Double Edged Sword: Charter Schools & Vouchers

Dr. Jordan Lauer and Dr. Ryan Jackson explain, discuss, and debate Charter Schools and School Vouchers. Two issues that are rocketing into our state houses, schools, and communities. Come join the fight!

Episode Transcript

(00:00):
Welcome back to Educational Warfare. I'm Dr. Jordan Lauer here today with my partner Dr. Ryan Jackson.

(00:18):
I want to do a shout out to our producers, Tommy Ruth and our director Matt Paff, who make all the great visuals,
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You can email the show at educationalwarfare.pod at gmail.com and now you can watch full episodes of our show

(00:46):
on Spotify and the Educational Warfare YouTube channel. That's right, you can watch us, you can listen to us
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and tell your friends and coworkers and come join the discussion and join the fight.
So Ryan, by the power of Grayskull, you know, what's up man, how you doing today?

(01:07):
I'm doing well man, I'm excited about this episode. I mean I think like a lot of our listeners, I just need to know about this topic.
We're definitely ready to dig in.
Well just like some of the legendary swords, you know, we're here, beautiful cadet toys and comics and Spring Hill hanging out and
you know, just like some of the legendary swords of the great 80s and 90s cartoons and movies, today's topic can kind of be
one of those double edged swords. You know, I know, you know, I know what a charter is, it's an agreement, you know,

(01:33):
I know what a voucher is, but what are those things for schools, is what we're talking about today. Charter, schools and vouchers.
Yeah, and you know, listen, I've been a public education guy man for a long time, as I know you have, and that is one thing
that I've always been curious about, speculative about, at times concerned about, and I think that's sort of hitting fever pits.

(01:55):
So I'm ready to dig into this. I know you've got a ton of great content to kind of pack, unpack here for us today.
Man, let's dive in.
Yeah, let's pull that sword from the stone. Let's explain first what charter schools are and what vouchers really are.
So let's get to it. So first of all, charter schools, let's start with that. So basic definition, just like make sure everybody knows
what we're talking about. They're independently run public schools with more flexibility in curriculum and operation,

(02:22):
but they have to meet specific performance standards set out in their charter agreements. That's why they're called charter.
So they're not part of a school district. They just kind of pop up, but they make an agreement with the state and say,
this is what we're going to do. So a little bit in numbers here, 7% of all public school students attend charter schools,
according to the NCES. So not a huge number, but it's growing. You know, kind of one of the issues here is they serve as an alternative

(02:49):
to the traditional public schools, but remain publicly funded. And that's where it gets controversial because they're outside.
You don't have to be tied to a district, but they're still receiving that money that would go to public schools.
But, you know, and I got to jump in as I normally do. So two things immediately come to mind, and I'm not going to let this first one slide.
You know, you said they have flexibility in curriculum and operations. Man, that sounds like a euphemism for something.

(03:16):
So I'm going to want a deeper explanation on that part. And the second piece is, you know, you've mentioned now,
you know, they're not a part of a district, but it seems like, and correct me if I'm wrong, you know,
charters are constantly getting voted on by districts, almost speaking to Metro Nashville public schools specifically.
It seems like they're always voting on this or that charter or discontinuing that charter. Are they not a part of Metro public schools?

(03:40):
No, not really. They exist outside. It's almost like they're their individual district, but they do, like they don't have,
like the Metro board does not rule them. They usually have their own board of directors or some type of leadership structure.
And they, you know, they like said, they receive the big part is they receive state and local money.
So this is where we get kind of to it. And, you know, a lot of people say, oh, are they nonprofits? Here's the issue.

(04:06):
Kind of. Right. That's where we get again. There's a lot of gray areas. Kind of. Yeah. So like many are run by nonprofits.
So they're not a 501 C. Yeah. They're a 508. Yeah. Whatever. Yeah. They're just they're run by nonprofit management
organizations that they often call charter like they're just called CMOs or charter management.
But some states allow for for profit companies to run them called educational management organizations or E.M.Os to run the schools.

(04:33):
And that's like, you know, when you have a for profit thing running a school, schools don't really make money.
You know, so one of the issues and we'll get to this when you talk about some controversies with them,
but just kind of quickly getting that definition, they can just shut down. Like if it's run by a for profit,
they can just be like, bye. Door closed. Yeah. Shudder. Show up. Good luck. Backpack on.

(04:55):
I'm at the door. Like, hey, guys. Boards over. Yeah. It's like you ever.
It's like when you go to a store thing and to be open, but they have the sign of the holiday hours.
And like, oh, man, that's like some kids show up and that's literally like we are now closed.
You know, please call your local school district to see what school you should attend. Man.
All jokes aside, you know, we're here and we record this in Spring Hill.
Man, that recently happened to me at my doctor's office. Oh, really? Like the doctor's office just closed.

(05:18):
You know, just appointments, patients, all of that. Good luck. That's crazy. Yeah.
I'd be like, I need help. So I'm thinking of these kids now like I was when I'm going to get my physical
and my blood work and I'm like, yeah, I got an appointment. Yeah. It's like a sign on the door.
Yeah. You're just like turned away. Wow. So the other thing that we're talking about today that goes with this
are vouchers, like school vouchers. So much, so much involved in that. Yeah. They're all over the news.

(05:43):
If you miss this for teachers out there, obviously this is something we're watching and monitoring
and just a lot of questions about. And that's why we're covering here today. So you guys understand.
So you guys can get that knowledge. You can have that in your toolbox. That way when something goes down,
you're ready. And that's what we're trying to do. So you're going to be able to explain to us today because, man,
this has been a hot button issue for so long. You know, I think of the Willy Wonka ticket, man, like I got my ticket.

(06:07):
So I've got my voucher. Tell me about these vouchers, dude, that everybody's scrambling about, you know, vouchers.
Yeah. So they're I mean, the basic thing is there are programs that allow parents to use public funds to pay for private or religious school tuition.
So it's the states giving you this type of thing, this voucher, this, you know, like you said, golden ticket.

(06:28):
And then you can use that to apply to the tuition. It's basically the reason you might say, why do we need this?
You know, like public schools are here, private schools there. If you want to go to private school, go to private school. Right.
Go public school. Don't write. This is all part of the I'm not going to say new, but the now to the forefront, very much recent program that's supposed to have
allowing parents to basically have more choice in their schools. That's how it's being sold.

(06:53):
Like, look, if your school is bad and we understand that we're teachers and sometimes you get in an area where the school there that the kids have to go to isn't the best.
You know, there's there's many options for that. So this is supposed to be like, OK, if you don't like that, here's a way to go somewhere else using that public school money.
So you're not chained basically or tied to a school district or.
So, of course, man, my brain is automatically going to. But if everyone wanted to exercise that option, not a possibility.

(07:21):
No. Right. So then it gets into, I guess we're now we're talking lottery, lottery days like we're back to that kind of there's there's vouchers, there's educational savings accounts,
which we're going to talk about a bit called the essays that's going to have this. And it does cause a lot of issues.
You know, just some examples, you know, for example, there there's rapid growth here in the state of Tennessee.
Florida has pushed them. The voucher expanding their program in Arizona has really been blown up a little bit.

(07:47):
And we'll get into that. But here's the question kind of that we can talk about real quick.
Are these initiatives like vouchers charter schools truly about empowering families or a little bit of conspiracy, you know, corner here?
I knew it was coming right. Or are they dismantling or are they planning dismantling public education?
What could the motivations of the people behind them be?

(08:08):
You know, that's kind of look here because it's really, you know, you're almost on a teeter totter.
I totally get if you're in an area where the school is not the best, you want your kid to have an education, like have the best education possible.
You want to be able to to go somewhere.
And then they so these vouchers are like, oh, here's a private school.
The problem is those private schools can still say no.

(08:29):
It's not like if you have this, you have to get in. Oh, they can still reject you even with the voucher.
It's literally just in this case of Tennessee is just seven grand off of their tuition.
So it's basically like this makes it this makes it basically where you have a little bit more time.
They go a little bit like you can look around, but you can use it to like, hey, I don't want to pay this much, but this lets us get in.

(08:55):
But they can still say no. And it's usually obviously not the price of the full tuition.
OK, so it's school choice. But it's really who's getting to use this choice.
And we'll talk about it in just a few how the families using it really aren't exactly or a lot of times aren't exactly the families they intend.
But you mentioned seven thousand is like, is that pretty standard?
Is that the number from looking around? I mean, it depends on seven thousand.

(09:18):
It's all on state budgets. So they can literally say, hey, we want to do if our budgets this it's this.
If it's it's lower, it's lower. That's usually a standard thing.
But then we were getting this problem. You kind of get where the private school then raises their tuition.
So that's seven thousand is no longer seven thousand people are getting in.
And of course, right. They're going to bake. They're going to bake it into.

(09:39):
Yeah. So they're like, oh, well, it was 10. But since you got seven, we're going to make it 14 now.
So you get a 50 percent. That way they make more money and it becomes more selective.
A lot more families can afford maybe three grand to get their kid there, but they can't afford five.
Yeah. Yeah. Can't afford whatever they prove the price up to just to that way.
It's still being selective. So there's some games, man.

(10:01):
But I want to I still want to go back to that question.
You know, are we empowering families or is this some kind of man nefarious?
You know, plan conspiracy to undermine and ultimately destroy public education.
And before you go, I know, you know, when I was working in Nashville, right.

(10:24):
So I'm a I'm a assistant principal at this time in my career.
I'm working to school in Nashville and we just hired a guy out of a charter to come in.
So he's now a public school teacher. He's working where I'm serving as assistant principal.
He just come out of charter and cool dude.
And he's explaining sort of his past three years.
And this is really my first insight into charter schools, specifically in Nashville.

(10:48):
And I can just remember it was this feeling of exhaustion.
You know, back to some of our previous episodes, like they were really feeling it because it sounded like you made less.
You worked more. Right. Your responsibilities were compounded, meaning, I think he said something like everyone who was employed had to coach something or run some kind of after school program.

(11:15):
It was kind of that was a given. Right.
And just this expectation, you know, that you were going to nose to the grindstone almost because you want to be here and not over there.
So if you don't play by these rules, we'll cast you out as well.

(11:36):
I just always wondered about that, you know, and but again, back to that point of undermining and the conspiracy here.
He was a good dude. Right. And I've always wondered, like the people that work in those buildings, you know, the administrators that teach it.
These are people just like us. Right. Educators just like us.
I struggle with conspiracy theories at times because of this. Right.
There's no way all these people involved are like on that program. Right. Hey, this is the mission.

(12:03):
Here's what we're coming in to do. Don't tell anybody. Yeah. I mean, it just I don't know, man.
You're going to have to really sell me on this. And I totally get that. And there's some great people, you know, obviously, they're educators.
They're trying to do what we do, educate children and trying to do it a different way.
And like you said, a lot of it is people, you know, teachers who don't want to go into especially in inner cities.
You see this a lot like charter schools are. They're very set behavioral standards.

(12:26):
Like I said, they have to get in there. Private school. Same way. You can still say no. You still have to afford it.
And then they're just basically if you don't meet our behavior standards, we don't have to have 20 meetings and all these different processes.
It's goodbye. That's back to that operations point you brought up earlier where they have this flexibility in curriculum. Yep.
Which I still think is interesting, too. And I think we've got to touch on that. Yeah, we definitely will.

(12:48):
And we're talking about also operations, i.e. who we accept, who we kick out and win, all of that kind of who we can support.
That's one thing. And I've been in. I've done a tour of a couple of charter schools.
And when you talk about they teach it a different way, it is kind of crazy.
I was in one and their teacher, you know, they their curriculum is scripted for a lot of them.

(13:09):
So when you go in, it's not you know, when I'd make a lesson, it's I'm going to teach us.
It's scripted for a lot. It is almost down to what you say specifically.
And then they have ways of doing things. The class I was in, the students would when they asked a question, the teacher asked a question, the students would raise their hand.
Teacher pick one like we always do in every school. But then he would say track and all the kids would look at that student and as they talked and he'd go and the student would answer.

(13:34):
He told the teacher would say if it was right or wrong. And then he'd go track me.
And they'd all look back. And it was very me sitting in the back. I was just it was very kind of robotic. I'm just going to say it.
And that's strange. It is. Yeah. It was like I'm sitting there like I mean, I shouldn't say strange. That's that's different.
That's certainly going to be different than your experience. Right. Yeah.
Some schools, anybody, public school teachers sometimes like, excuse me, guys, hey, I'm over here. Right.

(13:56):
Pay attention to me now. And this was just like those heads snapped.
It was like a military like a military where they were in uniforms. They were.
OK, yeah. The kind of the classic, you know, polo with polo girls had the khakis.
Yeah, not the skirts. They did. OK, there you go. Girls had that guys had khakis.
It was very, you know, kind of old school in that type.
So these schools are, you know, when we talk about are they, you know, trying to dismantle it, I think when you say the operational people, the people in charge know it's the whole idea behind it.

(14:24):
Because it's what we talked about last week with our with our educational smackdown, Linda McMahon being nominated to be the secretary of education of the United States.
What's her end goal? You know, that's what we talked about. It's kind of on that.
This has been an area to where a lot of people have wanted to make money.
I mean, this is I mean, every student in America goes to some type of school like legally they have to.

(14:47):
So this is an area where how that could be monetized.
The idea is here. This is some low hanging fruit. We're not taking advantage of this.
So we've put Linda McMahon's going to come in here and DDT public education so we can start this back over through a capitalist lens and start making some cash.
And charter schools are a way to do that. And the easy way to make that sell is you just say it's parent choice.

(15:11):
We want you to pick where your kids go to school. Don't let this. And that makes a lot of parents like, yes, I will.
And you know, but the underlying question there, though, is, OK, they're going to make that choice.
Why? Because they are better because they're different. I'm a go there because they're safer.
I mean, what is the reason? And I know there's lots of different reasons that parents, I'm sure, make that choice.

(15:35):
But I think that's one of the big questions for me is it's choice. And why are we choosing that choice?
I think it's it's selectivity. You know, they are not public schools, as in their name.
You have to take everybody. You know, it is you're here. You're in there. Welcome in. That's right.
We're here. It is. Oh, we're going to do it this way or we're going to take this type of kid or we're going to take.
You have to have this GPA. So it is. I mean, all those things you said safer could be.

(15:59):
I mean, if you think you have more academically inclined kids in a room, obviously you learn more because you don't have a kid like lighting a book on fire in the back.
You know, something crazy, less distractions, less delinquent behavior.
Right. All the things that wrap up. So parents are like, oh, they feel like my kids go in here.
And then some of those things I talked about, those tactics we talked about where it's literally tracking.

(16:21):
You know, if you're a parent and you're seeing that, it does look impressive.
I mean, my kid's going to sit in a class to where, like, they have they listen to the teacher.
They all look and give attention to who's talking. They even had their test.
You know how sometimes we post test scores, but we have to like we can't use the kid's name because we can't give him trouble.
They had the test up on the wall taped to it with their grades on it in full, transparent descending order.

(16:44):
Right. Billy got one hundred. Jimmy down here with a sixty three.
Right. And the kids just had to look at it. Jimmy's on full blast. Right.
So you were like there's that internal competition of like those kids are young and we can't really do that in public schools because there's so many other laws and things that, you know, did is that bullying a kid?
Man, so even the nature of charters competing against public drills all the way down to within the charter.

(17:08):
We create this kind of competitive environment, too.
I mean, we're the best of the best in here. Right.
And all that stuff and way different than public.
And those kids have to. That's just the way it is.
So either you're going to swim or sink in that situation or in public school, kind of go.
So talking about vouchers and talking about charter schools, let's get into three different blades, right. Like three swords. We're talking about them.

(17:31):
So we are here on the sword theme. I just I love it.
So yeah, it's like, you know, you see that when the sword comes out in a movie, you're like, this is going to be quality three to five minutes because like there's going to be a sword fight.
It's going to be fun. Somebody's we flipping over people.
There's going to be a dramatic death or something like it. It's just it's always a good time.
So, man, I'm going to throw one at you real quick.
Have you seen the movie Rob Roy? I have a long time ago.

(17:53):
Man, Rob Roy, Tim Roth, you know, one of my favorite actors, man, in Reservoir Dogs. Love that dude.
And if you have not seen that in a while, go watch the ending sword fight in Rob Roy.
I'm ready. Off the chain. So the time I'm going to watch my nugget for you today. Right. If you love a good sword fight. I'm in.
So it's like let's talk about the good, the bad, the controversial. Let's go real quick of charter schools and vouchers.

(18:15):
So the good, obviously sticking with swordsmen Excalibur. Right. So what's the good here like Excalibur, which represents freedom, goodness and growth.
There are positives. I don't want to just sound negative.
Like I said, it's a conspiracy corner we kind of dip into sometimes, but it's not like where I live.
I just like, you know, we want to talk about it. So some of the goods are it does increase parent parental choice and tailored educational opportunities.

(18:38):
You know, that way parents can say you're not stuck here. And then it kind of takes the pressure off school.
Like if your kid's still not performing, there's that there is. We just talked about there's competition driving innovation in some of these.
You know, you want more options for schools means they must compete to get students and everything you're saying right now is like speaking my language.
Right. I mean, so far. Yeah, it's not it's not inherently bad.

(18:59):
Like these are things you want because you can see the old model.
I'm not going to say like everything we've done is great because I think you always grow.
But the old model, when you are the school in a town, who you compete against.
I mean, you want the state to not like say, hey, you know, you need to raise your scores.
You obviously want to perform, but you also don't have any much pressure of what's right.
We got to keep this up because we're losing kids to that building right there now.

(19:22):
You know, and we got to. So there is that which competition is never a bad thing.
I'm not saying it's not bad. They also, you know, like you said, schools get lazy because it's like you're zoned.
So we're zoned here. So this is where it doesn't apply here. You can go anywhere.
They often. Oh, that's it. You can be you can live on the other side of town. Yeah. And it's in this charter.
Your voucher. So it has nothing to do with. Yeah, you're not.

(19:44):
There's no boxes drawn geography. If your parent can get you there. Right.
You can go and you got that golden ticket. You're in there at a discount. Right.
It's like, hey, I'm here. Teach me. Yeah, it was a 30 minute drive.
But if parents want to do that, they can. And that's that's a part of that freedom that they like.
But I like that Excalibur piece, man. If this school is not working, you know,
whether it is just low student achievement, whether it is off the chain discipline,

(20:08):
but it's not working. Me and my family want another option.
Boom. Charter school presents itself. Right. I got options, man.
Absolutely. What's the key to motivation? Man, autonomy. Right.
Whoo. I got some choice in this. Yeah. And then the parents like like that.
And this is going to be right up your alley, especially I know.
But they can often where public schools kind of have to run the curriculum that's on the state test.

(20:31):
Yes, for sure. Charter schools can take a little bit of alternative curricular approach
and emphasize certain fields so they can do arts like we are a charter of the arts.
We're focused on performing technology. Yeah. We're going to really focus on this math or the ever popular steam or stem.
Nice. Right. Yeah. Love that stuff. Yeah. Are they OK.
So that's again, man, you're like filling my cup. Right.

(20:52):
So I'm going to we're still on Excalibur. Yeah, we're on the good.
But when back to those student achievement, those standardized test scores, are they are they held to those measures?
Like, is that accountability? You know, yes and no, they don't have to report as much.
There is not where states have to even though they're getting the here's we'll get into the controversy.
Yeah, I know. I know you got it coming because I'm getting ready to ask.

(21:14):
They're getting I've heard rumblings that, you know, in terms of outcomes, it's not but we'll get there.
Even. Yeah. So they are held to some kind of accountability measure. Yes.
And it's it's murky to say the best to say to say the easiest. But like I said, we'll we'll kind of dive into that.
You know, they or they can you know, they do steam, they can serve special populations.

(21:36):
And there's a growing number of virtual. And here's the biggest thing.
You see more and more kids doing this in school. There's now virtual or cyber charter schools which have really I mean,
the thing they're doing here is they are challenging this idea of a brick and mortar physical school.
OK. You know, obviously, Covid pushed all this into the forefront.
You know, before Covid things like go to meeting and zoom were used for businesses or for like, hey, we can't be here.

(22:02):
So we'll do that. And then it became just part of our zeitgeist.
Like everybody was like, oh, we're going to zoom.
Even people, you know, instead of just kind of the NFL, several teams this past week zoomed,
interviewed all their coaches for the first round because it's like, why would we fly them out if we're not sure they're our finalist?
So even the NFL is like now saying that.
So for school, you have students who are they can kind of set their schedule.

(22:28):
I had one student literally this year not long ago walk up and like Dr. Lauer, I'm not going to be here after Christmas.
I was like, oh, man, what's going on? He's like, I really want to work.
I'm old enough to work. I'm 17. So I really want to work.
So I'm going I'm going virtual for school and then I can kind of set my classes around when I can work instead of needing to be there.
You know, and schools have that like high schools have dual enrollment and they do.

(22:49):
I mean, I even know I know one of the counties here nearby has a virtual academy that you can attend, which is for your non-traditional student that may need to blend work,
but still get some credits in order to finish.
But I don't know even that particular model is like a full time start from grade three to graduation.
It was really for like a select group of students in high school that needed that kind of.

(23:14):
Yeah. Right now, those virtual or digital academies you can call them or charter schools are more set towards high schoolers because, you know,
and God bless you all and God love you all.
Any elementary teachers who did zoom classes during COVID know keeping like 20 or even I mean, obviously, it'd be smaller class,
but keep like five elementary school kids engaged on a computer is just I can't even I couldn't do it.

(23:37):
Like, you know, I had to do it with high schoolers and these are grown grown people basically.
Were you and I working in the same county at the time when, you know, COVID happened and then the year after COVID because our county never shut down.
Right. So we had this blend of in person and virtual simultaneous.
Yeah. So it's synchronous. You had to manage what was happening in the classroom and cater to those that opted in.

(24:05):
Right. For the virtual deal that was synchronous with you at the same time.
I mean, we talk about the pressure people were under at that time.
I remember having my laptop literally like sitting on a podium on like books so they could like a like lecture to the class and the digital people.
Right. See me and then kids when behind me would be like, Dr. Lauer, like there's a notification.
I think they got kicked off. So I'd have to like sit there and like get it.
It was a thing. Yeah. Teachers teachers to me.

(24:29):
I mean, stake their claim are we really who we are who we say we are that year.
I mean, they proved it, man, when they went through that gauntlet.
Yeah, we're digressing there, but that was tough. Yeah.
I mean, that's in part of it. So you have so so, you know, the good just to recap is like they can drive innovation.
You have competition. You can have various things like, you know, if your child is really into, you know, to engineering and math or technology,

(24:53):
they can go to one of those steam or STEM schools if they want fine arts.
It does that instead of which is good.
I think education, American education, which we could talk about the system as a whole needs to start to fine tune a little more because you get behavioral issues
when a kid who knows what he's going to do is sitting in English for reading, you know, Hamlet.
But I'm still feeling like you're getting me really excited.
And there's still a strong possibility my family may not get into that school.

(25:17):
Yeah, I mean, there is absolutely. And it's still picking.
It's still number and we'll kind of go over some of the numbers from a film earlier.
So diving into that, let's get into a little bit of the bad.
So like the blade, the Nazgul wield and Lord of the Rings, you know, the wounds, some of these charter schools inflicted on states may never fully heal.
You know, this is some of the negative stuff.
Like some of these charter school plans have really hurt states like it's just it happened and then now it's just festering, just like Frodo sitting there.

(25:44):
He's turned into a race. He's got all the like the veins in the black.
Like some of the states, their budgets and everything is really hurt from this.
So jump into financial issues. Public schools losing.
So like public schools, right. These charter schools get public funds.
They're not increasing public funds.
Rarely it's now. So like you're dividing the pie and all teachers out there. We all know what's the one thing we're saying.

(26:07):
Hey, we need more funding. You know, we have to cut stuff all the time.
There's talk of arts being cut at different schools and some school cut art programs, which breaks my heart because that's how you connect to things.
You know, if you're if you're a person, they're that they're losing funding to charters and vouchers.
And so a study by the Network for Public Education found that charter schools cost school districts over 400 million in funding each year.

(26:31):
Wow. To go over there. So almost half a billion dollars, man.
Charter is impacting in terms of give me that. Yep.
Yeah. And it's like and it's just extra like that. We have to do this because now there's operational things like, hey, we need food for our cafeteria here.
That's neat. Neo needs that. We have to run these things. We have to have a maintenance crew.
All these things that run to schools. Some of them are smaller buildings.

(26:52):
You know, you may find a charter school in the strip mall, you know, where it's just literally a couple of rooms because it's more kind of boutique.
But that still needs, you know, you got to pay the rent for the strip mall. You got to keep it running.
So there's these people often don't think about that. That where's this money coming from?
Now it's being siphoned off. Mayor of Columbia, Chas Mulder. Man, great guy.
Yeah. If you if we got up there that, you know, he oh, man, you got a tweet from my man.

(27:15):
And full disclosure, you know, I think Chas Mulder is great mayor.
Great guy. Progressive. Cares about the community. Really doubles down on education.
What's he got to say? Well, he says like so some of the you know, for those not familiar with Tennessee,
some of the southern counties here under Nashville and, you know, Davidson County was Nashville's.
So some of these southern counties near Alabama, Hickman County, Lewis County, Perry County and Giles County.

(27:37):
So more rural. OK, right. He says these are just a few of the Tennessee counties in our region that do not have private school option.
How will the vouchers help and not hurt their public schools?
We need to invest and double down on public schools in Tennessee.
He literally said that double down on. Right. Oh, this is the way to help all Tennesseans.
That's a great point. We often don't think about that because when you think as you think of big cities,

(27:59):
there's not a private school in Hickman County. That's right.
You know, so he's making he's bringing awareness to, hey, while all the attention is here,
right on the excitement of this versus that will in these counties, these communities that don't have those options period,
but are still getting dramatically affected by the funding loss. Is that what we're saying?

(28:20):
Yeah, there's this money is being given. So now what you're doing is you're taking money from the state, taking money from these counties.
Right. To kind of pull up retarder schools. And then those kids are like watching that money go away.
And kids in Nashville are going to a private school because of Williamson County are going to a private school.
But they don't even have the option. So it's either drive an hour or just keep going.

(28:41):
So, you know, the old the old adage, man, you're robbing Peter to pay Paul. Right. In this situation.
Yeah, it's kind of a saying there. Yeah. And he has another tweet just kind of continuing to go along.
If that says the average cost of private school tuition in Tennessee is ten thousand plus.
OK, the seven thousand voucher bill will only benefit those who can already afford it,

(29:03):
not to those who don't have a choice for educational opportunities.
This is not a conservative approach. This is a reckless use of taxpayer dollars. Yeah.
I love the word reckless. Just going for it like just feels this.
I'm addiction guy, man. I'm a former English teacher. Right. He's he's being very intentional.
Yes. Yeah. The things he's saying. And I think that's important that he's like this is not an issue to where it pays to kind of be on the fence.

(29:25):
Like you're going to pick a side. And Mr. Boller said, hey, I've looked at the numbers.
This isn't going to help us like it. And again, that's one of the big negative things about vouchers, especially is that it only helps the people can already afford it.
It's basically a discount plan for people already sending their kids to public or to private schools.
Like they've already made this. Oh, we're going to pay 10 K plus. Well, here's seven K from the state.

(29:46):
So now you don't pay as much. Well, if you don't have that initially, you know, now you're scrounged around for some money. Right.
You know, like, oh, we have some, but we can't pay you the rest.
Even if they gave you seven, but you can't come up with the extra three. Right. You're living paycheck to paycheck.
Right. So three grand is still it's impossible at this point. You're out of the conversation regardless.
Yeah. So the people who can are like, oh, cool. So it's really only serving a certain type. Yes. Family potentially.

(30:14):
Yeah, potential. Absolutely. You know, and then so another part.
So that's a big issue of like, where's this money? You know, it's public money, but it's going here.
And is it really helping everybody? Because I guarantee those parents in those counties mentioned, they don't feel like they have choice because there's not an option there.
So right. Right. There's also financial mismanagement is a negative thing. Reports of unregulated charter schools failing students like some of just shuttered.

(30:37):
Like I said, they don't like the kids are doing poorly and then boom, gone.
Lack of quality teaching and reporting due to the curricular freedom. Right.
And here's a great I always like talk about this stuff and never want people just think I'm throwing it out there.
So I always try to bring some like gravitas to it.
So Stanford Center for Research on Education Outcomes called Credo found that 40 percent, 46 percent of charter schools perform no better than public schools and 37 perform worse.

(31:04):
Wow. Yeah. So this but performed worse in terms of what basically on the reporting they had to do.
OK, so now we can get into like, what do they report? What do they have to report?
And that's an interesting thing. And like private schools, a lot of private schools, for example, if they have the facilities to help special education students, we can get into that.

(31:27):
We're going to that in a second. They often don't have to report those test scores.
Well, we do. Yeah. Like public schools do. So like right there.
Boom. So like there's ways and things you don't have to report. So are the numbers really the numbers?
And I mean, I'll just ask it explicitly directly. Do charter schools accept students with disabilities?
I mean, do they teach students that have individualized education plans as an IEP for my parents out there that are that are trying to understand the inner workings of public charter?

(31:57):
You know, if your student struggles, I mean, he has he or she has legit disabilities.
You get an individualized education plan, special education services.
They're game changers for kids. Right. My son, especially, you know, when you have dyslexia and it's obviously, you know, inherent and you're struggling to read, man, you need those support pieces in place.

(32:20):
You do. I'm asking directly, do they support students like that?
So they educate proportionally much lower and can simply say we don't have the facilities.
So they can kind of either now the state has to give them the funds to get that, which again, polling from public schools, which do have the facilities.

(32:42):
But if you didn't want to get there, so they could say we don't have that. So we next. So they could you say, you know, hey, we don't we don't have that because we don't have that capacity right now or capability right now.
But if you continue to fund us, that's what we they could always dangle that out there to want to.
And we'll get there when we get more money. Yeah, we need the teachers. We need the room for students, like especially the more severe if you want to go.

(33:04):
But we need the specialized equipment. We don't have that. So now you're taking that from schools who do have those things, but they just didn't want to go there.
And now you're putting in these schools and they can kind of cherry pick a little more.
You know, they don't have where a high school public high school needs to have a CDC room.
So those are more you know, some of the students are intense disabilities. Yeah, sure. Where they need you know, literally whole time they're there.

(33:28):
Constant intervention, constant care. They don't need they don't take those students at all.
Usually. So then you get into students with dyslexia, students with some type of these other issues that may pop up in IEPs and they can kind of cherry pick like, oh, we don't have that.
So sorry. Just a just a fun note, you know, an interesting note, you know, for our viewers here when you are in a public school that has a CDC classroom, obviously special education classes, you know, students with those intense disabilities, man, they are going to graduate on a special ed diploma.

(34:01):
Yes, you're going to get them through, make the experience amazing. But when you graduate on a special education diploma, it negatively impacts your graduation rate. Right. OK, so those students who will graduate are graduating with a different diploma, which counts adversely against your graduation rate.

(34:25):
So when you're that principal that you know, you're measured by these things and graduation rate is one of them that that's a that's a tax essentially. Right. And it's a way.
But you know, we we we consume that tax because, hey, this is for the greater good. We're helping everyone. If I'm hearing you correctly.
And I don't even know if charters get measured on their graduation rate necessarily. But in public school, that's a reality.

(34:46):
But it does not sound like that's that's bothering these people or keeping them up at night at all. Yeah. And that's such an interesting thing because it's such like, you know, as a principal, you were like, oh, yes, like these students work so hard.
They're about to graduate. It's some of the coolest environments you'll be seeing that kind of life changing work. Big shout out to a teacher named Linda Lamar.
You know, she ran the program where I was principal for a while and just did incredible life changing work. So at the end of the day, I never cared about the impact on the graduation rate. It still is a thing.

(35:17):
That's in the back of your mind. Yes. That is a negative thing. And that's they literally because they have fewer IPs, you know, individual education plans, because they have those that affects testing scores.
So when they are showing, you know, where a public school has whatever the amount is and those students, depending on they have to take. So bring a full circle. Then you're saying all of that that we just talked about. They're still performing worse than. Yeah.

(35:40):
Like with those numbers and that that is changing as numbers go up. Like we will have to keep an eye on that. But it's growing. Now, yeah, you're getting more students there. They're getting more funding. There's more of them.
So we'll definitely keep an eye on that. But, you know, the key point is they don't have to take as many students like that or don't have the facilities. And if they do take them now, we're diverting more funds, which the students who are in high school, like public schools, are getting less fun.

(36:02):
So and then it's almost you've almost hit the sticking point for me, man, because I do have a son. He's 10 years old. He's in fifth grade. I love the public school where he is. They provide great services.
It's an awesome culture and environment. But to think now that those services, those funds that support that incredible work are getting diverted somewhere else that's not held to that same standard, man, you know, you start looking at that bottom line, the impact on my kid.

(36:33):
But you got somebody that's sitting next to you in your community or your next door neighbor that's like, yeah, but my kid needs this kind of environment. I mean, it's man, you get into pain points for families, right? And everybody's going to have, you know, their perspective, their pain point that they want to address.
And that's why the parent choice is such a powerful way to market this. It is because what an umbrella. Yeah, because you're literally saying I'm doing this for my kid. Right. And it be tell me I'm wrong. I'm talking about my kid.

(36:59):
He's been getting bullied historically his entire public education career. You're going to tell me, you know, they don't care about the bottom line on funding. My kid is not thriving in this environment. I want a choice.
Yeah. And so you're turning public education into this kind of clandestine, you know, like very we are I'm this group. You're this group. I'm going to take care of mine. You know, where the whole idea of it was emotions get involved.

(37:26):
Right. When do things change, man, when emotions are prevalent? Yeah, you get parents upset about their kids. It is a tough thing to navigate. So you're taking this public education. We're going to grow our country.
Now it's more like it are my people. Okay. You know, which definitely is interesting and kind of to talk about this. There's a great chart where we talk about one of the negatives that we hit on a little bit that a lot of the people who go there already are in private school.

(37:54):
This chart right here, it's shared by the new any NSA students from public school, private school or entering kindergarten. Right. And you can literally see on here that most of the private school that the baby blew in the middle.
I mean, that's 66, 69, 64 percent where public schools up here. So that just goes to show that literally this is just basically a coupon for people already in private school.

(38:18):
So are you getting a lot of change out of this by already diverting funds from public schools? So you're helping out the people at private schools. And that's that's where a lot of people kind of you're trying to make the argument here that it's not impacting everyone positively.
And I mean, even those that want to go there like, hey, I'm into it. This sounds this sounds cool choices for me. I need the help. I mean, we're flat broke. I'm working two jobs. I'm a single parent. But my zone school is in rough shape and I would love my kid to go there.

(38:49):
However, right. Not for you. Yeah. And they can say because the vouchers are open to everybody, they can say, oh, we have this many spots and the kids get this. So now you like a movie waiting for Superman. Did you ever see that?
Yeah, that's where you remember when they were sitting in there and it's like a gymnasium or something. They were calling the lotto tickets and you were like watching people's futures crumble.

(39:11):
I mean, whole families like breaking down when they didn't get picked. It's that is real. Yeah. Essentially what we're talking about. So you and what happened is the people who are there, they already been accepted. They get this discount.
And then they have, oh, we have, you know, we only have X amount for capacity. So now we have 34 spots open this year for the high school. You might have in that exam, the same example, you might have 400 kids sign up for 34 spots.

(39:36):
You know, and then they lose their parents like, oh, you might go here and then they don't. And, you know, so that gets into a lot of problems.
You know, so we'll look into that actually was there talk about waiting for Superman a little later once we get into it. But let's look real quick at like controversies. Right. So some of the controversy of this, you know, made me think still on swords.
She's my way the dark saber. It's been handed down who's in Clonber wars. Right. Yeah, it's great. It's a weird. Pull the nerd out of me. That's Mandalorian. Right. Darth Maul.

(40:07):
It's like a sword, not the round in the in the Mandalorian show and dude crashes and he cuts out that thing. He's wielding a dark saber. He looks awesome.
So it's a controversial blade. So we'll use that one area. Big controversy. It is in the news all the time. There are massive cost overruns in like the state of Arizona, for example, massive cost overruns and accountability issues in their universal voucher program.

(40:29):
So keyword there, universal. That is where it is just open for anybody. That's where we get into the problem of it becoming more of a discount for people already in is that it's universal. So like, oh, I'm in a private school and go if it's more targeted, it works better.
But right, right. Their expansion to know. So let's just just distill a little bit for me. If I'm making under forty five thousand dollars a year. Right. And we're targeting this to help those families to get you in a better school or give you some choice.

(40:59):
That's one thing. But this is universal. It's for everyone. Everybody does not matter. Your tax bracket. Everybody gets a shot. The problem is five hundred people have applied and we've got sixteen spots for this. Right. And then the school is going to be very subjective on who they're getting in and why.

(41:20):
Because and correct me if I'm wrong. I'm a go back to that one teacher in the in metro Nashville. Right. That came out of charters. I mean, he told me straight up because we were working at a tough inner city school in Nashville.
You know, my heart was in that school, but I was also aware enough to say, man, this place is tough. Right. So he's telling me it's nothing like this.

(41:42):
And that's why people are choosing to work there because the trade off is maybe I make less money and I work more hours, but it's ultimately an easier gig. Right. You you're able to do like, you know, we can all.
Oh, we worked a lot or it was exhausting as we did our first couple of episodes. Go check them out on Apple, Spotify, wherever your podcast over exhaustion and teachers.

(42:05):
It's exhausting, but that's an exhaustion where you can deal with like I'm choosing to do this. I'm doing good. Yeah. It's a different exhaustion where you're like putting out fires or worried about your safety.
Yeah, it's like, oh, yeah, for sure. Drained. You know, it's just like you go do something on the weekend. You build a deck like you're tired at the end of the day, but you feel good.
Like, yeah, that's there as opposed to like, you know, you're going over and your friend's house on fire. You're trying to put it down. Right. Right. It's much different.

(42:30):
So that's what's happening here is that they are expanding their more selective and they are like, for example, going back to Arizona, their voucher expansion drained nine hundred million.
So almost a billion from public schools in Arizona in twenty twenty four in one year. Yeah. Which which basically highlight the need for tighter regulation.
So and this is what's happening with a lot of this is that it's ballooning these budgets. We've seen that with states because again, you say we have this budget, right?

(43:00):
Like, oh, here's our education budget, but we're going to do vouchers and charter schools.
Well, you do the vouchers way more people sign up for when you think that it's universal. So we can't really say no.
Then you have the charter schools going, oh, by the way, I do need some facilities. I do need this.
So that starts to balloon because you now that you're offering this money to them, you can't really say no because then you're what?

(43:21):
Harming schools. So you're ballooning the state budget and you're siphoning from public education.
You know, so this is and this is out there. So some of the people pushing this, it's you're kind of like, look at the numbers.
You know, that's the hardest part for me to get is like, right. Right.
But when you're asking people to apply logic on something that's emotionally driven, we really don't care about that.

(43:45):
The reality is our experience has not been good here. We want options.
Right. And that's a big thing of them is like options are the thing.
We'll worry about it. And that's what a lot of people do. And we talked about the opportunity to make money off this, like the companies opening at these groups, making it.
They're kind of willing to ride it out because if yeah, it's blowing up the budget, but if they're saying they're pay for it, then that's cool.

(44:10):
We'll maybe see. So a lot of them aren't you know, there's this big push of we've been doing public school this way for a long time.
Another part of this is, hey, we're falling behind the rest of the world. Right.
Again, problem with that is I won't say that second part's true. Right.
But the first part, which we have this industrial age model of public schools, you know, Bell starts here, rings here, move to the next one conveyor belt kind of style of education model.

(44:36):
The other piece in terms of are we doing well? Are we falling behind in the rest of the world?
A little bit more subjective there, but I almost feel like you could say, yeah, yeah, maybe.
I mean, so the argument there can be made. Yeah, is my point. Absolutely.
And they do different. But you know, when you really start to dig down and here's the crux of it, right?
Here's where we get that. A lot of people say, look, we're falling behind countries like Denmark and Sweden.

(45:00):
And, you know, we should we're much more pluralistic and we shouldn't fall behind them.
When you look at it, what is Denmark and Sweden done?
They have decided one teachers, if you pass rigorous amount of tests, show you're highly qualified and like have good scores, we're going to invest in you.
So there's some of the high like teachers in Denmark are literally at the same level mentally for people as doctors, like medical doctors, like, oh, my gosh, you're a teacher.

(45:26):
And like you get paid accordingly. So then now that drives this. I have to earn this.
You know, that personal mental like, look, I have to do all these things to prove I'm highly qualified.
So you're going to get better things. We're here in America. It's like, well, you know, you're a teacher. Why?
You know, like people say, why? And then the state's also like, here's barely any money to live on.
You know, so you're naturally not going to get some of those high.

(45:47):
And again, in Denmark, it is an aspiration to be a teacher. If you're smart and something, you're a great biologist.
I'm going to be a teacher. They're a pay me well. I'm going to get respect here.
It's like, oh, did you get fired from by a bio company and then you just teach biology to like pass the time like that's it's it's the reverse.
So but but in in that in that same vein, that's staying on that argument.
I don't know. There's no glamour in being a charter school teacher.

(46:11):
I'm just saying it doesn't get any more glamorous in choosing that option.
If anything, it can I think just be as challenging in some areas, maybe in terms of lifestyle, especially in the sacrifices you have to make.
But yeah, there's I'm glad you brought up the Denmark piece because they're always getting brought up.
You know, the Norwegian countries are always getting referenced as men. They're just killing it.

(46:32):
They're doing great. And it kind of makes sense when you look at it through that lens.
Yeah. Look who they have and what they do and that's not so much a glamour of being a charter school teacher.
But when I was saying that they you know, you look at these, they use that as like we should be this.
But charter or public school teacher, what are we doing with it?
You know, like so, oh, we should be that. But are we doing the same things?

(46:53):
We've talked about it last week a little bit. You know, they take tests in eighth grade.
Are you going an academic route or are you going more of like a professional route where you may learn a trade?
So, again, their test scores that we compare ourselves like, oh, we're behind Denmark.
We're behind this. These areas, they're not the same as our test scores because we're testing everybody.
Right. So and that's an age old argument. Right. Apples to oranges.

(47:15):
Yeah, it's not the same. Yeah. So and that's so when you look at these people are talking about we have to catch up and that's the way to do it.
But it goes back that funding public education. Like, have we tried that yet?
We're trying this thing that's ballooning state budgets to see if it works.
But we haven't ever tried to be like, you know what? We're a give you everything.
You know, 10 year period where it upscores. We're going to make you prove your good teachers and see what happens.

(47:36):
Instead, we're like, oh, do better. But we're not going to change much for you.
You know, so that's the that's the area. There's a great in Ohio.
Another controversy is happening. Tweet from David Pepper, where he's literally talking about like he's almost live tweeting this from as he's hearing it.
Last week, newly sworn in Ohio speaker Huffman, the right speaker of the house, declared the state can't afford to fully and constitutionally fund Ohio public schools.

(48:03):
So and he says, well, here's a data point every Ohioans need to know.
So it's kind of a thread here. The amount of money diverted to pay for the new universal private school vouchers.
Notice he put private school in there, which largely fund the tuition of students who are already attending private school and could afford that private school last year is almost the exact same amount as the state shortfall in fully funding the bipartisan public school funding plan.

(48:27):
That's a loaded statement. Yeah.
And that amount of money being diverted from meeting that obligation obligation will only grow, eventually topping one billion.
And then he goes on to say they're playing a shell game, siphoning off a billion plus to serve certain interest, then crime for when it comes to constitutional responsibility.
Public schools in every corner of Ohio are paying the price. Here's like the big thing I really want to get for this.

(48:51):
Here's another data point. Zero percent.
OK, that's the amount of additional state revenue going to students in public schools since 1997 adjusted for inflation.
They're basically bleeding public education.
Drawing zero. Those are the facts.
Zero percent. So like when you adjust, they haven't said, oh, like inflation's up.
So it's literally right. We're at some schools in Ohio.

(49:13):
They're operating on the same amount of money. Yeah.
They were in 97. Have you you know, when you get into school budgets, have you heard of like maintenance of effort?
Yeah. You know, so sometimes budgets get passed with a maintenance of effort budget, which is like, look, we don't really want to give you any more money, but we can't give you less than we did last year.
So we're going to do a maintenance of effort budget, which is like just above what we gave you last year.

(49:35):
I mean, by a hair, maybe if not the same. So, yeah, I mean, zero percent, man, since 1999 is just staggering.
Yeah. So, I mean, that's kind of the issue. So we're diverting almost a billion to do this.
But we haven't increased that. And that goes to that argument of like a lot of people are funding that.
So with you know, and then you have Florida. OK, so we've done Arizona budget blowing up Ohio.

(49:56):
They're now saying they can't fund public schools, but there's a billion going here when they haven't really tried to fund public schools.
Florida, the voucher now, Florida, the voucher fund supporting unaccredited or low performing private schools again, not needing to be accredited.
They have a massive teacher shortage due to a lack of support and funding for teachers.
And then when Florida expanded their essay, right, their educational saving account programs,

(50:18):
nearly half of the state's new essay recipients came from families earning 400 percent over the federal poverty level.
Wow. So only one third came from families getting free and reduced lunch.
So, you know, when we say, oh, it's not really fair, you know, some people, they have feelings about charge schools and we're just giving you some numbers here.
Right. Like these are like starts to see it. So basically, Ford, you know, like families earning 400 percent.

(50:41):
So that basically for a family of four, that kind of boils down to they're making around one hundred and twenty five thousand, you know, for a family for for salary of both parents.
I think you're throwing out just crazy figures in this.
So we're talking about we've mentioned nine hundred million zero percent.
You know, it's just yeah, when you really start to peel that and look at the hard numbers, the impact on man.

(51:08):
Man. OK. Yeah, yeah. I'm with you. Yeah. So that's some of the issues with this.
So that's that is what we're fine. That's what we're looking at.
That's why we're talking about it, because I think people need to be informed on that.
They need to understand, like, where some of these numbers and facts, because it does like if you literally walked up to me, I was like, hey, what do you think about this?
I'm going to give you an option. Your kid can either go to the public school or we'll give you seven grand to go to a charter school or private school so you can pick where your kid goes.

(51:32):
Like, logically, that sounds good. I'd be like, cool. You know, maybe I like my school. I choose not to leave.
Maybe I don't. But these are the numbers that really matter.
And then we're going to have issues later down the road.
We don't want public schools shuttering their doors because we can't fund them.
And then you get into privatized education. And that's kind of a scary thing.

(51:53):
You know, we don't want students left behind. Not to make a pun, but you know.
So when you start talking about the privatization piece, man, it just makes me think of of prisons, bro.
Right. You know, when we privatize the prison model and you know that in order to keep that profitable, that means we have to have people in here.
So at the end of the day, it's not about, you know, recidivism.

(52:18):
And it's not about really helping someone overcome these issues about keeping these beds full, because that's how we make money.
Right. And that's that's what you want it based off. Let's educate kids. That's what you want it based off.
So some heavy stuff there. Right. Some like heavy. So let's take a little break. Yeah. Lighten it up.
Yeah. Take a little thing. So the other day I was literally I've been on the sword kick.

(52:41):
That's why I saw like double edged swords. I was on the sword kick and I was just sitting there.
I was like, man, you know, my house, we have this cabin outside that we got. We built. We insulated it. Ran electric. It's beautiful inside.
It's kind of like our bonus room now because we don't really have a big bonus room. And once my kids are kind of done using it, they're all getting older now.
I'm going to turn that into like kind of a man cave little out there. So I was like, I need some cool posters.

(53:05):
So I popped over to our friend, to our great to our great friend, Pop Catalog. Absolutely, man.
They got folded posters there, which is the way they originally did it.
So it's like, you know, it's you got the creasen. So, you know, it's legit vintage. Yeah.
You get some, you know, you can get some action figures if you want there. You can get actual discs.
So it's a great place to kind of I was thinking like, how can I make this like even cooler when you walk inside?

(53:26):
This is a neat little room. So I went over to Pop Catalog, looked at those things, pop on over there.
I love that kind of pop catalog. Pop on over there.
Look at VHS DVDs, CDs, posters, action figures, video games. They have it all, you know, elevate your collection.
So today we're a look at staying with the sword thing. We're going to look at a little bit for our pop catalog pop quiz here.

(53:48):
You know, love good swords. So we're asking this. All right.
What actor has been in more sword fights on screen or stage than any other actor is working?
All right. I'm with it. Go. So some options here. That way you're not just picking is a Sir Richard Harris.
Great actor. He was a man called horse. Right.
Dumbledore for people who are kind of more modern. You know, he's in Count of Monte Cristo. Great stage actor.

(54:12):
Richard Harris in the movie Unforgiven. Oh, man.
Powerful. He's older than that. Anyway, great actor. Yeah.
So you got Richard Sir Richard Harris. We have Ewan McGregor.
Obi Wan Kenobi. Right. OK. We have C Orlando Bloom.
So he's been Legolas. He's been in the Pirates of Caribbean.
And then we have D Christopher Lee, who was Count Dooku, who was Saruman and so many other films.

(54:37):
So which one are you thinking? What's your app? What do you? Oh, man.
You know, I'm going to I'm going to rule the two newest guys out.
I'm saying, you know, I'm going to get down to my 50 50 and I'm thinking it's either A or D.
And then out of those two, I'm going to go.
Christopher Lee. You are correct. I got that right.

(55:00):
Oh, Saruman. Like that's why he like as he played Count Dooku in there,
he had so much training that he actually had to like slow down when he would fight
because he was so and he encourages him to put a lot of work. Right.
Yeah. So what are we doing? And he literally he's been on so many plays.
You know, he's done Shakespearean plays.
I think the last count they said he was in over like 700 sword fights.

(55:22):
Wow. Yeah. So it's like that's a really cool.
It's Christopher Lee. You could see him up there. He's great.
Great voice to me. Right. That's a great job.
I was I thought I thought that Richard Harris or the Orlando Bloom would get you
because you think like three movies for sure.
Shoot, even the Hobbit. I'm just thinking of this dude's catalog.
Oh, man. Like, I mean, no way Orlando Bloom holds it right.
You look at you look at some of the things he's done.

(55:44):
He's a great actor. I mean, obviously he's passed away.
So R.I.P. Christopher Lee, but great and great as Saruman, too.
Doesn't really. So, you know, he just he's that voice is great.
Yeah. When he's standing up on the hill or up on the up on Orthank,
like going on, oh, no, no, no.
I was the guy who did all the vampire, the Dracula films,
like the Hammer films from back in the day.
I believe he was in I believe he's in least one or two.

(56:06):
OK. I mean, like I said, his catalog, if you go on IMDb and look it up,
it's like, dang, man. Yeah. You've done some things. Yeah.
But, you know, I'm thinking Count Dooku, the dark side charters,
undermining public. Yeah. Right.
Well, he's he's a really good as Count Dooku.
He is that because he was so elegant, you know, like he wasn't one of those guys
who like, oh, I'm joining the dark side because I'm pure evil.
You know, he just literally is like, I just agree with you.

(56:28):
He didn't believe with the ideology. Yeah.
The Jedi wanted more power. Split. Right.
And he had the separatist because he could talk.
And that's kind of a lot of what we're you know, like what's happening here is it sounds good.
Like, oh, this is being good. But last nerd fact on him and we'll move on.
Man, he was he not he was Qui-Gon Jins like. Yes.
He trained him and he was a bad dude. You know, where's universe before he goes bad.

(56:51):
Yeah. He was Yoda's Padawan. And then Qui-Gon Jins was his bad.
Shout out to Christopher Lee, man. Been in the most sort of. Is that awesome?
That's awesome. I wonder if he was like at home, like just messing around.
It's like what I do cut a dude's arm. Right.
So let's look at OK, let's think what every so we've talked about the numbers.
We've explained what they are. Let's kind of look at what everybody thinks.
Let's like go around. We're going to reforge. Stay with the sword.
We reforge Narsal. Right. Return to the king.

(57:13):
They take the shards of Narsal, which cut the ring off Soran's hand.
And they made Indriya, which is the flame of the West.
And it's about the people. So that's what we're looking at.
So let's first start with teachers. All right. What are teachers feeling about this?
Well, kind of talking to him, kind of looking there's frustration with loss of resources,
obviously, when things are being cut. Right. They're insulted here.
So one of the things here in Tennessee, Governor Billy, governor in Tennessee,

(57:37):
he's really pushing about your thing.
A lot of teachers are insulted that literally he's kind of bribing them that he said if if they pass,
like if his voucher bill passes, then he'll give teachers a one time payment of two thousand dollars.
People are like, so cool. Like two thousand grand, two thousand dollars.
And then you tell them that like right before Christmas. Yeah.

(57:59):
That's awesome. And it's like it just it's kind of insulted because it makes you feel like, oh, well, just oh, cool.
You'll maybe siphon funds and some poor schools will close. But I got to do grand, you know, one time it is.
You know, and that's and that's kind of insulting because it's like, again, the whole argument is fund public school, like pay teachers.
And teachers are even like, you know, there's this big perception like, oh, there's they're a bad teacher.

(58:23):
I've worked in a couple of schools. I've very rarely seen a teacher is just like bad.
You know, I mean, like people are trying hard. So if they were like, hey, we're going to increase standards,
like we're going to check you a little deeper there for to pay you more.
Most teachers like, let's go. You know, I'll do the work. I'm already doing the work.
I'll do the work. We're already doing a good job.
So they're kind of a little you know, a lot of teachers are kind of angry at that.

(58:44):
There's a fear by teachers of being forced to compete in an unequal system.
You know, if they're you know, the last thing we want, we all work hard.
Teachers are doing a great job. We're working on the lesson.
You want to sit in a meeting, have your principal be you know, and this is not against the principles because they just have to have your principles.
And I've talked to you about we're not performing well enough where like we just talked about, we know they're maybe not reporting the same thing.

(59:07):
Yeah. You know, so it's like, oh, you guys need to do more. It's like, is this equal?
Yeah. Yeah. You know, you're it's hard to make that argument.
It's only going to exacerbate this already contentious relationship between public charter.
And I've always wondered, you know, you put a charter teacher right next to a public school teacher.
I mean, they're just sitting side by side. Right. And they're both teachers.

(59:31):
Yeah. Like they're both trying to help kids.
But at the end of the day, one is being measured differently, way, you know, differently than the other.
And it's just ultimately unfair, man, to hold those teachers to that kind of standard, that kind of accountability measures is unfair.
It is. And that's what teachers are worried about.
And then, you know, again, this is just when you get this other option and you're worried about all those things, you know, nobody likes to do anything in an area of instability.

(59:59):
You know, we want to know, like, hey, we're supported. Hey, we got this.
And now it's like, oh, well, they're going to say we're doing a bad job.
And this happened. So that's one of the things teachers are feeling.
Let's go to parents, switch over to parents, mixed reaction.
Honestly, the support from those who with successful charter voucher experiences, obviously, if you go to a school, your kid is happy.
You're doing that. They're like, this is amazing.

(01:00:21):
Then you talk to other ones and their school shuttered or their school at some type of controversy or the person in charge of it was making three hundred grand a year.
And some of those funds were kind of like there's some fishy accounting going on.
So it's really split. Then you get this perception.
You literally brought it up earlier of a day. Davis Guggenheim's Waiting for Superman, the documentary talked about.

(01:00:42):
I mean, remember much publicity that guy was major. You know, I was working in Metro Nashville.
Yeah, they took us all to go see it. Right.
I mean, the entire district, dude, that's crazy.
One hundred eighty schools. I've never seen a documentary and they had all of us go see that at that time.
Yeah, I've never seen the documentary get that much.
There were segments on NBC about the documentary. There were like Good Morning America was doing it like not since basically anything Morgan Freeman narrates, you know, as a documentary.

(01:01:07):
Like I can't remember. There's a Penguin one like that guy. That's right.
Right. But like this was like about education. Yeah, that was a great.
Yeah, that's it. So Stanford, you know, like basically the perception of that movie, though, if you go look at it again, like I watched a few clips, the perception is just public school teachers are awful and schools are bad.

(01:01:28):
So Charlie and I remember they got they've got that bid in there. Remember, it's like the padded room or where they're just showing the maybe New York City.
Yes, I think a lot of those new teachers who are literally getting paid, they show up on the job, but they go to this room every day because they're either not good enough or whatever they've done.
But maybe they're protected under a union. It's real anti-union. I remember that. Yeah, it's very anti-union in that. Yeah.

(01:01:50):
So I mean, like, but it's all focused on teachers. But you don't look at a lot of the outside reasons. Some of these schools like Stanford, economists Raymond sponsored a study showing that teachers statistically account for around 10 to 20 percent of the achievement outcomes.
So their teachers, the most important factor within a school. Right. But you have parents, you know, there's parents, there's poverty like this. You know, that type of film doesn't look at poverty.

(01:02:15):
It doesn't look at any of those issues that affect all those things. Right. And we've talked about it before. And, you know, book, I'm finishing up. It's, you know, the two backpacks.
There's other things that kids have to deal with that doesn't, you know, like I said, if you're if you're worried about when you're going to eat, it's really hard to focus on algebra and put the care into it.
So that's kind of where it goes into us. But that movie, there's just like it made it look like these charter schools are going to save. And that was oh nine. Right. And here we are in 2025.

(01:02:43):
Right. So it wasn't the panacea that they were they were pitching it to be. Yeah. At the time. Yeah. And so I mean, and then so going off of that where teachers are 10 to 20 percent University of Washington economist Dan Goldhaber said about 60 percent of achievement is explained by non school factors such as again, family income, all of that.
So when you're looking at charter schools, it's even like you have these vouchers. There's such as this public perception. And the problem is there's not much of a way for teachers to like fight against that because all we can say is no, I'm doing a good job. Like, you know, and we're not reporting the same thing.

(01:03:15):
So that's a kind of an uphill thing that parents are seeing. Like they are seeing what's kind of being pushed of this. And, you know, so parents out there, you know, talk to your teachers, like literally talk to email, go to the school, like look, you know, obviously schedule it like just ask to talk to them and beat them.
And feel the vibe like you'll be surprised. I think the schools really try your schools care. Like I said, it's a profession of care. Yeah. And I wanted to go back to your point, you know, and obviously I've been a principal assistant principal in multiple counties.

(01:03:43):
And there are there are ineffective teachers. Yeah, I mean, I mean, there are. But it's been it's been my experience that any principal worth their salt is doing their best to either a build capacity grow that teacher or be grow or go.
I mean, exercising you out of the building if you just can't get to where we need you to be, which is effectively teaching kids, helping them learn at a level that impacts our accountability measures the right way.

(01:04:15):
So I just think that, yeah, there there are going to be ineffective teachers. But it has been my experience, man. We're working to either improve them or get them somewhere else where they can be successful so we can get the right person in here.
Yeah. And I think I think there's and I I totally agree with you. And I think that's a great thing. And I think because education is so personal, there's this perception that we're just hiding those teachers.

(01:04:40):
Like you said, the padded rooms, like teacher jail, like you're not good enough to be in the class. You've done something bad, but we can't fire you. And that's not it's like any other business.
Like if you're not doing it, they do try to support. They try to grow. And if you can't cut that, like you said, they let you go. And I think there's a perception that schools don't do that. We just keep. Oh, well, John hasn't opened a book in 12 years, but always sure do love them.

(01:05:02):
So we'll let people are familiar with the word tenure. Yeah. And I think tenure is that knee jerk reaction of like, man, dude's tenured, man. Good luck.
You know, and there is a reality to that. I'll speak to that directly. There is there is a reality to that. There are measures that can be taken against that, but it's still really challenging.
So even still, there's some underlying truth there in what's happening. That particular documentary just chose to only show that and make it seem like this is how everything is.

(01:05:31):
Yeah. And so then you get to like politicians, right? Proponents, right? Like so Tennessee Republicans right now are obviously behind Governor Lee's thing. They're basically saying it's empowering families and proving education of his voucher push.
Then you also have critics, right? Like the Arizona Democrats are saying public money should not fund private education because then you get into this. We talked about curriculum.
Like what are they actually teaching? And then like looking at this according to all four ed.org, they have an annual report. There's a bipartisan support for increasing public school funding over vouchers.

(01:06:03):
So this is bipartisan. Okay. You kind of see this post on X this is a little like pie chart comes up and it literally looks when asked to choose majorities of Democratic and Republican voters prefer increasing funding for public school voucher.
Public schools over vouchers. You're looking at 82% Democrats want public schools funded that tracks. Okay. We look at all voters like just mixing them all up. It depends. Everything 68% on it.

(01:06:28):
And you look at Republicans only 58%. So still more than half. Yeah. So like there's this idea that people don't want to fund it. It's wrong. It's just are the politicians going to listen to that?
Literally they asked as they were kind of walking in one of the Tennessee's House representative members were asked your local school district does not want they literally voted. We do not want charters. Does that affect your decision how to vote?

(01:06:55):
He just flat looked at the cameras and no. You know, so when you have politicians not serving their people, especially when right board say that this is where you get in this area and that's happening in a county nearby.
Yeah, I mean, I've seen that vote come up a couple of times and get voted down, but there may or not be, you know, politicians that are still pushing that particular agenda. So to that point, right? Yeah, I've seen that play out.

(01:07:17):
You got really the will to be in real life. I've seen that you got will the people right here. You work for the people, right? Like the House representatives of Tennessee, the people. So then you're back to your conspiratorial agenda.
Right? Yeah, like you're sitting there like, oh, why you brought us full circle. I have this. So I try to do. I get it. It makes sense. So final thing here, right? Let's look at. So what all of this happens. So we just talked about parents, teachers, politicians, how they're looking at this. So what can we do? Let's do a little call to action here. Come on. Right. So like again, we take in Narsal. We've reforged it figured out. Now we got Andrew, the flame of the West. We're fighting. We're moving forward. We're not going to take the old way. So for teachers, what can they do? Join unions, like be a part of that union.

(01:07:56):
However you feel about that advocacy groups, like be aware. Don't let this just hit you in the head. And I know people can get knee jerk on unions. To me, when I hear that, get involved, get involved, get it, get informed, get involved, you know, take action. Right. I mean, just don't sit the keyboard jockey, two thumbs blasting on social media. I mean, get informed and get involved in real life. If that means being a part of that union.

(01:08:25):
Then double down on that. Go into it with this attitude of I want to learn more and I want to see how I can make my actions, my vote count. Yeah, absolutely. That's what I mean. It's not just joining union. It's just like advocacy groups. Be a part of it. You know, email call your rep, you know, like look up their number, say, oh, this is who represents me in the state house. Let them know, hey, I don't want this. Or if you do want it, I do want this. Be a part of it. Don't, you know, don't just let it happen to you.

(01:08:55):
You know, and for, you know, like I said, stay informed about local policies, go to those meetings, speak out at board meetings like voices aren't heard. People like, you know, silence is concession.
Right. If they're like, oh, we're going to vote and there's not many teachers there to say, hey, we don't want this. This is why I don't want it. They're not getting those data points. And there's like, OK, must be OK. You know, some of the powerful things I've seen. I know you're talking about parents, but is when like a student comes up at a board meeting, speaks from the heart, but they're prepared. They're informed. I mean, they're just railing on this. Yeah. I mean, I love that.

(01:09:24):
So, you know, get up, speak at a board meeting. You know, anyone can do that. All you got to do is sign up. I know there's some protocols and things like that, but everybody's voice can be heard at those board meetings.
Yeah. Let it be heard. Great point. You know, for parents, you know, research your schools thoroughly before enrolling your children. Right. You don't want that. You don't want to send them to a charter school.
That's what you choose. That shutters the doors or has some issues. But you also don't want to just have your school, you know, like don't assume your public schools bad. I feel I see so much of that.

(01:09:51):
Yeah. People just assume like, oh, because that's the narrative. Right. And that's what we're trying to like change a little bit here. Look at and this is what parents often, you know, you kind of look at one or the other.
Look at quantitative data. Right. So look at their test scores, graduation rates. You can find that a lot of different places for each school, but also look at qualitative data.
Like, you know, like any surveys that measure student family satisfaction, you know, the type of curriculum they do, school belief on discipline, learn those things, because that's like the heart of a school.

(01:10:17):
You know, like that's where you're you're that quantitative data, the qualitative stuff is pushing towards what they want to achieve.
So kind of find out those things again. What does your school think, especially if you are looking at a charter school?
What's your full perspective? Right. You know, get the numbers. Hey, you're on this. Yeah. Yeah. Don't just go in like, oh, it's bad.
You know, demand transparency, accountability, if you do to a charter school and voucher programs, you know, these are popping up in our areas, especially down here.

(01:10:45):
They're talking about needing to build them. You know, they don't have the ability to build its public funds. Right.
Literally say like, hey, OK, well, we want if you're to do this, we want this and this and this to figure it out, you know, because that's if we're truly doing parent choice, then we should demand transparency.
You know, legislative example exam standardized tests.
Again, we talked about draining 900 million Arizona figure, right?

(01:11:07):
Create regulations like we can't jump into this with just no guardrails.
And if they're just diverting public funds like we can't, I mean, Tennessee had a surplus.
We can't go 900 in the red. We don't want that.
Our million in the red. So the legislators need to make sure there's guardrails.
Don't just jump on this. So there's a lot of discussion.
That's why we're talking about it here today is because we want to start discussion.

(01:11:27):
This is an issue that's coming at education, coming at educators.
And we need to talk about it. Give you facts. So that's why we are here.
I think it's one of the hottest button issue. Absolutely.
Currently. And again, it goes back to that emotion piece.
This is my kid. This is our experience. We want choice.
I mean, any time you get into that emotional crucible there of people and their children, you know, yeah.

(01:11:54):
So, again, get informed, both logic and feelings, right?
You want the quantitative and the qualitative. Get the full picture.
Get to know your your zone school. Yeah.
Get the tour. Meet the principal. You know, hear from from staff.
But get to know that school before you throw the baby out with the bathwater.

(01:12:15):
Just because you've heard only bad things about public school.
Yeah, absolutely. Like that school, when you walk in and you get the tour,
it's going to be the same as if you weren't there because we can't control that many kids.
It's not like we're put like you put on a dog and pony show.
We're like, everybody stay in your seats. There's a parent walking through. Right.
Like, yeah, you're going to see exactly what your kid would see if they were there.
And you can get that vibe like go in there and principals love.

(01:12:37):
You know, they like giving tours. They have a lot to do, but they like it.
They they like showing that, you know, I'm a throw this in real quick.
I heard this one time.
So, you know, we all we we constantly ask our kid, how is your day?
You know, how are things today?
Oh, what did you learn today?
And you don't get much out of a kid. Yeah.
But I heard somebody position it like this one time.
Ask your child what they saw today. Oh, interesting.

(01:12:58):
Yeah. You know, hey, what would you see today? Yeah.
And just listen. Yeah.
You know, what did you see today at school?
Oh, man. Yeah.
I saw this or oh, man, we, you know, yeah, we did this.
Yeah. It's just a different way to frame it, to try to get
because I think at the end of the day, man, talk to kids.
Mm hmm. Man, talk to children.

(01:13:19):
It's one of the things that I think we just don't do a good enough job at. Right.
Speak to children about their experiences in school.
It's not always easy to get that information out of them.
So reframing it with them, you know, what did you see?
Yeah, they'll just talk forever because it's like when you say, what did you learn today?
They're like, I mean, you know, my schedule. Yeah.

(01:13:39):
I learned math in my 10 year old son.
And it is. Yes, I had art.
Yeah. Liam will be like fractions.
I like what about fractions? Yeah.
But what did you see today?
Oh, man, I saw this.
I mean, it's just a different way to find out.
Add to that writing and research in my book.
You know, the two backpacks about what like teens are thinking and feeling.
But if they they're naturally going to kind of go probably a little drama

(01:14:01):
based thing or something kind of crazy.
I will tell parents and stuff, don't react negatively.
They don't like, well, you shouldn't be around because that'll close them off.
Just listen. You're just listening at this point.
Right. It is hard to do. You're right.
You don't want your kid like, oh, they're in food control.
You should have been anywhere near that.
We're even close to that. Right.
How are you even in a position to see that? Right.
Yeah. Let me keep that trust open because then you'll notice they'll start.

(01:14:23):
Eventually, if you do that enough and correctly, they'll sit down next to you.
And be like, guess what happened to school today?
And you're like, I didn't even do you have do you have parenting tips
like that and stuff in your book? Yeah.
On the two backpacks. Yeah.
It's a lot of it's building that connection of like, so we're trying to understand
teens better. And that's like one of is like they want to reach out.
But then they're also afraid of being judged.
And if parents are always in that disciplinary mode, even not like go to your room,

(01:14:45):
but like, oh, don't be around that person or you shouldn't be near that door.
Yeah. Then they're like, all right, well, you don't care about it.
Yeah. Why would I tell you what I saw? I'm going to yell that.
Yeah. So like there's a lot of good stuff like that.
I hopefully will help.
So closing thought, one thing, you know, we're we're really going to think about
it, put it out there. And then once you have an and if you have something you want to say,
email us at educational warfare dot pod at gmail dot com.

(01:15:06):
But if the goal is truly student success,
how do we balance innovation of these new vouchers and charge schools?
Like we're innovating things and equity in education.
Yeah. Yeah. So it's kind of something to think about, like, how do we balance those two?
Like we are trying to change the system and you can't discredit them.
Like this is something that's different. It's a shakeup.
Kind of like Linda McMahon, we talked about being possibly a secretary of education.

(01:15:29):
It's a shakeup. But also equity.
Like if we're going to give funds here, are we giving more or less to public schools?
We can't lose that just because it says public.
And look, I know the current climate, so I'm just going to say it.
I mean, equity is not a bad word.
No, man. Equitable.
You know, I'm the underdog's advocate.
That's been my persona in education for a long time.

(01:15:50):
I'm going to fight for that student that needs support, you know, that needs that kind of advocate.
So equity to me, not a bad word.
We want to ensure that students everywhere are getting the kind of game changing education that they deserve.
This is your constitutional right.
Yeah. Free public education.
So equity to me, not a bad word.

(01:16:11):
But I love your question because I'm an innovative guy and I like to think I am right.
So how do we balance?
We want to push this conversation forward.
Man, we don't want to serve under an archaic model that's no longer benefiting, you know, the majority.
So we want to balance this innovative approach while also keeping equity so that our students, man, are getting those needs met.

(01:16:35):
You know, I think of my own son with that dyslexia piece and the great work that's gone on at his school.
Special education services.
Man, those things matter. They're important.
Just like anti bullying campaigns and getting students out of bad situations matters.
I understand and represent and respect all of that.
Just get informed.
Yes. So that you have the clearest picture possible.

(01:16:58):
But man, it's such a great question to close with.
Man, it's balancing innovation and equity.
Yeah, because you want to change things.
You want things to be better.
But you like I said, you can't start leaving people behind.
You can't start leaving schools or programs out of schools.
We don't ever want like I don't want a football team to stop being able to play football because they don't have the funds.
I don't want an art program to stop being doing that because they don't have the funds because we're trying this.

(01:17:19):
So, you know, there are still kids in these public schools.
Our kids in these charter schools. Let's make sure it's equitable.
Yeah, that's what we're talking about.
So I think it's a lot of information today.
I think it was super cool to talk about it because it is so deep.
We probably do a five hour podcast on this.
There's so much stuff out there.
So I had a lot of fun.
You know, and thank you, everybody, for joining us today on educational warfare.

(01:17:40):
Charter schools and vouchers are reshaping education.
They are here.
But whether for better or the worse depends on all of us.
Just like Dr. Jackson said, staying informed and engaged.
Don't let it tire you out.
Don't let it make it be like I've talked about this.
I've gone to meetings and it's still coming back up.
Be engaged. You know, fight for education.

(01:18:00):
That's why we're here on educational warfare.
So we all have that.
Ryan, thank you for being here today.
Absolutely. Great, great conversation today.
You know, my final thought would be for not only educators,
but I'm thinking of parents out there, stakeholders, community members,
industry leaders, right?
You have a voice.

(01:18:21):
Exercise that voice.
Get involved. Be heard. Get informed.
Man, great, great, great conversation today.
Great information today.
So we're hoping to inform people.
Yeah, it's been a lot of fun.
So for Tommy, for Matt, for Dr. Jackson, you know,
I am Dr. Jordan Lauer saying thank you for listening.
Thank you for being here.

(01:18:42):
And thank you for being a part of the fight.