The results of the 34th annual Phi Delta Kappa/Gallup Poll of the public's attitudes toward the public schools were released on Tuesday, and as in other years, early attention has focused on what those results show about public support for vouchers.
A few months back, Terry Moe of the Hoover Institution attacked last year's PDK/Gallup poll for "cooking the questions" on vouchers by posing two separate queries on the issue, phrased and framed in different ways, then highlighting in their press release the results that seemed to show less support for vouchers.
This year, the poll found that support for vouchers rose significantly no matter how the question was phrased. When asked whether they favored a policy permitting parents to choose private schools for their children to attend "at public expense" (which Moe notes invites a negative response because it presents vouchers as a special-interest program for an exclusive group), 46% said that they would favor it, up from 34% last year. When asked if they favor allowing parents to send their children to any school they choose, with the government paying all or part of the tuition-the same basic question, but using different language-52% said yes, up from 44% last year.
The press release issued by PDK/Gallup this year made no attempt to disguise the fact that support for vouchers rose, though it did emphasized that a majority (52%) still oppose the idea (using numbers from the question which is biased against support for the program). Note that the survey was conducted before the Supreme Court announced its decision upholding the Cleveland voucher program. It's likely that this rise in public support for the policy, combined with the Court's go-ahead, will add momentum to the voucher movement.
A separate survey commissioned by the Center for Education Reform and also released on Tuesday found even higher support for vouchers. When asked if they favor allowing poor parents to be given the tax dollars allotted for their child's education and permitting them to use the money to send their child to a private school of their choice, 63% said yes. When asked if they support providing parents with the option of sending their children to the school of their choice-public, private, or parochial-76% supported the policy.
Even more popular than vouchers, however, is the No Child Left Behind Act (NCLB). Fifty seven percent of those surveyed by PDK/Gallup believe that that the federal government's heightened involvement in local school affairs is a good thing and two-thirds favor annual testing in grades 3-8. Indeed, most would go further than NCLB: 68% would require all states to use a single, nationally standardized test, and 66% favor a national curriculum-these being two of the great education bugaboos of Washington politicians. Large majorities support offering "in-district" choice for students in schools that fail to meet state standards (86%), offering tutoring by state-approved private providers (90%), and termination of the principals and teachers in failing schools (56%), though most oppose closing the school (77%). The public seems unworried by the increase in testing and does not share the concern of some educators that the emphasis on reading and math in NCLB will result in less reduced attention for other subjects. (56% say this would be a good thing.)
The 34th Annual Phi Delta Kappa/Gallup Poll of the Public's Attitudes toward the Public Schools, by Lowell Rose and Alec Gallup, August 20, 2002
Center for Education Reform 2002 National Survey of American's Attitudes toward School Choice, August 20, 2002
"Cooking the Questions," by Terry Moe, Education Next, Spring 2002