Lost in the hullabaloo surrounding Michael Jackson’s arrest and other noteworthy news developments was the resolution of the U.S. Senate to pursue a program of school vouchers for Washington, D.C. Aiming to jump-start the moribund state of D.C. education, this program would come in the form of a $13 million federal grant in the district’s budget. Though one would not know it from the response of Senate Democrats, this could be a godsend for thousands of inner-city youths in Washington, D.C., public schools.

The voucher movement began in cities like Milwaukee and Cleveland, where, for all intents and purposes, many children in public schools were not — and are still not — receiving educations. Even today, for instance, a child in Cleveland has a statistically greater chance of falling victim to a violent crime than of graduating from a public high school.

School vouchers already provide opportunity and hope for thousands of children in Milwaukee and Cleveland, who, rather than languishing in the futility of public schools and wasting their intellect, are given an outlet for their desire to learn in private schools. Moreover, vouchers make affordable to lower-class youths quality private schools — institutions that would otherwise open their doors only to wealthy children from the suburbs. Indeed, the recent D.C. initiative could be a harbinger for wonderful things to come.

Numbers from the British news magazine The Economist indicate that most parents of voucher children hold such schools in the highest regard; nearly 70 percent of parents involved in school-choice programs report that they are “very satisfied” with their child’s school. Most importantly, studies of educational results from choice schools reveal academic improvement on the part of those enrolled.

The numbers seem to favor them, new communities like D.C. are embracing them, and the Supreme Court ruled them constitutional this past July. Overall, the future seems bright for the “voucher experiment”. Unfortunately, school vouchers face formidable opposition in both the Democratic Party and its benefactors — nationwide teachers’ unions. In its rhetoric, opponents of school choice toil in the best interest of inner-city youths and those who receive shoddy public-school educations. In truth, the Democratic Party has an acute allergy to the concept of vouchers; it seems their members will support them only if they are looking down a political gun barrel.

The bottom line, though, is fairly simple. School-voucher programs place control of a child’s education where it belongs — in the hands of parents. They provide opportunity to innumerable students stuck in the morass of failure that has become all too common in inner-city public schools. One would hope that even the most powerful of special-interest groups cannot defend such a wretched status quo forever.

The Wisconsin’s Senate and Assembly recently voted to expand choice programs in Milwaukee, but both bills await a likely veto from Gov. Doyle. This not only testifies to the power of the teacher lobby, who helped bankroll Doyle’s campaign, but it affirms the extent to which many of the program’s opponents are out of touch with the thousands of voting parents who favor school choice.

If the Milwaukee and Cleveland choice programs represent the landmark first steps in the voucher movement, then the recent decision to implement them in D.C. embodies a vital continuation. Let us hope that vouchers cease to be merely an experiment and become a permanent fixture in the continuing efforts to provide better education for American children.

Frank Hennick ([email protected]) is a sophomore majoring in political science.