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Black groups advocate parental choice in education

By Thomas C. Hanson  

The South Carolina Center for Grassroots and Community Alternatives, and Clergy for Educational Options, in conjunction with the Greenville County Center for Advocacy and Change, conducted a town hall meeting Oct. 24 to discuss "The Plight of Black Children in Public Education."

These meetings are taking place statewide, and attendees learn about parental choice and why it must be a part of any education reform proposal. The event took place at the Phyllis Wheatley Community Center.

High dropout rate

Richard L. Davis, president and executive minister of Clergy for Educational Options, who helped lead the discussions, said his organization exists because “our schools are failing at an alarming rate. South Carolina has one of the highest dropout rates in the country.”

Ten children are going to school, and five are dropping out, Davis said. “We are sending more children to jail, and more children are joining gangs than are finishing school.”
Clergy for Educational Options was formed to ensure that churches and community leaders would get involved in reforming education because they have these children in their churches every week.

Recounting the biblical story of the Good Samaritan, Davis said: “We cannot continue to watch our children get beaten up, battered and left by the side of the road, and walk away, and hope that someone else will come along to pick them up and take care of them.”

He continued: “We don’t blame the teachers, but we do blame the system.... When you look at what is happening to our children, the longer they stay in the educational system, the more they seem to fail,” adding that “at some point, we as a people have to stop waiting for somebody to come along and fix the system, and stand up and say, We are sick and tired of being sick and tired. If you are not going to fix the system, we are going to fix it ourselves.”

Clergy for Educational Options has mobilized more than 180 churches around South Carolina to start programs in their churches, to start schools, to do things to make sure these children are not left on the side of the road.
He asked: “Should black folks get reparations: 40 acres and a mule? Don’t give me reparations. Give our children a good education, and they will buy themselves a mule and 40 acres.”

The group’s website is www.ceo-sc.org. 

Parental choice

Thomas Simuel, president of the South Carolina Center for Grassroots and Community Alternatives, said that most groups that represent African-Americans are opposed to parental choice.

Simuel talked about several myths dealing with parental choice, the first one being that this would destroy public education, when in fact the competition could help those schools improve. He defined parental choice as open enrollment, where a child would no longer be told that because of where you live, you must attend this school.
Parental choice would mean that if your child is trapped in a failing school you could move him or her to either another public school or a private school using vouchers to pay the tuition. He talked about magnet schools, charter schools, private schools religious, private schools non-religious, and virtual schools, using online computers.

“You have the ability to change law,” Simuel said. “You have representatives right here who feel like, excuse my expression, you need to stay on the plantation. How dare you ask for choice for your child? Your civil rights organization nationally is opposed to the issue of parental choice. They say: This is a Republican scheme, it is a gimmick, it is a way to destroy public education. Politicians know African-Americans will respond more to fear than hope.”

If Mark Sanford, the Republican sitting governor, took the heat and attended the NAACP convention in Augusta, Georgia, “surely Tommy Moore [the Democratic candidate for governor], who is supposed to be a friend of African-Americans, can show up. He can snub you and still get 90 percent of your vote, and you don’t think we have been taken for granted. I am a disgruntled Democrat. I am ready for African-Americans to show this party not to take us for granted.”