By James R. Golden
Guest Columnist

I am a Kentucky attorney and father of four children, all graduates of local public schools, three college graduates (the fourth currently in college), one with a post-graduate degree and one currently pursuing a post graduate degree in physics. I have served on the school board at Pineville Independent School District since 2010. I want to explain why I am voting “YES” on Amendment 2 next Tuesday.

A few months ago I spoke with a friend of mine, a Kentucky father from a metropolitan area who had just moved his children to private school after struggling with the local school system’s

byzantine bureaucratic rules and woke agendas. He said “the difference between the experience

(our kids) are having in private school vs the local public school is staggering” and even “life

changing.” This is from a person with lifelong positive experience with public schools. His statement reflects just how dysfunctional some public schools have become. He and his wife are among the fortunate ones who can afford private school for their kids. Most working parents in  these areas cannot afford it and are forced to accept a substandard education for their kids. This is the very situation that expanded school choice is designed to address.

More and more states each year and every state surrounding Kentucky allow parents some form of expanded school choice consisting of a voucher system, charters or a hybrid of some description. Public education in those states has not suffered as a result but educational outcomes, test scores and opportunities for poor kids have improved. A voucher system does just that, in effect putting a share of public dollars towards the education of every Kentucky child, allowing the parents to choose where it is spent. Parents are in a better position to decide the best path for their child than any school bureaucrat could hope to be.

But let’s be clear, the vote on Amendment 2 has nothing to do with creating a voucher system, nor is there any connection between a yes vote and funding for public schools in Kentucky. It’s about who decides what schools your child can attend. A “no” vote means you are content to allow public school bureaucrats to continue to have a monopoly on all kids who cannot afford any alternative. That works if you have a good local public school available, but many parents are locked in horrible districts and cannot escape. A yes vote allows the legislature to CONSIDER alternatives that will expand choice for those kids. Outcomes are better when you give parents control instead of the central planners at KDE.

In Bell County we are fortunate to have three good public schools available, and voting yes will do nothing to change that or diminish funding for these schools.

It has been said that in our federal system, states are the laboratories of democracy. The last decades have seen many innovations in the approach to public funded education across the country. According to Edchoice.org, these include education savings accounts (17 states have these), voucher systems (22 states), tax credit scholarships (22 states), tuition scholarships (22 states), and charter schools. Kentucky is missing out on these dynamic changes because of an unnecessary roadblock in our 1893 constitution. Amendment 2 is intended to fix that.

In spite of the growing trend of expanding choice, Kentucky social and traditional media is rife with wildly inaccurate fearmongering surrounding Amendment 2, most of which is coming either directly or indirectly from the various “K” groups, the Kentucky Department of Education (KDE) or the Kentucky Education Association (KEA), the teacher’s union and others. Most of that fear-mongering is spread by design in service of the educational establishment. Parental choice is anathema to folks at KDE and the other “K” groups because it reduces their control, not because it will be detrimental to education, hence their intense dislike and vitriolic, misleading and often unlawful (the law does not allow government employees to use tax dollars to advocate political positions) propaganda opposing the amendment. They perceive it as being harmful to their own interests.

When you read that voting yes will endanger or even destroy public education, remember, the Kentucky legislature actually passed a voucher system a few years ago. It did none of the horrible things being posed in opposition to Amendment 2 but was struck down by the Kentucky Supreme Court because of an outdated provision of our Constitution. If “yes” prevails then something similar may pass again but whatever passes into law will be a product of the legislative process which was designed by our founders to address and mediate competing interests. History shows that the Kentucky legislature is very responsive to the education establishment. There is no reason to be afraid of that process. There is reason, however, to be afraid of rule by bureaucrats with unchecked power. Parental choice is the antidote. Vote YES!