Attack on public schools has begun in Missouri

Anyone who thinks that public education hasn't been targeted in Missouri is living in a fool's paradise.
The signs are all there. One of them is the 65 percent plan that Governor Matt Blunt supports and plans to submit to Missouri voters. The plan has come under attack, naturally, by school superintendents, and it has been easy for Governor Blunt's supporters to claim the school officials are simply protecting their high pay, but there is a lot more to it than that.
Supporters of the proposal say that it will put more money into the classrooms by having 65 percent of school budgets directly geared to the classroom and that, of course, would include the classroom teachers.
But even they would not be safe from the Machiavellian tendencies of GOP leaders like Rep. Jane Cunningham, R-Chesterfield,chairman of the House Education Committee. Ms. Cunningham is a top official in the American Legislative Exchange Council (ALEC), and at one of that organization's meetings in August in Grapevine, Texas, she criticized benefit packages for teachers, including pensions. At the meeting, she led a discussion over the 65 percent proposal and how it might be impacted by teacher benefits, according to the Hernando, Fla., Classroom Teachers Association website.
"Chair Jane Cunningham seized on this, suggesting that legislators could 'define it (65 percent solution) a little tighter' to exclude pensions or other benefits from spending on classrooms - in other words: driving down spending for teachers and staff."
That representation of the way Rep. Cunningham feels about public schoolteachers comes from what appears to be what some of our GOP legislators would refer to as a liberal website.
However, an even more illuminating picture of Rep. Cunningham's true views about public education comes from an Oct. 1, 2003, article in the conservative School Reform News.
Under the headline, "Trying to Make a Difference in the Show-Me State," the article tells the story of how Ms. Cunningham came to favor vouchers following her experiences as a school board member. When she tried to do something about parents taking their children out of public school and placing them in private school, she said, she ran into a lack of interest. "We have fewer children to educate and we still get their taxes," she says her fellow board members told her. She said that with her background in economics she could see the harm this education "monopoly" was causing.
The point was further driven home, she said, after she took one of her sons out of public school (the article does not say why) and put him in a Catholic school. Her son, who had been receiving A's and B's in math in public school, did poorly in the private school.
"The staff at the Catholic school thought he must have a learning disability, because they could not imagine his local school had done such a poor job," Rep. Cunningham said.
The article goes on to say that "after intensive personal attention by his teacher, her son rose to the 90th percentile in math."
Rep. Cunningham makes no bones about her efforts to move Missouri toward a voucher system. The School Reform News article says, "In 2003, Cunningham sponsored two school choice bills, both designed 'to get folks comfortable with the concept.' One bill addressed the issue of access to programs in public schools denied to non-public schoolchildren whose families were residing in and paying taxes to the public schools. The other, HB 345, would have given school choice to at-risk children in low-income families and in families where a parent is a prison inmate. Although neither bill passed, she was happy to be able to bring some Black Caucus members on board with HB 345." The magazine article was written by Laura J. Swartley, communications director for the Milton and Rose Friedman Foundation, Indianapolis, Ind. The Friedman Foundation began the school voucher movement in 1955.
Rep. Cunningham is serving as chairman of the ALEC Education Task Force. Her co-chairman is Robert Enlow of the same Milton & Rose Friedman Foundation. The Friedman Foundation recently hired a lobbyist to represent its interests in Missouri...Andrew Blunt, the governor's brother.
And let us not forget that Rep. Cunningham created quite a stir last year in a multi-page letter she wrote asking to be reappointed chairman of the House Education Committee. One of her selling points was the amount of money she had brought into the state from All Children Matter, another pro-voucher group.
An Aug. 7, 2005, Associated Press article explored the connection between Governor Blunt and All Children Matter. The pro-voucher group spent $196,252 on radio advertising blasting Blunt's opponent, State Auditor Claire McCaskill during the final days of the 2004 gubernatorial campaign.
The AP article noted that Blunt served as keynote dinner speaker for "an invitation-only conference of about 150 leaders and activists for All Children Matter, hosted in Siverthorne, Colo. The group was picking up the tab for his trip, said Blunt spokeswoman Jessica Robinson."
The attack on public education has begun and some of those bills have already been pre-filed in the Missouri House and Senate.
When I wrote about Rep. Cunningham earlier this week, some readers asked me to provide you with a way to contact her. According to her state webpage, she can be reached at Jane.Cunningham@house.mo.gov or at janecunningham@charter.net