Editorials

SACRAMENTO — Citywide voucher programs for low-income students in other states have shown “somewhat promising” results but raise questions about whether a statewide plan in California would do the same, a new study says. 

Proposition 38, a measure on California’s Nov. 7 ballot, would give parents across California $4,000 in taxpayer money to send their child to a private school, regardless of the family's income.  

A review released Wednesday by Policy Analysis for California Education looked at studies of student achievement in citywide voucher programs in Dayton, Milwaukee, New York City and Washington, D.C.  

The report found black children's math scores rose in the first year, but reading scores failed to rise for any group, and math scores for Latino and white students showed no improvement.  

It is unknown if those results could be applied to the statewide voucher system envisioned by Proposition 38, said Bruce Fuller, a study co-author and a University of California, Berkeley, education professor.  

“It's a great question. Voters need to be very careful not to generalize from these smaller city experiments,” he said.  

In New York City, parents who applied for the privately funded vouchers tended to be somewhat better educated and more likely to be working and from a two-parent household than low-income parents in general in the city, Fuller said.  

The rise in test scores shown in the citywide voucher programs is similar to one-year increases seen in states including California after infusions of new funding and improvement programs such as statewide standards and testing, according to the study by PACE, an educational research group affiliated with the UC Berkeley and Stanford University.  

The only thing really certain about Proposition 38 is that if it is approved by voters, the state will have to pay nearly $3 billion within four years to the mostly affluent parents whose children are currently in private schools, the study said.  

“This is a cost the state is going to incur no matter what,” said study co-author Luis Huerta.  

The state could start saving money if students now in public schools shift to private schools, since the state would pay their parents the $4,000 voucher instead of more than $6,700 to the public school, he said.  

If 10 percent of public school students, or 600,000, switched to vouchers, the state's net cost would be $200 million a year, the study said.  

The state’s private schools currently only have about 32,000 vacant spaces, according to a California Catholic Conference survey quoted by the PACE study.  

The $4,000 voucher is not going to be enough money to pay the capital costs for new or expanded private schools, Huerta said.  

In addition, nothing in Proposition 38 prevents private schools from increasing their tuition to deal with the sudden demand, the study said.  

For example, a private school now charging $4,000 tuition could increase that to $8,000 and keep all its current students, whose parents could collect vouchers and come out even, Fuller said.  

Proposition 38 sponsor Tim Draper of Redwood City was making a campaign appearance Tuesday in San Diego and did not immediately respond to messages left with his spokesperson by The Associated Press seeking comment on the report.  

Jon Lensner, a spokesman for the opposition campaign, said the study showed Proposition 38 “is welfare for the rich.” The PACE study took no position for or against Proposition 38.  

On the Net:  

Read the PACE study at http://pace.Berkeley.edu  

Read Proposition 38 at www.ss.ca.gov