CO: A Bonkers School Choice Constitutional Amendment

While other states are stumbling over constitutional language that aims public dollars at public schools (e.g. South Carolina and Kentucky), voucher fans in Colorado have proposed a constitutional amendment that comes up for a vote soon. And it is a ridiculously ill-conceived and hastily crafted mess.

The language is simple enough-- here's the whole text, originally known as Initiative 138 and as Amendment 40 and now Amendment 80. 

SECTION 1. In the constitution of the state of Colorado, add section, 18 to article IX as follows: Section 18. Education - School Choice

(1) PURPOSE AND FINDINGS. THE PEOPLE OF THE STATE OF COLORADO HEREBY FIND AND DECLARE THAT ALL CHILDREN HAVE THE RIGHT TO EQUAL OPPORTUNITY TO ACCESS A QUALITY EDUCATION; THAT PARENTS HAVE THE RIGHT TO DIRECT THE EDUCATION OF THEIR CHILDREN; AND THAT SCHOOL CHOICE INCLUDES NEIGHBORHOOD, CHARTER, PRIVATE, AND HOME SCHOOLS, OPEN ENROLLMENT OPTIONS, AND FUTURE INNOVATIONS IN EDUCATION.

(2) EACH K-12 CHILD HAS THE RIGHT TO SCHOOL CHOICE.

The proposal comes from Advance Colorado, a right wing anti-tax, let's shrink government until we can drown it in the kitchen sink, kind of outfit. They're headed up by Michael Fields, who previously headed up the Colorado chapter of the right wing Koch brothers astroturf group Americans for Prosperity, then became AFP's national education policy leader. Then on to Colorado Rising Action where he kept his interest in education. Back in 2012-14 he spent two whole years as a Teacher For America product in a charter school. 

Advance Colorado was founded in 2020. Their leadership team also includes former state GOP chairwoman Kristi Burton Brown.

The amendment has also drawn support from House Minority Leader Rose Pugliese, who is also a "fellow" with Advance Colorado. The actual filing came from Fields and Suzanne Taheri, a former official with the Secretary of State's Office, a former candidate, and former Arapahoe County GOP chair.

Why does Colorado, a state that has long offered many forms of school choice, even need this? Supporters of the amendment are arguing that they are trying to enshrine and protect choice, just in case those naughty Democrats tried to roll it back some day (Colorado's Dems once tossed out the pro-choice, not-really-Democrats Democrats for Education Reform). And though they aren't saying this part out loud, the amendment would be a great set-up for school vouchers.

The language proposed is, however, strictly bananapants. And I'll bet you dollars to donuts that the people who would most regret passing this amendment would be those who support it.

Let's say I want to send my low-achieving, non-Christian child to a top-level Christian school. Let's further presume that I can't afford even a fraction of the tuition cost. Does this amendment mean that the school has to accept them, and that the state has to foot the entire tuition bill? Wouldn't any answer other than yes be denying my constitutional to equal opportunity to access a quality education and my constitutional right to direct my child's education? Does this mean that to have full access the state must also transport my child anywhere I want them to go to school?

What if East Egg Academy has far more applicants than it has capacity? Must it scratch its entire admissions policy and use a lottery instead? 

The major obstacles to school choice are not state policies. The major obstacles are, and have always been, cost, location, and the school's own discriminatory policies. Virtually all voucher policies are set up to protect those discriminatory policies. Wouldn't an amendment like this require those to be wiped out? 

Wouldn't this language amount to a state takeover of all charter and private schools? 

And that's not all. Wouldn't this amendment also allow parents to intrude into every classroom. If I have a constitutional right to direct my child's education, does that not mean that I can tell my child's science teacher to stop teaching evolution? Or start teaching evolution? Can I demand a different approach to teaching American history? How about prepositions? And how will a classroom teacher even function if every child in the classroom comes with a parent who has a constitutional right to direct their education?

You can say that's silly, that "obviously" that's not what the amendment means. But that's what it says, at least until some series of bureaucrats and courts decide what exactly "direct the education of their children" means.

Kevin Welner (National Education Policy Center) has it exactly right-- "It's really a 'full employment for lawyers' act."

Supporters say this doesn't establish a right to public funding of private schools, and I suppose they're sort of correct in the sense that this does not so much establish a right to public funding of private schools so much as it establishes an obligation for public funding of private schools as well as obliterating private school autonomy. Unless, of course, some judge steps in to find that the language doesn't mean what it says, which is, I suppose, not impossible.

Nobody on any side of the school choice debate should be voting for this amendment. It's exactly the kind of lawmaking you get from people who have wrapped meaning in particular rhetoric for so long that they have forgotten that the words of their rhetoric have actual meanings outside the meanings that they have habitually assigned them. Here's hoping the people of Colorado avoid this really bad idea.