Tag Archives | Indiana

Indiana students flocking to Catholic schools

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On August 29, 2011 in Catholic education, Education and Public Policy, General, School Choice

The Associated Press reports that Indiana’s new school voucher program has caused a spike in enrollment at the state’s Catholic schools:

Weeks after Indiana began the nation’s broadest school voucher program, thousands of students have transferred from public to private schools, causing a spike in enrollment at some Catholic institutions that were only recently on the brink of closing for lack of pupils …

… Nearly 70 percent of the vouchers approved statewide are for students opting to attend Catholic schools, according to figures provided by the dioceses in Indiana. The majority are in the urban areas of Indianapolis, Fort Wayne, South Bend and Gary, where many public schools have long struggled …

… Our Lady of Hungary Catholic School in South Bend is among those institutions reaping the benefits of the vouchers. Just two years ago, it was threatened with closure by the Diocese of Fort Wayne-South Bend. Now enrollment at Our Lady of Hungary has jumped nearly 60 percent over last year, largely because of an influx of voucher students.

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Same arguments, different rulings

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On August 16, 2011 in Education and Public Policy, General, Parental Choice, Religious education, School Choice

An Indiana judge refused to halt the state’s new voucher program, concluding that new statutory provisions guaranteeing publicly funded choice of even parochial schools are “religion-neutral” and “for the benefit” of students, not churches. It is a conclusion wholly different from one ruling issued Friday in Colorado, where a district judge weighed similar arguments challenging a Douglas County voucher plan and found that the same choice provided “no meaningful limitations on the use of taxpayer funds to support or promote religion.”

From Indiana Superior Court Judge Michael Keele:

The [scholarship program] is religion-neutral and was enacted ‘for the benefit’ of students, not religious institutions or activities … It permits taxpayer funds to be paid to religious schools only upon the private, individual choices of parents …

… [The plaintiffs] would thus threaten long-established, and apparently unquestioned, Indiana traditions of permitting tax dollars to be spent on religious education by way of private, individual choice.

From Colorado District Judge Michael A. Martinez on the Douglas County ruling:

Because the scholarship aid is available to students attending elementary and secondary institutions, and because the religious Private School Partners infuse religious tenets into their educational curriculum, any funds provided to the schools, even if strictly limited to the cost of education, will result in the impermissible aid to Private School Partners to further their missions of religious indoctrination to purportedly ‘pubic’ school students.

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Catholic diocese: All Are Welcome

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On August 5, 2011 in Catholic education, Education and Public Policy, General, School Choice

To those who argue that voucher and tax credit policies create dual school systems where one half cherry-picks students who are less difficult to teach, look to the Catholic Diocese of Evansville, Ind., which is embracing the state’s new voucher law and starting the school year with a new theme: “All Are Welcome.”

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Interest spiking in Indiana voucher program

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On July 14, 2011 in Catholic education, Education and Public Policy, General, Parental Choice, School Choice

While a group of educators and clergy are challenging Indiana’s voucher law in court, more than 125 schools have submitted applications to participate in the program, according to The Associated Press.

About 80 have been admitted to the program, considered one of the most sweeping voucher efforts in the nation which will initially allow a limited number of low- and middle-income families to use public money toward private school tuition. Indiana Gov. Mitch Daniels signed the voucher program into law in May.

Meanwhile, Fort Wayne-South Bend Catholic Diocese Schools Superintendent Mark Myers says his organization “has been flooded with calls from parents hoping to obtain vouchers,” reports Fort Wayne’s The Journal Gazette.

“The target is to admit 25 students in each building or about 1,000 new children in grades K-12 this summer,” Myers wrote in an article for Today’s Catholic News, the diocese’s official publication. “If this goal is reached, the diocese would receive just fewer than 14 percent of the total number of vouchers awarded by the state in 2011.”

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Indiana’s Mitch Daniels on education reform

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On May 5, 2011 in Charter Schools, Education and Public Policy, General, Parental Choice, School Choice

Indiana Gov. Mitch Daniels is planning to sign two sweeping education bills into law today — one that will create the nation’s most expansive school voucher program, another aimed at expanding charter schools. During a talk yesterday at the American Enterprise Institute, Daniels said that no longer will Indiana “incarcerate any family’s kid in a school that they don’t believe is working, having tried it for at least one full year.” That portion of his talk is below. The full hour-long discussion can be found here at AEI’s Web site.

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Indiana’s expansive voucher bill heads to governor’s desk

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On April 27, 2011 in Charter Schools, Education and Public Policy, General, Parental Choice, School Choice

From the Evansville Courier & Press:

INDIANAPOLIS — Two key planks of Indiana Gov. Mitch Daniels’ education reform platform cleared their final legislative hurdles Wednesday and are now headed to the Republican governor’s desk.

The Indiana House of Representatives approved measures Wednesday afternoon that would ease the process of opening new charter schools and launch the nation’s most broad private school voucher program.

Their passage comes as the Republican-led General Assembly enters its final two days, and despite opposition from Democrats in the House who at one point fled to Urbana, Ill. for five weeks to block progress on the education bills and others.

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Indiana Senate passes voucher bill

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On April 21, 2011 in Education and Public Policy, General, Parental Choice, School Choice

From The Associated Press:

The Indiana Senate has approved a plan to create the nation’s most expansive school voucher program.

The Republican-ruled Senate voted 28-22 Thursday to advance the bill, which is the most contentious part of GOP Gov. Mitch Daniels’ extensive education agenda. The bill allows parents to use some of the tax dollars that would normally be sent to public schools at private schools instead.

Families of four making up to about $60,000 a year would qualify. The program would be limited to a fraction of the state’s students – just 7,500 for the first year and 15,000 in the second.

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Indiana Dems revolt against a voucher plan that has liberal roots in their state party

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On February 24, 2011 in Education and Public Policy, General, Parental Choice, School Choice

Now into their third day of a self-imposed exile in neighboring Illinois, Indiana’s House Democrats say they want another 11 Republican-backed bills soon to come up for a vote to be “killed” along with the proposed “right-to-work” legislation that initially prompted their flight from the state.

Republicans have offered to dump the latter, but are refusing to yield on any of the other bills, including a proposal to allow low- and middle-income families a public means to choose a private school for their children. House Minority Leader Patrick Bauer, a Democrat from South Bend, told reporters that the tax credit scholarship proposal and a bill that limits teachers’ collective bargaining rights are “dealbreakers.”

While it’s common for Democratic leaders to distance themselves from tax-credit and voucher programs, it’s interesting to see Indiana’s Democrats do so. After all, in Indiana, such programs had their roots in the Democratic Party, and those roots don’t go back far. Continue Reading →

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