Government Attacks on Parental Choice in Virtual K-12 Education in Virginia. Chapter 5: Driving Out Commercial Providers
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4 responses to “Government Attacks on Parental Choice in Virtual K-12 Education in Virginia. Chapter 5: Driving Out Commercial Providers”
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That “Actual Local Expenditures for Operation above RLE (Required Local Effort)”is not money just laying around as “excess”. It is what the school division spent over and above what was the minimum required by the SOQ funding formula. It might have been used to pay teachers more than the “prevailing salary” used in the basic aid formula. It might have been used to hire more teachers or counselors than required by the SOQ formula.
You acknowledge that it was financially advantageous for Richmond to switch from the MOP to Virtual Virginia. One can hardly blame RPS for trying to save money.
You cite the “terrific” SOL performances of the students in the Stride program. The implication is that the Stride program is singularly responsible for those performances. Another assumption is just as reasonable: Those kids were the kinds of kids who had scored well on SOL tests in their home school districts before the pandemic and the advent of virtual education and will continue to score well in the future whether they return to brick and mortar schools or enroll in Virtual Virginia. It would be interesting to conduct such a comparison. But, that would be an enormous undertaking and, due to privacy concerns of individual student records, it might not be possible.
I, for one, am glad that Richmond cut back on its MOP contract. Those 3,000 nonresident students that show up in the Richmond SOL test results skew the results and help to hide the poor job the district itself is doing. If the state is going to allow districts to contract with MOPs and enroll nonresident students, the money may follow the student, but the test results should either be reported in the students’ home districts, or the MOP should be treated as a distinct school district for the purpose of SOL records.
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Your first paragraph is true and undisputed. The second one is a supposition. I have no idea why Richmond dropped the contract, and have said so. I made no implication about the reason for the outperformance of the Stride students, other than to report it, and to note that they take all applicants.
I have also noted that VDOE has reported neither the demographics nor the SOL scores of its Virtual Virginia students, who are, unlike the MOP students, screened by school counselors before being permitted to apply. When you read my recommendations tomorrow that I have already posted for timed release, you will see that I recommend professional assessments of both costs and value of Virtual Virginia and its MOP competitors.
It is a giant leap to say that you are glad that Richmond cancelled its MOP contract. Hundreds of kids who live in Richmond and had been attending Stride’s Virginia Virtual Academy, some for years, were by that action forced to leave their school. But you did not know that.
This is a story that by the end of tomorrow I will have rolled out in eight parts. I am truly sorry it takes that long to tell. But that is a direct result of the endless complexity and multiple curtains behind which Virginia’s “system” is hidden.
That, my friend, is the crux of the problem.
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Semi-related. In a new VCU poll, 52% of Virginians supported increased charter schools while 34% opposed.
Looks like Youngkin has a winner.
https://drive.google.com/file/d/1HR1BveTiKgUVNQ5xyPtWOev_W_XbL-EY/view
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Four thousand kids forced out of a system that worked for them and their parents, and for what? VDOE and RCPS actions make no sense.
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