To: The Pennsylvania State House, The Pennsylvania State Senate, and Governor Tom Wolf
Vouchers and state funding for schools now
Funding for public and charter schools in the Commonwealth of Pennsyvlania shall be apportioned by dividing the number of funds collected in all school districts by the number of students served, state-wide, and then assigned as grants, or vouchers, per each student.
The parents of each student will determine to which school, public, charter, private, or parochial such funding should be directly paid. If the cost per child of attending such school is completely covered, then the school has been paid. If the cost is greater, then it is up to the parent to pay the difference, seek scholarship aid from private sources, or choose a different school.
Funding must remain discrimination-free. Vouchers or grants, as named in this petition, will be available to all children attending school in the Commonwealth without regard to race, religious affiliation (of the child or of the school), gender, sexual orientation, or political affiliation of the child or of the parent.
The funding, whether for private, charter or government-run public schooling, is to be used for secular educative purposes only, and never for the explicit teaching of religion, except in a comparative religions or social studies class, if such is available as an elective in a valid social studies curriculum. Otherwise, it is to be devoted to the teaching of mathematics, reading, writing, grammar, social science, science and so on, recognized by the Commonwealth as valid curricula.
Nothing in this act seeks to demand nor deny the teaching of religion in the Commonwealth, but rather seeks to keep funding for all non-religious teaching separate, and accountably executed .
The nature of state-wide funding, rather than parochial, district by district, funding is to break down economic barriers that create economic ghettos that segregate rich and poor students, isolating talent from means.
The parents of each student will determine to which school, public, charter, private, or parochial such funding should be directly paid. If the cost per child of attending such school is completely covered, then the school has been paid. If the cost is greater, then it is up to the parent to pay the difference, seek scholarship aid from private sources, or choose a different school.
Funding must remain discrimination-free. Vouchers or grants, as named in this petition, will be available to all children attending school in the Commonwealth without regard to race, religious affiliation (of the child or of the school), gender, sexual orientation, or political affiliation of the child or of the parent.
The funding, whether for private, charter or government-run public schooling, is to be used for secular educative purposes only, and never for the explicit teaching of religion, except in a comparative religions or social studies class, if such is available as an elective in a valid social studies curriculum. Otherwise, it is to be devoted to the teaching of mathematics, reading, writing, grammar, social science, science and so on, recognized by the Commonwealth as valid curricula.
Nothing in this act seeks to demand nor deny the teaching of religion in the Commonwealth, but rather seeks to keep funding for all non-religious teaching separate, and accountably executed .
The nature of state-wide funding, rather than parochial, district by district, funding is to break down economic barriers that create economic ghettos that segregate rich and poor students, isolating talent from means.
Why is this important?
It is time to launch a citizen's right to use his or her money for the good of the children in his or her community. It is time to make it law that any parent, regardless of income, gender, race, religious affiliation, or status in life should have the right to use his or her share of his school district's per child funding, or ideally state funding, in the form of a voucher that would permit him or her to send their child to the school of their choice, so long as the money is earmarked for teaching of non-religious subjects in that school of choice. It should not matter if the school is itself religiously affiliated, as long as it meets state and district standards of pedagogy for subjects like mathematics, reading, grammar, writing, spelling, geography, history and the social sciences, and no public money is used to fund the teaching of religion. It is hypocritical to limit at the K-12 level what we do not limit at the post-secondary level. We permit PHEAA and federal grants to be used at private and religious affiliated post-secondary schools. Take as an example schools like Catholic Villanova and St. Joseph's University, or private University of Pennsylvania or Dusquesne, etc. We never limit the use of public funds to just the neighborhood community college, for example. We sponsor our children's effort to achieve the best. If we are willing to adequately fund our children and expand their choices once they graduate from high school, should we not also maximize their choices in getting into high school and college in the first place? Vouchers should, by law, be available to every child in the Commonwealth. FInally, we should stop segregating children by school based upon how much housing their parents can afford. All state funding is needed, not local funding, as the major source of school funding. Adjustments can be made that adjust funding per student based on real-evidence of cost regionally, but otherwise funding should be evenly distributed. This may require all districts to pool their resources, or a legistaltively derermined portion of their resources, in a state pool, to be re-distributed per child. Provisions to reimburse home-schoolers for approved and verifiable costs will be determined by the Legislature.