To achieve choice in education, we must change the way we view education funding. Traditionally, we have thought of school funding in terms of how much money goes to each school. Our children must be the focus. They are the reason our schools exist. Child-centered funding puts the spotlight where it belongs.
Parents are able to choose where a child goes to school, and the money follows the child.
This empowers parents to place a child in the environment best suited to his or her particular needs. And it motivates schools to better meet the needs of more children. In preparation for the 1999 legislative session, I am drafting a bill called the Public Education Portability Act. Under this proposal, parents would be able to remove a child from a school that is not meeting the child's learning needs and place him or her in another school. A child would not be doomed to attend a chronically low-performing school simply because of geographic location.