NCPA is a Texas-based think tank with a national focus that expresses its regional pride through food. So I was finishing up a plate of scrambled eggs, a sausage patty, a sweet roll, and fresh fruit as DuPont ran through a loose history of school choice. Then, said DuPont, skipping ahead, there was Milton Friedman s seminal paper in 1955. On hand to discuss the Grand Canyon State s experience was Lisa Graham Keegan, who s serving her second term as Arizona s superintendent of public instruction. The tax system to finance education ought to be broad and fair, she says.
School choice ought to be a non-negotiable part of public education.
Keegan supports the principles driving Bush s plan. But as a state official, she also knows that education, regardless of what the president does, will still primarily be a creature of state and local governments. And as someone who s been in the trenches for years, she knows that choice has many enemies. In fact, she identifed one such enemy that may have shocked a few in the audience. The first question was a softball designed to let her rip on the educational establishment.