Dear Friend,

In Virginia this week, conservatives won state-wide elections for the first time in twelve years. Why? A big part of the reason was school choice. 
 
The conservative candidates in the contest came out strongly in favor of school choice, which proved to be pretty popular. Having been behind in the polls for months, once the conservatives made school choice the centerpiece of their campaign, they stormed ahead.
 
Here in Mississippi conservatives have been banging on about school choice for as long as anyone can remember. The reality is that we still have surprisingly little to show for it.
 
Besides a handful of Charter Schools in Mississippi, what has really changed? Many families in our state have more choice over where they buy their groceries that they do over the public education that their children get.

Charter Schools are wonderful. They are a brilliant way of giving lots of kids opportunities that previously only rich people had. Charter schools have an extraordinary record elevating education standards and ensuring young Americans from every background get a great start in life.  
 
The trouble is there just aren’t enough of them. 
 
Rather than put all of the school choice eggs into the Charter School basket, conservatives need to find additional ways of giving parents power. That means advocating for a comprehensive school freedom program, including open enrolment. 
 
Rather than picking fights with teachers, we need to make it clear that we want a better deal for teachers – if not necessarily for their union bosses. 
 
Since 1992, the amount of funding spent per pupil in our state grew by 54%. Teacher pay, however, rose a mere 2%. We want reform so that more of the money goes into the classroom, not on the kind of fat cat administration salaries that we have seen.
 
Virginia shows that this kind of conservatism is popular. Here at the Mississippi Center for Public Policy we are producing specific proposals to show how it can be done.
 

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