A school choice bill that would create “education savings accounts” is up for debate this Thursday, February 6th, in the State Legislature’s House Education Committee at 8 a.m.
HB1140 sponsor, St. Rep. Travis Couture (R-Allyn), tells KVI listeners his school choice bill, “is essentially education savings accounts and this account is basically the backpack on the child’s back…where the dollars go into the account, and you can choose –parents can choose–wherever school or educational alternative that they want to go and spend those dollars on.”
Couture spoke to KVI morning show host, John Carlson (pictured above). To hear the entire interview, click the play button below.
The goal of the school choice bill, Couture says, is “we’re funding students and not systems and bloated bureaucracies. We spend billions and billions of dollars on a K-12 system that doesn’t deliver any measurably good outcomes. Like 70% of our kids not being able to do math at (8th) grade level in our state. ”
The latest 8th grade reading and math test results for Washington students showed a drop in how many are testing at grade level.
Couture adds, “school choice is growing across the nation. Over half–almost like 3/4ths of the states–now have some kind of school choice policy. Its’ growing in popularity–especially after the (COVID) pandemic. And people want choices. This is America. This is what its all about. People want the choice of where to send their kids to get the education that best fits the needs of their families and their kids.”
Teacher’s unions have typically opposed school choice bills and reforms. Couture acknowledged that reality, saying “frankly there’s a lot of myths that need to be busted with teacher’s unions and everything else. School choice is very popular in a lot of other states and growing in popularity. We don’t want to get left behind as a state.”
The John Carlson Show is heard weekday mornings from 6-9 on Talk Radio 570 KVI and 101.5 FM HD3.
