Dave Barnes with gubernatorial candidate Darren Bailey and lieutenant governor candidate Stephanie Trussell (R) | Facebook/Dave Barnes
Dave Barnes with gubernatorial candidate Darren Bailey and lieutenant governor candidate Stephanie Trussell (R) | Facebook/Dave Barnes
GOP activist Dave Barnes is asking for school choice following a report by Wirepoints showing students in Illinois schools are being underserved.
He also demanded that schools should have the proper funding they need to ensure quality education is provided.
“I would like to see school choice for the parents and the state money going with the school,” Barnes, a Belleville insurance agent, told Metro East Sun.
A new report shows Illinois education attainment for black students in some school districts is just above 0%.
"Our assessment is harsh because student outcomes are beyond dismal and no one, it seems, takes any responsibility for them. Social promotion, hyper-inflated teacher evaluations and misleading ‘accountability’ designations from the Illinois State Board of Education all help to deflect blame,” the Wirepoints report reads.
The report found that only 2% of Decatur School District 61’s black students in third grade can read at grade level and only 1% can do math at grade level. While Decatur's low achievement rates are a stark achievement decline across many different spectrums of the student body, school achievement rates exist throughout the state.
GOP gubernatorial candidate State Sen. Darren Bailey (R-Xenia) has questioned the public school systems in play and the fact that parents are required to send their children to those schools if they cannot afford an alternative, according to the Macon Reporter.
"Our education system is failing our kids and it is especially failing minority students," Bailey said. "It is time to empower parents with real choices when it comes to the education of their children. At a minimum, we need to allow parents to choose which public school to send their children [to].”
The report comes as Awake Illinois is promoting an event featuring Corey DeAngelis, a national leader on school choice. Awake Illinois is offering free tickets to those using the code "PARENTALRIGHTS." On a recent taping of the Adam Corolla Show, DeAngelis discussed the idea of school choice, Dupage Policy Journal reported.
“We don't residentially assign low-income families to government-run grocery stores and tell them that they must use their food stamps at a particular institution. You can choose Wal-Mart, Whole Foods, Trader Joe’s and I can keep going on and on with examples but we do this in so many other areas. Why don't we do it with K-12 education too?” he asked.
The event will be held at the Hotel Arista in Naperville on Saturday, June 18.
Alerts Sign-up