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Cheetos or choice?

By Jim Waters

Now that Kentucky’s legislators have passed a law demanding better nutritional options for students, will they recognize with equal fervor the need of offering parents a choice when it comes to the type of education those children receive?

Do-gooders are enthralled with the possibilities presented by removing Snickers bars and soda pop from school vending machines. They say it will help address the serious problems presented by childhood obesity.

Tonya Chang of the American Heart Association even exclaimed that nutritional rules being considered by our state’s Department of Education “could make Kentucky a leader for school nutrition in the nation.”

Is that a goal to which policymakers and Kentucky’s educational leaders should aspire? Should it be Frankfort’s responsibility to try to keep a fourth-grader in Rooster Run from consuming a drink that has more than 40 milligrams of sodium?

Our educational leaders should be less concerned with the quality of food in our children’s stomachs and more concerned with the information that enters their brains. It turns out that most of Kentucky’s fourth-graders are doing about as well on their math exams as if they timed themselves in a race after devouring a bag of Cheetos.

Kentucky’s white fourth-grade students, who comprised 85 percent of the state’s fourth-grade class in 2003, ranked dead last in the nation in math performance, according to the latest results from the National Assessment of Educational Progress (NAEP). And while the state’s black students performed a bit better, their NAEP math ranking compared to blacks in other states plummeted during the past decade.

Before we establish goals to make sure Kentucky’s kids eat more spinach and drink fewer Mountain Dews, shouldn’t we at least get our white fourth-grade students’ math results out of the nation’s cellar? In fact, why is a state law needed to restrict sales of snack foods during school hours when schools like Louisville’s DuPont Manual already have such policies in place?

Apparently, this is a politically palatable issue for those lawmakers determined to protect the status quo. While focusing on the health risks that threaten obese children, these politicians can offer the appearance of taking bold, decisive action on some weighty but “safe” issue.

They can be seen as implementing politically correct policies to bolster the state’s public-education system while avoiding really critical issues. In reality, many of our political leaders have become little more than sugar daddies handing out large wads of cash to failing schools while expecting little in return.

Our state’s public-education leaders should be more concerned about fewer graduates and rising remediation rates as they are about expanding waist lines. Is more physically fit – rather than fewer – dropouts the best we can hope for?

Thankfully, some policymakers are beginning to acknowledge that the state’s public-education system is malnourished. In a recent column published by the Courier-Journal, Jefferson County Public Schools (JCPS) board member Patrick O’Leary pointed out that 35 percent of JCPS eighth-grade students recorded math scores at the “novice” – or lowest – level.

As O’Leary points out, “The definition of novice is a student who demonstrates minimal or incorrect knowledge of concepts, shows limited understanding, makes minimal connections, demonstrates ineffective communication skills, and shows minimal use of critical thinking skills. This definition fits 1 in 3 of our eighth-grade students.”

The kind of courage demonstrated by O’Leary is needed on every local school board and in the legislative halls of Frankfort.

Our state’s political and educational bureaucracies have it backwards. Politicians are trying to make choices about food for Kentucky’s school children – which is strictly the responsibility of parents. At the same time, they steer clear of what government is entrusted with – ensuring that each child has access to a quality education.

The Kentucky Education Reform Act (KERA), which was passed in 1990, insists that no parent in this state should be forced to send their child to a failing school. And yet 31,000 – or nearly one-third – of JCPS students were forced to stay in failing schools during the 2004-05 school year.

Many Kentuckians have the misguided impression that it is government’s job to deliver the education. Instead, policymakers are responsible for simply making sure that all Kentucky children have an equal opportunity to obtain a quality education.

The education vehicles tried so far – substantial funding increases, more and more regulation and botched experiments – are broken down on the side of the road. But all is not lost.

Legislators will have a chance during the 2006 Kentucky General Assembly to pile into the vehicle of school choice – and we don’t mean the choice between lima beans and Oreos, either.

Parents deserve a choice so our kids can have a chance. And parents can do their part by signing the school-choice petition found at www.kentuckyalliance.org.

-– Jim Waters is director of policy and communications for the Bluegrass Institute, Kentucky’s free-market think tank.

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