Per  Reuters:

Starting this fall, thousands of poor and middle-class kids will get vouchers covering the full cost of tuition at more than 120 private schools across Louisiana, including small, Bible-based church schools.

The following year, students of any income will be eligible for mini-vouchers that they can use to pay a range of private-sector vendors for classes and apprenticeships not offered in traditional public schools. The money can go to industry trade groups, businesses, online schools and tutors, among others.

Every time a student receives a voucher of either type, his local public school will lose a chunk of state funding.

“We are changing the way we deliver education,” said Governor Bobby Jindal, a Republican who muscled the plan through the legislature this spring over fierce objections from Democrats and teachers unions. “We are letting parents decide what’s best for their children, not government.”

First comment I’d make…if you go back and read the entire article at Reuters, keep in mind that they would be biased against this type of approach.  They aren’t necessarily as biased as other organizations, such as NYT, would be, but they are biased all the same.

We all know our current education system is failing and failing miserably in the quality of education that is being provided to young Americans.  Most of us agree that this needs to change.  But when it comes to what kind of approach is taken…we don’t always agree on that as much.

My own opinion…

One part of being American that I believe we very badly need to hold on these days is the “spirit of independence”, i.e. finding our own way to succeed in things.  For years on end, the left has been defining a scope of “what is acceptable” for our society, including education.  It isn’t working and won’t get any better as long as Unions continue to stick their grubby fingers into it for the purpose of political power, money, etc.  Through this, they have granted an ever-increasing level of power and control to government.

Any changes we attempt to make on the issue of education is going to require taking a risk at this point.  We’ve existed for so long within a specific scope of standards and patterns of behavior where provision of education is concerned that it could be difficult to overcome.  We will hear the left attempt to make use of everything they can find to stir up the need for government to define this for us and fear of failure if we do not conform to and adhere to this way of thinking, which I find as being the ultimate irony given the totally ridiculous example of failure that our education system has become over the years.

The approach Jindal is taking opens up the doors to a lot of different possibilities.  It’s a challenge, and the question now is whether or not we still have what it takes, as a society of free and independent people, to rise to meet that challenge.

That’s my opinion.

I’m posting this more for the purpose of discussion between us in evaluating the kind of approach that Jindal is taking in LA.  So, speak freely about it…both good and bad, strengths and weaknesses.