Initiative 138 is controversial – allows parents to send children to any school of choice

Colorado voters will decide whether they want to protect the right to school choice in the state constitution in November after a measure with that goal qualified for the ballot Friday.

Put forth by conservative political nonprofit Advance Colorado Action, Initiative 138 sets out to reinforce parents’ ability to send their children to any public school, charter school, private school or homeschooling program they want. But some education advocates and policy experts see it as a stepping stone toward a state voucher program in disguise. Voucher programs give parents public dollars to enroll their kids in private schools, including those with a religious affiliation.

“We’re definitely concerned about the implications of this ballot measure,” said Kevin Vick, president of the Colorado Education Association, which is opposing the initiative. “It has the potential to do tremendous damage to already fragile school funding, and we’re also extremely worried about the lack of transparency built into this measure with public funds.”

Initiative 138 would take parents’ right to school choice one step further beyond its current protection under state law. Proponents of the measure submitted 198,450 signatures in support of it, 131,223 of which were valid, according to the Colorado Secretary of State’s office. The measure would need the support of 55% of voters to pass in November.

The initiative has divided school groups and communities and is the latest flareup in a politically  charged battle over how much the state should prioritize school choice. Educators, advocates and lawmakers have frequently disagreed over the extent of accountability and transparency charter schools in particular should follow. Charter school advocates have balked at state regulations, concerned they stifle schools’ flexibility and innovation.

Previous attempts to introduce a voucher program in Colorado have regularly failed. The few school voucher programs that did manage to move forward were legally challenged and ultimately dissolved, including a school voucher law rejected by a Denver judge in 2003 on the grounds that it violated local control provisions in the state constitution.

Michael Fields, president of Advance Colorado Action, said school choice needs to be further insulated from ongoing assaults at the Capitol. He noted that because Colorado school choice laws are statutory, they could be amended at any point. School choice is “under attack” and will likely continue to draw more intense scrutiny in the future, Fields said, pointing to a legislation introduced by a group of liberal Colorado Democrats during the legislative session this year that would have created tighter restrictions for charter schools. That bill failed. “That broader battle is going on right now, but if we have the opportunity to give parents and children this right in the constitution, now is a good time to do it,” Fields said. “We’ve had a long history of school choice here, and we want to be able to build on that and this is another step in that direction.”

Fields denied that Initiative 138 is a prelude to a statewide voucher program since it is not part of the ballot measure’s language and there is no cost attached to the ballot measure. Advance Colorado Action doesn’t disclose its donors.  “Literally all we’re doing is locking in the current laws that we have when it comes to school choice,” Fields said. “We’re not creating any new programs.”

Vick, of the state teachers union, questions the need for the measure when the right to school choice is already enshrined in state law. School choice is already “a basic component of our education system,” he said. “So you have to ask yourself who’s putting this on and why are they doing it?”

Should voters approve Initiative 138 in November, he worries about the possibility of it opening the doorway to a statewide voucher program. That could divert money away from public schools to private schools and homeschools that offer the public little transparency, Vick said. “We already have one of the lowest-funded school systems, so the pie for schools is already really small,” he said. “And this just means that the number of hands in that pie increases, which means the amount for each person currently in the system gets smaller.”

The Colorado Secretary of State’s Office will finalize the ballot Sept. 9. Initiativee 138 will be among a long list of initiatives that go before voters.

Article by Erica Breunlin/The Colorado Sun

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