It’s official now: presumptive Republican presidential nominee Mitt Romney wants to attach federal Title I and IDEA dollars to individual students, according to his remarks in Washington on Wednesday and his “A Chance for Every Child” plan for reforming education.
The proposal would give low-income students and students with disabilities the chance to pick which school they attend from among regular public schools, charter schools, and private schools, in states where that would be allowed by state law. (This is what my colleague Alyson Klein and I guessed from another document the Romney camp was circulating over the weekend.) Students could also use the money to pay for tutoring or online classes.
But it appears Romney didn’t consult with special education advocacy groups before making his pitch. While special education vouchers have grown in popularity in recent years, the number of programs is small, and the number of participants is also tiny.
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