Traditional school districts don’t allow for the customization needed to prepare students for the future economy, Bush said in his keynote address, adding that parents should be the drivers of education for their children.

“The new system should be parent-driven, should be totally transparent, should be focused on as many choices as possible, where we customize the learning experience for this unique group of people that are emerging into our world,” he said. “Empowered with the proper information, parents are the best school district that exists in this country.”

Five states allow for Education Savings Accounts: Florida, Mississippi, North Carolina, Arizona, and Tennessee. Commonly referred to as ESAs, they are funds set aside by the state for families — usually from low-income backgrounds — to spend on options like private school, tutoring, textbooks, or special education services. ESAs differ from vouchers, which can be spent only on private school tuition, and tax-credit scholarships, which involve money raised from corporate tax breaks.

The panelists at the event envisioned a future where education services become “unbundled.” For example, a student might spend half the day at a traditional school and then take music and calculus courses online, followed by private Spanish lessons from a retired teacher, Bush said — all paid for through ESAs. He compared school choice to the options in the milk aisle of a grocery store.

“The whole world is alive when you’re given options and you are an informed consumer, and that’s what parents should be. They should be given information to make the best choices for themselves, and whether it’s private or public or something in between, it doesn’t matter,” he said.

Education savings accounts have proven controversial. Nevada has had a law for three years allowing ESAs, but legal challenges have kept it from operating. Opponents argue that ESAs send public dollars, which should be used for struggling public schools, to private organizations that are outside government accountability, including religious institutions that may defy anti-discrimination laws against groups like LGBT communities.

Bush and other panelists acknowledged that one challenge of the ESA model is trying to find an accountability system for what could become a very scattered marketplace of education options. Several suggested an online review platform similar to Yelp that is driven by parent feedback.

“I think ESAs can push to the next generation of accountability,” said Adam Peshek, director of education choice at the Foundation for Excellence in Education.

Lindsey Burke, director for the Center for Education Policy at the Heritage Foundation, looked at whether parents were really using the accounts to customize their children’s education. She studied ESAs in Florida, where the Gardiner Scholarship Program has provided $10,000 to thousands of families who have students with disabilities. After the first two years of the program, she said, 40 percent of families had become “customizers,” meaning they spent the money on more than one educational option, such as curriculum, therapies, or private tutoring. Half of those customizers didn’t even set foot in a school building, preferring private personalized options instead.

Burke found a similar pattern in Arizona, where one-third of families were spending state money on multiple education options.

While Bush complimented Education Secretary Betsy DeVos on her support of choice options, calling her an “ally,” he and other panelists cautioned that the battle for ESAs should be fought in the states, rather than at the federal level.

But Burke pointed out several areas where federal oversight would be useful for Education Savings Accounts: providing options for military families, Native Americans in poor-performing Bureau of Indian Education schools, and students in Washington, D.C., who fall under federal governance.

“That’s why this is important. Education is the chance to be able to have the skills to live a life of purpose and meaning, plain and simple,” Bush said.

Since Tom Boasberg was appointed to lead Denver Public Schools in 2009, the district has seen a renewed focus on providing opportunities for high-needs students, boasted exponential gains, and expanded its portfolio of high-performing charter schools. DPS has received national recognition for a number of its initiatives, including those of school choice and new schools.

Boasberg arrived in Denver by way of the Federal Communications Commission, for which he was a legal adviser. He was also once a junior high school English teacher in Hong Kong’s public schools.

In Colorado, the education climate is a little different — achievement gaps persist, and political resistance is strong. And even as acceptance and cooperation have grown for greater collaboration across traditional district and charter schools, school reform opposition endures.

The following interview has been lightly edited for clarity.

����Ӱ��: What do you consider your biggest accomplishment in offering a high-quality education to families?

Boasberg: I think it’s been the tremendous growth in student achievement. We’ve decreased our dropout rate by 70 percent; we’ve increased our graduates by 70 percent. As a result of the increase in quality of our schools, we’ve had the fastest enrollment growth of any school district of any big city in the country.

Choice has played a very important role in that. From the beginning, we had a very intentional and clear strategy to work very hard to improve our existing schools, to welcome high-quality new schools, and to encourage innovation in our schools. I think that’s been a very important part of driving improvement in academic performance and driving the huge increases in enrollment.

In what areas, and from where, do you face the most backlash?

Our model is a very different model from the traditional model of public education, which has long been a monopoly, and has long been one where there’s often very little choice for parents, and one where you had one school in a boundary, where boundaries have often replicated patterns of housing segregation. Our model, on the other hand, has welcomed high-quality district schools, high-quality charter schools, and integrated multiple district schools and charters in community enrollment zones.

So there’s pressure from the charter side, from the traditional district side, from white folks, from people of color…. None of these issues are easy or cut-and-dry. There’s lots of disagreement — and there should be — about the best approaches to these issues.

Are your greatest challenges political or logistical?

I don’t think they’re logistical. Our system has been seen as very strong. Our unified enrollment system is a national model and has a high degree of respect and acceptance. I think our challenges are both policy — how do we devise and implement the best policies — and political — how do we make sure we’re responsive to community concerns and leading on critical issues.

Where is there room for improvement?

Lots. The overarching improvement is we want every school to be an excellent school. I’m grateful for the improvement that we made, but we’ve got lots to do on the quality of all of our schools and in successfully eliminating achievement and opportunity gaps.

What role does a district superintendent have in promoting a portfolio of high-quality options?

It’s a central leadership role in trying to articulate a clear vision in where we want to get to, to be able to help create effective and thoughtful policies, and to work closely with the community to have a strong level of understanding and support in a two-way manner so that changes can be both made and, most importantly, sustained in our democracy.

How has your own thinking evolved on school choice over the years?

I’ve always believed in equity among all of our schools, regardless of governance. And the whole purpose of school choice is to drive greater equity for our highest-needs kids and for communities that have not historically been well-served. And I continue to believe very strongly in both those core principles. The purpose of this is to drive equity, and to do so, you need to have strong, equitable systems of governance: choice, district, and charter schools.

One thing that keeps getting hammered home time and again is the power of privilege in our society, and how strong a pull that has on families in the community. And our historical systems — for example, where we rate schools solely based on the academic status of students — really exacerbate those biases and prejudices that are so inherent. There’s a powerful lesson here around how important it is that you be aware of the powerful force of privilege and set up your systems to be able to deal with the power of those forces.

What are some lessons learned from your experience that can be extrapolated and replicated in other states and districts?

One is to be clear on what your overarching purpose is. I think that overarching purpose in Denver and elsewhere is, or should be, around driving greater equity for historically underserved students. If your systems aren’t doing that, then what are they doing? And by definition what they’ll be doing is exacerbating the inequities in our society.

Linked to that is, if you’re going to have public schools of multiple governing types — district-run and charter — make sure you’re committed to having truly public schools, and that all of your schools, regardless of governing type, have the same opportunities, resources, building facilities, and have the same responsibilities to serve all students.

When Pedro Martinez arrived in San Antonio to lead the Independent School District in 2015, he was handed a portfolio of just two quality schools of choice and carried with him a goal of improving academic achievement and creating equity in one of the most economically segregated cities in the country.

Martinez brought with him experience from Washoe County School District in Nevada and Chicago Public Schools. He grew up in poverty in Chicago’s inner city after his family emigrated from Mexico when he was 5 years old.

Martinez was the first in his family to graduate from both high school and college, paving the way for his siblings to follow his lead in earning their own degrees. Three of his sisters eventually became teachers in Chicago Public Schools.

The following interview has been lightly edited for clarity.

����Ӱ��: What do you consider your biggest accomplishment in offering a high-quality education to families?

I came in 2 1/2 years ago, and we had a couple high-quality options open, but there wasn’t much else. Since then, we’ve opened up an all-boys school and we have options for Montessori and dual language. Texas allows districts to enroll from anywhere within our region, so we have a free market of sorts. And we’ve seen a strong demand for our options even from outside our district. And seeing the overwhelmingly positive response of families both within and outside district boundaries — that we’ve instilled that type of trust and excitement in families is perhaps the biggest accomplishment that I see.

In what areas, and from where, do you face the most backlash?

We haven’t seen backlash up to this point on our current options that are open today. The most recent backlash, though, was this week when were bringing in a new high-quality option with New York’s Democracy Prep Public Schools. Our trustees and I went to see it in New York, and we loved their rigor and track record. But for the first time I did see some backlash from our unions because this would be the first traditional K-12 option in our district that will not have employees reporting to us — instead reporting to another organization — and not have the same type of contracts our teachers have.

For every other option, the employees have reported to us, so we’ve been able to open new models with little resistance.

Is it coming from parents? The short answer is “no.” I had a parent meeting last week to explain this, and it’s not coming from them. I’m proud of the trust we have built with parents. Parents want these choices. The backlash is coming from our unions and alliances in San Antonio. It’s about having charter schools that don’t have union contracts versus schools with union contracts or union right.

But what I’m paying attention to the most is that we’re listening to parents and that for our employees, we’re partnering with individuals that are going to treat them well.

Are your greatest challenges political or logistical?

They’re mostly logistical. Different partners have different expertise in areas like English language learning versus bilingual education. The partners that we have have a deep commitment to working through those things, but it takes a lot of work and time.

The political side is now revealing itself with the partnerships we’re entering. That’s something that I knew eventually was going to come, and it’s purely a political difference. I respect the union and their views. I don’t agree with them, but what I’m going to focus on is the needs of our students and doing what’s best for them.

Where is there room for improvement?

We’re learning. This is going to be a continuous process of learning. I look at the work that Denver, Chicago have done. The work has always been messy. Many times there’s philosophical differences and challenges around communication.

There are many innovative models, so we need to understand what we’re doing and why we’re doing it. We need to make sure that we communicate effectively, answer questions, and stay positive because things can get negative. My hope is that we continue to focus on what’s important: listening to our families and responding to them. And we’re getting a very positive response.

What role does a district superintendent have in promoting a portfolio of high-quality options?

Here in San Antonio it’s interesting because we were the original district in the city, and the city was able to annex 16 to 18 districts that have some presence within the city of San Antonio. So we have the opportunity to be unrestricted in how we enroll children.

But while it really is a true free market, for lack of a better term, there are other unintended consequences. The main thing we have to ensure is that we don’t create inequities in that process. It’s easy for us to attract motivated, more educated families for these options. So if we’re not careful, we can design a system that weeds out a lot of families either because they’re working two jobs or don’t become informed of those options.

In my role as a superintendent, I need to ensure we’re creating equity and serving families in these options that I know we may have to go the extra step to ensure they have access to them.

How has your own thinking evolved on school choice over the years?

This focus on equity is one that, from my experiences in Chicago and Atlanta, is a much higher priority for me. When I was in Chicago, we created some amazing magnet options, and to this day they’re still some of the top schools in the state. But one of the things I learned from that is that the unintended consequence was that while we brought back middle-class families — because we were losing them to the suburbs — we also reduced access to some of the neediest families because the demand was so high for those seats. The same thing is seen in Boston with their Latin schools. You end up creating, by mistake, a segregated system.

We are already the most segregated city by income in the country. So our challenge here was: As these schools become very popular, how do we prioritize those seats to ensure that families that may not be as well informed will have available to them? It’s about having a stronger focus on equity and access, and that’s something that has evolved, because I was proud of the work we did in Chicago, but I have the ability now to reflect on: For all the successes we had there, what were some of the challenges we created?

What are some lessons learned from your experience that can be extrapolated and replicated in other states and districts?

We always have to think about choice in a very broad way. One mistake is, when we talk about choice, it brings out certain terms: charters, vouchers, magnet programs. I’ve worked in K-12 across four cities across the country, and the local context matters a lot. What’s right for one community might not be right in another. How do you build on the assets you have? That will build the quality of success. How do I deal with the fact that it’s already a very segregated city?

One of the things I did my first year was listen and evaluate the community, and we were very careful about the options we rolled out. Now we know more. That’s one of the reasons I think families are willing to trust us, because we’re being thoughtful about it, it’s something that’s specific to San Antonio, and if I were in New York City, I’d want something that’s specific to that site.

One of the things that grounds me is that as I talk to our staff and community, the one thing I make clear is: Regardless of the partnerships and the options, they’re different pathways, but they all have to go in the same direction. Children have to graduate and, if they choose, go to university and graduate. And we have to match them with the right universities. Having that clear north star is very important. Everything until then can be a different pathway to get there. As long as they get there.

With President Donald Trump and U.S. Secretary of Education Betsy DeVos driving the public dialogue toward their far-right, for-profit privatization agenda, an alien from another planet could be forgiven for landing here and assuming that “school choice” is the priority of only the Republican Party — or that Democrats are in retreat when it comes to expanding options for improved public education for all students.

That would be a nearsighted and incorrect view. As distinct from for-profit private schools with a flimsy track record of success, it was national progressive leaders from labor and civil rights who laid the foundation for public charter schools. These equity-focused leaders include Al Shanker, former president of the American Federation of Teachers; the past two Democratic presidents, Bill Clinton and Barack Obama; the late liberal icon Minnesota Sen. Paul Wellstone; and former Vermont governor and head of the Democratic National Committee Howard Dean. Minnesota Democratic state Sen. Ember Reichgott Junge authored the nation’s first charter school law, and big-city mayors like Cory Booker, Antonio Villaraigosa, Adrian Fenty, Mitch Landrieu, and the late Tom Menino succeeded in creating some of the most vibrant and high-performing charter sectors in the country.

Today, Democrats continue to lead the way forward in advancing public charters with accountability. This past legislative session alone, Colorado Gov. John Hickenlooper and Speaker of the House Crisanta Duran in the Colorado General Assembly won the fight for charter school funding equity; in Connecticut, state Senate Majority Leader Bob Duff reversed Republican attempts to cut charter funding; in Washington, D.C., Mayor Muriel Bowser and the City Council passed the largest charter funding increase in a decade. And despite multimillion-dollar attacks by elements focused on maintaining the status quo, Democratic charter supporters won intense school board races in Los Angeles and Denver. In New Jersey, state Senate President Steve Sweeney won re-election despite the odd alliance between anti-charter school forces and conservatives in favor of his opponent, an avowed Trump supporter.

The proof for why Democrats should continue to lead the way is in data that show it’s what parents want. Public charter school enrollment is highest in Democratic strongholds. Democratic mayors preside over seven of the eight cities in districts with the highest percentage of students attending public charter schools and in nine of the top 10 cities with districts having the largest number of public charter school students. Democrats also make up about two-thirds of those members of Congress representing all or part of the 14 school districts with the largest percentage of students enrolled in public charter schools, and 82 percent of those members of Congress represent the 10 school districts with the largest number of students enrolled in public charter schools.

Meanwhile, red states like Alabama, Kansas, Kentucky, Mississippi, Montana, Nebraska, North Dakota, and Wyoming are disproportionately represented among those that have 1 percent or fewer of their students in public charter schools. In many ways, what is most remarkable about the politics of charters isn’t that so few Democrats support them, but the converse — that despite having no organized resistance to charters within their party, so many Republicans have failed to advance them in the states they control.

The progressive case for public charter schools with accountability is truly about equalizing education opportunities and giving every child — regardless of race or ZIP code or immigration status — access to a high-quality public education. Serving traditionally underserved students is a fundamental part of the mission of many public charters, and by law all public charter schools must have a fair and open admissions process, conducting outreach and recruitment to all segments of the communities they serve. The positive impact is clear — independent researchers at Stanford University found that across public charter schools in urban regions, black students in poverty receive the equivalent of 59 days of additional learning in math and 44 days of additional learning in reading compared with their peers with similar demographics in traditional public schools.

Despite the history of Democratic leadership in advancing improved access to high-quality education, in too many communities Democratic charter supporters face uphill political battles with too few resources against a heavily entrenched anti-charter opposition. Progressive public charter advocates must collaborate more effectively and strategically to protect the progress we’ve made and, more important, build upon it.

We progressives have a long, proud legacy of fighting for equal educational opportunities for all children, and empowering low-income families with the option to choose the best public school for their individual child has been an essential element of that legacy for decades. Because of what pro-charter progressives started, public charter schools today are providing students with a high-quality public school option previously unavailable to them. Parents need more, not fewer, of those kinds of choices.

Shavar Jeffries is the president of Democrats for Education Reform.

Here, in honor of National School Choice Week, is our recent series on five key school choice options being offered to families across the country:

1. Understanding charter schools in 100 seconds:

2. What’s a tax credit scholarship?

3. A primer on school vouchers

4. Instant Expert: Education Savings Accounts in 2 minutes or less

5. Defining ‘open enrollment’

It’s the most wonderful time of the year: .

What better time to remember there are millions of children who are not in the optimal school for their needs?

There are hundreds of thousands of children on for charter schools. There are many more students with for whom private programs would be better, but they lack the financial support to those schools. And, there are the students for whom would make a world of difference.

Together, they make up a nation of kids mismatched with schools that fail to , passions, and needs. Those kids, too often invisible, are why I participate in school choice week with the passion of an advocate who doggedly believes increasing and improving educational options is a game changer for all families.

Each year I’m puzzled by the same question. Why do we need a week to popularize the seemingly uncontroversial idea that parents have a right and a responsibility to facilitate the development of their children?

That question would be good if school choice were, in fact, uncontroversial.

In reality, there is a loud, self-righteous, fully vested and wholly religious network of activists deeply dug in on the battle to maintain headcount in schools where many kids would leave if they could; schools that people of means abandoned.

Ironically, that well-coordinated, well-funded , along with unions, and parents privileged by the current system. Together, they hold the dreams and potential of children hostage to narrow ideological beliefs, and cold indifference to the stunting of their victims.

Why?

It’s a crude, but honest, truth that children aren’t children to a public school system. Children represent money, pensions, and mortgages. Thus, the battle to prevent students from taking their per-pupil allocation to a school of their choice.

It’s an understandable fight for survival and an unfortunate sign that none of this is about what’s best for kids.

School choice is controversial not because it’s bad for students, but because it’s bad for paychecks.

Choice opponents frame their fight as one against wealthy white people who want to take over black community schools.

The implausible logic goes like this: Billionaires give large sums of money to open new schools and new education opportunities because they want to make money off the schools that receive their money.

That is a crafty distraction used by the parents with money living safely in the best parts of , , , and other hyper-liberal enclaves, who lock arms with to prevent parents in other parts of town, , from having options everyone should have.

It’s not uncommon for those same parents to find their way where their closed minds can for other people’s children.

To them, school choice is a hostile attack on public schools that spurs segregation, benefits more affluent white families most, and takes public education out of the control of citizens.

They have an American right to their opinion. They have no right to limit opportunity for others.

What they won’t admit is that many parents see public schools as an attack on the of children; or that those schools are segregated because school boards elected in low-turnout elections that create education deserts and preserve privilege for the parents school districts prize most; or that America has rarely devised any program to help the poor that doesn’t in some way help everyone else.

For our part, I fear those of us who believe in school choice have oversold it as poverty alleviation rather than something basic and universal. While I believe parental choice is an invaluable tool in the fight against inequality, I think we focus too much on school reform hot spots, like New Orleans and D.C., and we ignore better school choice examples, like Arizona, where families of every stripe are invested in choice as a basic premise of how education should happen.

Every child, whether poor or rich, black or white or brown or foreign-born, has a human right to an education that fits. It’s a personal right held privately within the sovereignty of their being, and it should never be violated by proponents of any one-best-system.

As long as that right is in dispute, there will be a need for good people to march together with purpose and conviction during school choice week.

Chris Stewart is the CEO of the Wayfinder Foundation, a former elected member of Minneapolis’s Board of Education, and a 2014 Bush Fellow.

BOSTON

(Or, to be exact, Dorchester. To be more precise, the Savin Hill neighborhood of Dorchester. To be extra-precise, the houses on this particular street are mostly owned by white, blue-collar retirees. In Boston, this is identity, and it shifts block by block. Here, this stuff matters.)

….

In a city that incessantly agonizes over its racism, a city with a busing history of infamy, a city with public/private schools that show stark racial divides, here’s a fact that may surprise you: The most integrated school in the entire city appears to be a charter school, .

Every day, students whose families live in hyper-segregated Boston neighborhoods — Dorchester, South Boston, Roxbury, and Mattapan — arrive at Boston Collegiate to live out an academic day with students not from their neighborhoods, students who split about 50–50 between white and non-white.

Nothing here is always perfect, and everything takes a lot of extra diligence. For the staff, it can be exhausting at times. But it works.

What these students experience is something that students in Boston’s traditional public schools (10.8 percent white/Asian in grades 7-12) and Boston’s exam schools (Boston Latin: 76 percent white/Asian) don’t always experience — actual diversity. And it’s happening in a charter school, an entity that critics say contributes to segregation.

The white parents sending their children here are not liberal Boston college professors looking to expose their children to a more diverse student population. The most common jobs held by white parents: cops, firefighters, nurses, many of them from South Boston, a neighborhood made famous by Hollywood, and usually not in a good way. The same pretty much goes for the black parents, only you have to mix in some more downscale jobs, such as janitors and child care providers. Their neighborhoods: Roxbury and Mattapan.

Why would blue-collar parents seek out diversity for their students that they don’t seek in choosing where to live? Roughly, the answer works out like this: For white parents, especially parents whose children didn’t get into an exam school and balk at private school tuition (and for whom traditional public schools are unthinkable), Boston Collegiate is a pathway into a good college. For black parents, the reasoning is similar. Private school tuition is far out of reach and the traditional schools unpalatable, thus leaving Boston Collegiate as the place where their kid has a shot at a good college.

Even more interesting about Boston Collegiate: It’s not an “intentionally diverse” charter school. There are no special admissions rules or special boundaries allowing this school to be diverse. It just works out that way.

Thus, given its location in a highly segregated city, and the national debate over the rising number of racially segregated schools, Boston Collegiate may be more than just the most integrated school in Boston; it may be the most racially interesting school story in the country.

The history

The school got launched in 1998 in an old warehouse in South Boston. Its original co-founder, Brett Peiser, now runs the acclaimed Uncommon Schools network. Then called South Boston Harbor Academy, it drew its student population from the low-income, almost all-white South Boston neighborhood, which had been devastated by the busing clashes.

Looking to expand, and also to diversify, in 2004 the school moved to Dorchester and changed its name to Boston Collegiate. Soon after the move, the school grew to a roughly 50–50 racial mix, where it has remained. Today, about 700 students attend, in grades 5–12.

Students win a spot here via an electronic lottery, which makes balancing racial enrollment tricky. The only way to affect that ratio is by recruitment efforts. For white parents, not much outreach is needed (because the school started in South Boston, many parents still think of it as a “white” school, and feel comfortable sending their kids there, despite the move).

For both white and black parents, the most effective word of mouth is: “I hear one of their graduates got into Brown (or another prestigious college).” The college record here is reasonably good, considering that most of their students are first-generation college-goers, and half qualify for free or reduced-price lunches.

So far, only two Collegiate classes of alums have reached the six-year mark where college success is measured. Of those 55 students, 56 percent have earned bachelor’s degrees. For context, 9 percent of poor kids earn those degrees in that time frame, while 70 percent of kids from the top-earning families do.

Surviving and thriving with constant race issues

Considering the sharp racial issues in Boston, and the racial diversity at Boston Collegiate, it might seem logical that teachers would want to sidestep or straddle touchy issues. Like Donald Trump, or Black Lives Matter, or national anthem protests.

But I get a puzzled look when I raise that with teachers Nadiya Ledan and Wintana Yohannes, who also co-chair the Multicultural Club. That option was never even considered. Just the opposite happens here: No ducking; everything gets hashed out, sometimes painfully.

At a recent staff professional development gathering, the focus was on how to have “courageous conversations,” said Yohannes. One example of how that works: Collegiate conducts “Cross Grade Communities,” multi-grade small group sessions. The most recent session: microaggressions. What are they? Have you experienced them? Discuss what you can do to improve school climate.

Each year, the students get more comfortable talking about these topics in racially mixed groups. But that’s the world in which they live. More tricky than students are the parents. As one teacher bluntly put it, the students here are more (racially) evolved than their parents.

The big parental flare-up broke out in 2014 after the Ferguson, Missouri, riots over the shooting of a black teenager, Michael Brown, by a white police officer. Word got out that Boston Public Schools students planned a rally in Boston Common that December, and some Collegiate students indicated that they wanted out of school to participate as well.

Collegiate executive director Shannah Varón, who has run the school for the past seven years, sent out word to the parents: Please discuss with your child. If your student wants to participate, and you grant permission, the school will excuse the absence.

Seemed reasonable, at least to Varón. But the blowback was immediate and fierce, especially from families where a parent was a police officer. “I was rocked to my core. What I got back was such vitriol.” Varón, leaving out inflammatory language, summarized the reaction this way: “How can you endorse kids walking out of school? My husband puts his life on the line every single day!”

In the end, only about 30 students ended up going to the demonstration. (It’s an academically focused school: Who dares miss class?) The students got over it quickly. The parents less so. A constant undercurrent at Collegiate is hearing white parents suggest that school standards are slipping: fewer dress code demerits, for example. What Collegiate staff see as “equity” adjustments, some parents see as signals of heading downhill.

“I believe it does prepare them for college. One of the struggles for urban youth is confronting differences, and our kids confront differences every day. Our kids learn to raise their hands when white kids have their hands up.”

— Shannah Varón, Boston Collegiate executive director

The latest equity issue to arise there: Last year, the school staff decided to start phasing out its “honors” English classes in ninth and 10th grades, essentially tracked classes to smooth the way into Advanced Placement classes. Yohannes said her ninth-grade honors class was 75 percent white.

“We’re hoping more students will have a chance at AP.”

Why go to this trouble?

On the surface, life might seem easier if the school were all black or all Hispanic, as are many charter and traditional schools in urban neighborhoods, or all white. Balancing all these racial issues sounds exhausting.

“Every day I try to walk a line, and the line is hard to find,” said Varón. But Varón and the teachers I interviewed seem to believe it is all worth it.

“I believe it does prepare them for college,” said Varón. “One of the struggles for urban youth is confronting differences, and our kids confront differences every day. Our kids learn to raise their hands when white kids have their hands up.”

The biggest endorsement came from the students I talked to. “My best friend is Hispanic,” said junior Emily Foster, who is white. “This would never have happened had I not gone here. I go to her house, and on certain holidays we play games she played back in Mexico.”

Julia Damatin, a white senior, pointed to Anya Tisdale, who has a black father and a white mother, and said, “Anya is mixed, but she’s just Anya. At the end of the day, they are all our peers.” That experience, said Damatin, makes her “feel like we’re going to be one step ahead of everyone else in college.”

Said senior Korede Oyenuga, who was born in Nigeria and moved here at age 3, “This school doesn’t allow race to define you. You choose to define who you are.”

The most revealing comment, perhaps, came from Foster, a reflection of how racially isolated Boston is. “You don’t realize how diverse this school is until you step out of school.”

One more sign that the struggle here is worth it: There are 1,500 students on the waiting list.

From my perspective, every week of the year should celebrate these families’ stories of empowerment and choice. All too easily, we can lose sight of where the focus should be throughout the year: on the children and on ensuring that every family has the opportunity to find the right educational fit to prepare their children for success in school, in careers, and in life.

Last year, we joined dozens of state and national educational groups to draw more attention to the daily success stories of families across the country. Members represented all forms of choice, including magnet programs, homeschooling, virtual schools, public charter schools, and scholarship programs.

Together, we asked families, students, and adults to tell us how having a choice in education changed — or could change — their life while lifting their dreams for the future.

From Alaska to New York City and everywhere in between, we heard tales of educational frustration, hope, and success.

One example is the story of an Indiana man whose mother lied about their address when he was a boy so he could attend a public school that would better serve him. Today, is giving back as the dedicated principal of a successful public charter school in Indianapolis.

For in Southern California, homeschooling was the right fit. She took classes that catered to her needs, got a head start on college credits, and served others in her community with a homeless ministry she started.

A Florida man shared his story of growing up poor with a single mother. Despite being tested as gifted, he had no access to the higher-quality options that were available to other students because of their address and income. As an adult, wanted more for his own child, and his son is now thriving in a gifted program at a high-performing public charter school in Miami.

The in northern Ohio is blessed with a child with autism. Like parents everywhere, the Fifes were focused on finding the best opportunities for their son. With the Ohio Autism Scholarship, they were able to find a school that is successfully providing for his special needs.

These powerful stories, viewable at , show the rich collage of educational freedom and its positive impact on children. While their families come from dramatically different backgrounds, they are united by the common thread of seeing their children succeed when given the opportunity to find the right educational environment for them.

Similar personal tales of joy and excitement for learning can be found each and every day in your state, your town, and your neighborhood. There is no partisanship or political divide in hoping every student can thrive.

As we celebrate these students and more during National School Choice Week, let’s honor them by working throughout the year to make sure that one day every family has a story of success they can share.

Patricia Levesque is chief executive officer of the Foundation for Excellence in Education.

Is it achievement gains, graduation rates, or efforts to make systems more responsive to the needs of parents? Is it policy, programs, or accountability?

If you attend an education conference or panel discussion, you hear a lot about these things — and they are important.

What you don’t hear about enough is happiness.

Throughout 2017, I heard a lot about happiness during my travels to 25 states meeting with parents, educators, and students. These are the very people who help to make National School Choice Week so impactful every year.

What I learned is that parents care about school choice, at its core, because they want their children to be happy.

Parents know that when a school is safe from violence and bullying, their children have a better chance at being happy.

Parents know that when a school motivates and inspires their children to learn, the potential for happiness is so much greater.

And parents know that when their children feel respected at school, they respect themselves and that respect leads to a higher probability of happiness.

When students are happier, they are empowered to take on scholastic challenges. They are more likely to acquire knowledge.

Happiness is relatable, not as a point of policy, but a matter of basic humanity.

The founders of our country understood this.

Today, 242 years after the Declaration of Independence was signed in Philadelphia, “life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness” remains an enduring American ideal.

During National School Choice Week, we embrace this ideal.

National School Choice Week lets parents know that they have options for their children’s education by shining a positive spotlight on the different environments that are available — environments that will encourage their children to pursue and enjoy their own happiness.

We include and celebrate all educational choices for all students, from traditional district schools to public charter schools, magnet schools, private schools, online academies, and homeschooling.

To help raise this awareness, we encourage schools, homeschool groups, community organizations, and individuals to hold open houses, school fairs, information sessions, and even large rallies to bring attention to the great work they do in communities.

What began with 150 events in 2011 has grown to 32,240 events and activities across America in 2018.

If you attend one of them, you will hear parents sharing their stories about school choice and how they are pursuing happiness for their children.

There are millions of these stories, but one in particular comes to mind, about a student who had attended two schools and was bullied at both. The situation became untenable; he was unhappy, and the way he was treated was profoundly unfair.

But his parents discovered a homeschool program, and within months after being removed from this bullying environment, this young man discovered a variety of new educational and extracurricular interests. He’s learning about journalism and video creation. He’s discovered an interest in playing football, and he’s working with a coach. Most important: He’s happy.

There are many stories like this, stories that speak to the opportunity and the magic that is school choice in America today.

After decades of policy proposals and press releases calling for vouchers and other non-traditional education options, Republicans are relishing their first big win on school choice, a victory in a year otherwise marked by legislative disarray.

“We had a national victory for school choice last month that will resonate for years to come,” said Sen. Ted Cruz, Republican of Texas. He spoke of the issue he championed, an expansion of 529 tax-advantaged savings plans to cover private K-12 tuition, at the National School Choice Week rally on Capitol Hill last week.

Education Secretary Betsy DeVos also briefly spoke at the rally, the first time an education secretary has done so, providing a sharp contrast to last year’s event, which was held in the midst of her contentious confirmation process — largely over the very issue of school choice.

“I hope you will go out from here and you will tell your stories, that you will encourage others who haven’t yet joined us to do so,” DeVos told the roughly 200 assembled students from six D.C. charter and private schools.

For every student who is able to choose the school that best meets their needs, there are dozens that can’t, the secretary said.

“We need to collectively rethink how we do education here in this country. We need to give parents empowerment and choices to choose the right school, the right education, for all of their children,” she said.

The 529 expansion, which Cruz called “the most significant federal school choice legislation in the history of our country,” came after a surprisingly messy year for Republicans, unable to pass major legislation besides the tax plan despite their control of the White House and both houses of Congress. Even a federal expansion of school choice, a largely popular idea in the party, was in question, given that there was skepticism from some GOP caucus members and advocates about whether the federal government should push to expand choice.

Republicans have advocated, mostly unsuccessfully, for federal school choice programs for decades.

In 1970, Richard Nixon established a presidential commission to study school finance, particularly the “financial crisis of parochial schools,” . Ronald Reagan proposed . George W. Bush . And Donald Trump in his first budget request proposed a $250 million voucher pilot program and $1 billion public school choice program through Title I.

Last month’s final victory came on the heels of some drama — as judged by the standards of the United States Senate, at least.

After losing two Republican votes, Cruz said Senate staff called Vice President Mike Pence to come to the Senate and break an expected 50–50 tie.

While Pence, with his full motorcade, was making the drive from his residence to the Capitol, Sen. Joe Manchin, a Democrat from West Virginia, unexpectedly voted yes, so staffers called Pence’s team and said the vice president was no longer needed, Cruz said.

After some lobbying from Democrats who opposed the measure, Manchin switched back to a no, necessitating a third call to the vice president to come to the Senate floor and ultimately approve the proposal.

Cruz said he came to the rally to celebrate that victory and encourage continued advocacy to expand choice. “This is a fight about our future, this is a fight about our children, this is a fight about our country,” he said.

Cruz tied the issue of school choice to the legacy of Martin Luther King Jr., whose birthday was celebrated at the start of last week and whose “I Have a Dream” speech turns 55 this year.

“[King’s] vision, that dream, is every bit as powerful today as it was 55 years ago, and school choice, the reason we are gathered here today, is the civil rights issue of the 21st century,” Cruz said.