It's National School Choice Week, a time to consider if the education your child is getting is a good fit. There are lots of options for educating a child, like homeschool, charter school, or online. The National School Choice Awareness Foundation's goal is to educate parents about their options.
“For parents, especially a generation ago, a lot of these options didn’t exist, so it’s a lot sometimes for parents to soak up if they haven’t experienced it before or they’re just choosing for their son or daughter for the first time. So, we try to make sure parents have this information," said Shelby Doyle, vice president of public awareness for the National School Choice Awareness Foundation.
The group says this is the time to start touring and looking at schools, so enrollment deadlines aren’t missed. If taking a tour of a school, the organization recommends a few things to ask:
- What are the school’s academic expectations?
- Are the classes challenging and interesting?
- How do you evaluate students’ learning?
“School choice doesn’t need to exist just because people are mad at the school they're zoned for or there’s something wrong with it. In fact, we know that more than 60% of parents are satisfied with the school their child is assigned. Even if they want to change schools. So it's not like an us versus them, or an either or," said Doyle.
During School Choice Week, advocates want families to know they can choose the best fit, which may or may not be a public school. According to a survey conducted by National School Choice Week, Black, Hispanic and young parents are most likely to consider switching to a new school.
