All-star lineup set for School Choice Week town hall meeting

January 16, 2012

Public education is being redefined. More and more, people are coming to understand that “public education” simply means “educating the public”—and it doesn’t matter where that education takes place.

Pennsylvania state Sen. Anthony H. Williams, a liberal black Democrat, says “an innovative and productive public education system can include homeschooling, parochial schools, private schools, cyber schools, public charter schools and, yes, traditional public schools.” Doug Tuthill, the former president of two teacher unions, likewise talks about an “increasingly customized public-education system” in which parents have a wide variety of choices.

Next week is National School Choice Week, and Gov. Mary Fallin has proclaimed it School Choice Week here in Oklahoma too. She recognizes the importance of Oklahoma’s traditional public schools, charter schools, nonpublic schools, home schools, and more. To learn more about school choice, I invite you to a town hall meeting January 24 in Edmond featuring J.C. Watts, state Superintendent Janet Barresi, John Fund of The Wall Street Journal, state Sen. Gary Stanislawski, and Jeff Reed of the Friedman Foundation for Educational Choice.

“School choice continues to spread, unstoppable now, despite the best efforts of its foes to contain it,” education scholar Chester Finn has correctly observed. Come join us on January 24 to learn more.