigger: Justification and Design Guidelines

Making Texas Public Education More Efficient: Taxpayer Savings Grant Program

Ten Principles of Higher Education Reform

Ideas

  • Taxpayer Savings Grants

    Originally proposed in Texas in 2011, Taxpayer Savings Grants would reimburse parents for tuition paid for enrollment of children at private schools of their choice in the amount of actual tuition or 60 percent of the state’s average per-pupil maintenance and operations expenditure, whichever is less. Students entering kindergarten or enrolled in a public school for at least one year would be eligible. The Heartland Institute estimates about 6% of public school students would be moved to private schools, saving the state approximately $1 billion a year.

  • School Vouchers

    Giving public funds to consumers in the form of vouchers is not a radical idea. Existing voucher programs include food stamps, low-income housing vouchers, the GI Bill and Pell Grants for college students. There can be little doubt that the schools parents would choose under a school choice program would be different from those currently funded with tax dollars.

  • The Parent Trigger

    This might just be the most powerful education reform policy since Milton Friedman advocated the school voucher. Begun in California, the Parent Trigger allows a majority of parents to petition to have their local school reorganized or transformed into a charter, or even to receive vouchers to choose private schools. Built on the framework of choice and democracy, the Parent Trigger crosses ideological lines and empowers parents.

Education

School Reform News

School Reform News is The Heartland Institute's monthly print publication sent both to paying subscribers and each and every elected official. Click on the image below to browse the publication's archives.

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