Many are listening to the much-talked about report by National Education Policy Center, which argued for more stringent online high school regulations; some of the recommended measures being financial audits of online schools, requiring face-to-face proctored tests and a more rigorous accreditation process.
Colorado suffers from an inadequate virtual school system that incited anger over misused public funds last month, has decided to take action. Legislation that would require financial audits for online high schools was proposed last Tuesday to the Legislative Audit Committee. However, it seems that economics is not the only thing trickling down from Washington – the bipartisan gridlock that has infuriated much of the nation and ground politics to a stand-still has, as well.
Committee Split Down the Middle
The results of the proposal was divided 4-4, split down party lines; Democrats for and Republicans against. Democratic Senate President Brandon Shaffer was accused of pushing the proposal by the Republicans in an attempt to, as reported by The Republic, “Malign coursework favored by home school children and some charter schools.” They also accused Shaffer of using the issue to bolster his educational platform in his upcoming campaign for congress against a Republican rival.
A Partisan Issue – that was Never Really a Partisan Issue
Regardless of the political intentions in the proposal – and whether or not there ever was any – the government and the schools themselves admit that the way they fund schools in inadequate. In the system, they calculate the number of students enrolled in a school (virtual or otherwise) on October 1, every year, and award state funds depending on that amount. The problem with this system is that schools will boost their numbers prior to that day, and then have no incentive to retain the students. So often the school is awarded money and then as much as 50 percent or more of the students drop out – which is the statistic for the some online schools’ dropout rates in Colorado – but the virtual high schools still keep the funds.
The audit was therefore going to evaluate the financial costs of running online schools. However, now that it has become a “partisan” issue, if we follow Washington’s lead, the issue is probably going to be deadlocked for a while.
To read more about it in The Republican, click here.